On June 3, Zippo Manufacturing Co. produced its 600 millionth lighter, each of which has been made in the city of Bradford.
The company had originally anticipated reaching this milestone in mid-to-late April, but due to the Commonwealth’s efforts to slow the coronavirus pandemic, Zippo’s production schedule was delayed by several weeks. Continued orders for social distancing and disease mitigation efforts also meant that Zippo had to scale back the celebration, although employees and George Duke, Zippo’s owner and chairman of the board, still found an appropriate way to mark the occasion.
The 600 millionth lighter’s case emerged from the press shortly after 8 a.m., bearing a special 600 Million bottom stamp that would be featured on every lighter produced on June 3. Grant Duke, George Duke’s son, current Zippo board member and the company’s business intelligence associate, donned cotton gloves and his facemask to hand-carry the lighter to each step in its production.
Upon the lighter’s completion, George and Grant Duke, CEO Mark Paup, and several of the company’s employees with the most years of service spread out across the main floor to watch George Duke ignite the 600 millionth lighter.
Afterward, George Duke and the executives walked the finished lighter through the facility’s main walkways, raising it in salute to all Zippo employees. The employees lined the path maintaining appropriate social distancing and face mask guidelines, cheering and raising their own lighters in celebration.
Later that morning, at a small closed ceremony, George Duke installed the 600 million lighter into the Zippo/Case Museum.
He said, “This is an incredible milestone for any company. For all the steps that go into making a single Zippo lighter, to make 600 million of them in 87 years is an amazing feat.”
He talked about the history of the company as well.
“My grandfather, George G. Blaisdell, started Zippo as a tiny company in 1932. It was the middle of the Great Depression and everybody said to him, ‘George, this is not going to work.’ He had a difficult time, of course, but with the devotion of his small group of employees, they made it through,” George Duke explained.
“And thanks to the continued devotion of our exceptional employees today — several of whom are grandchildren or great-grandchildren of the original employees — we continue that legacy, making something we can all be proud of,” he continued.
He said it was an honor to put the lighter on display in the museum, “as a tribute to this company — its remarkable past and promising future, the thousands of people who have worked at Zippo over the last eight decades, and the city of Bradford, Pennsylvania, Zippo’s home and the words stamped on every single lighter we’ve made, all 600 million of them.”
The company will be launching a commemorative 600 Million lighter on July 31. It will be a high polish chrome lighter featuring 360° laser engraving, a color image 600 Million logo and the commemorative bottom stamp used only on the day of production. Each lighter is consecutively numbered, with only 20,000 available worldwide. A limited number of the lighters will be available for purchase at the Zippo/Case Museum and Flagship Store and on zippo.com.
