This is too lengthy to post, but a link to the NIST minutes of the meeting (March, 2005) is at
http://ts.nist.gov/ts/htdocs/200/202/EUDirective.htm

The questions asked are from a very US perspective, but they may be of some interest in the UK, which may "choose" not to enforce the directive very much. There is also a link to the text of the EU Directive.

Since the US now seems unlikely to amend FPLA, I suspect the meeting would have had a different tone, had this been known.

Thanks John, interesting and revealing read.
Thank god for the EU, without it Europeans would have to put up with A3+ paper sizes and numerous other measurement abominations. Still it looks like America will not comply with the 2010 deadline.

Metre,

That may be the very reason the EU Commission has decided to support interests inside the UK to press for complete metrication. Consider that EU support for complete metrication in the UK will make it impossible if anyone from the US requests yet another 10 year extension come 2010. How could the Commission on one hand support British moves to complete metrication and then grant another 10 year extension?

Pressing the UK now, and playing "hardball" would also serve as a signal to the US to get busy amending FPLA, before 2010 gets too close.

Regardless of the date, if the UK makes a commitment to go fully metric, the US has to rethink its "stuck in the mud" status.

I don't think pressure on or from the UK will be enough to convince the US to amend the FPLA. Something more drastic has to happen. I posted a Yahoo article on growing concerns about our economic situation. We have too much debt and had seen fit not to do much about it. But we are running up against brick wall after brick wall.

We may have to adopt some drastic austerity measures to turn ourselves around, but we will also have to put into effect some long term measures to keep us on the right track. Metrication and adoption of international metric standards will have to be part of the movement to a more sound and stable economic future.

The EU Commission along with other nations in the world need to put pressure on the US to metricate as a means to reform the US economy. Not in a threatening manner but in "you really don't have a choice, if you want to retain the living standard you have become accustom to". It is in everyone's economic interest for the US to metricate and end once and for all the mess in the US and the UK.

The UK are the only other consumers who want supplemental measures on their goods (others at most tolerate it), and were supportive of the last extension to the EU Metric Directive. Get them to fold and the US stands alone on dual labeling.

Now, whether we TAHE HEED of the warning sign would be another matter. Who knows. If the UK folds, US producers can kiss an extension goodbye, which will mean they should have backed NIST and the FPLA amendment now.

"The UK are the only other consumers who want supplemental measures on their goods....."

Is it the UK consumers or that minority that claims to speak on their behalf? I don't think the vast majority of consumers would bat an eye if the non-metric were dropped.

Don't know. The minority is vocal enough to get it added.

I don't know how many people care in the US either. Metric sizes seem to be accepted OK. Of course, they have to be dual-labeled by law.

<<
I don't know how many people care in the US either. Metric sizes seem to be accepted OK. Of course, they have to be dual-labeled by law.
>>

John, I think you are misrepresenting the situation in the US. Metric sizes seem to be accepted only for a very limited number of items: soda and water bottles, alcohol, some cosmetics, and a few others. For the VAST MAJORITY of consumer items sold in the US, the English units are the primary label and the metric is in brackets, and the company would quite happily drop the metric if it wasn't forced to retain it by law, because most people don't look at it. This goes for virtually all groceries, hardware, paint, and most other things.

"because most people don't look at it."


They don't look at the imperial either. People are influenced strictly by color, shape, attractiveness, etc. They buy what they perceive to be a bargain or a sale and compare by what appears to them to be small, medium or large. This same topic was mentioned on the USMA list server and this was the basic conclusion. People don't really have a feel for imperial units, and have no ability to compare the something in one unit to another.

You may have made a concerted effort to feel comfortable with imperial units, but you are a rarity.

<<For the VAST MAJORITY of consumer items sold in the US, the English units are the primary label and the metric is in brackets>>

I agree, perhaps even 80%, typically. However, the minority includes examples where some brands or types are primary metric and it has not hurt sales or been rejected by the consumer. Obviously, soda pop, everybody has 2 L. As I have pointed out before, in the oils and vinegar aisle, olive oil and herb-infused oils of any kind are metric, plain oil corn oil (or canola) is Customary. Wine vinegars are usually metric, plain vinegar is Customary. In packaged orange juice, both half-gallons and 1.75 L carafes exist (frozen is all Customary). If metric were as "hated" or "unfamiliar" as you suggest, shouldn't these products have lower sales than similar brands that use Customary? Why do even American olive oil producers use metric sizes (and their Italian names) to look imported until you read the label carefully for origin?

Since that 20% or so incurs no obvious market penalty, I have to conclude people don't much care.

The reason the 20% that is labelled in metric first incurs no market penalty is because the English units appear following in brackets, as required by law. For example, some companies sell juice in half-gallon cartons, others sell 1.75 L. But the 1.75-L bottle will have the equivalent in fluid ounces listed also, so it is easy to compare. If companies were allowed to drop the English equivalent, Americans would have to make their comparisons in a system that they are not familiar with beacuse they have mostly ignored it up to now.

<<But the 1.75-L bottle will have the equivalent in fluid ounces listed also, so it is easy to compare. If companies were allowed to drop the English equivalent, Americans would have to make their comparisons in a system that they are not familiar with beacuse they have mostly ignored it up to now.
>>

Since I buy that OJ, I can tell you that I disagree. Dividing by 59.something ounces in my head is way too hard. I look at the unit price sticker. The obligation is on the grocer to present the unit price of both using the same unit (he could choose either quart or liter, but all his packaged OJ has to be the same.)

I buy that brand because I like the taste better, and I'm willing to pay some premium to get it. Being a metric size is a very minor plus, but since I'm hooked on "Simply Orange" I'll use it as an example. I tried the Tropicana, which is also offered in 1.75 L carafe. Putting it in a metric bottle doesn't make it taste any better. :)

That is also how I decide between 2 L soda bottles and 6 or 8 packs of 20 or 24 oz (where the 2 L is always cheaper). Knowing that it is 2 QT 3.7 OZ really doesn't tell me much, to me, it is 2 L.

I found you some Customary olive oil today! The bad news it is only 25% olive oil, 75% some crap that clogs your arteries. But it is Customary-round! All the real olive oil at my store is in metric-round.

My observations exactly. No one looks at the amounts on the package. People grab what they want off the shelf, and just put it in the cart.

<<Is it the UK consumers or that minority that claims to speak on their behalf? I don't think the vast majority of consumers would bat an eye if the non-metric were dropped>>

You tell us Brits exactly how we think and talk - after all you know more about us that we do because you've never been here and you have google on your female replacment.

Also - you need, as an American (I won't put "proud"), to get everything very metric so that you can catch up with your neighbouring economies of Argentina, Chili, Brazil and Mexico - who are already fully metric (except where they're not).

BTW Danny - I suggest you make up your mind to whether the UK is or is not metric. You keep flitting from one to the other, then harping on about a military campaign to defeat England in the new war of independance followed by the collapsing US economy, with a foot note about how brilliant Germany is whilst claiming that a slow growth is called "recession".

<<
My observations exactly. No one looks at the amounts on the package. People grab what they want off the shelf, and just put it in the cart.
>>

Daniel, are you proposing that companies should stop labelling the amounts on the package? If not, why not?

I don't know what Daniel is proposing, but the net contents need to be labelled.

As I argued in another thread, when you are buying something familiar, that you have bought before, you don't really need it. If you are buying something "unusual," you need the data to be there.

It just might be a good idea. They can have large, medium or small sizes. The weight is meaningless anyway. If you buy a 400 g bag of potato chips and 100 g if dust when you get home, then you really only got 300 g despite the bag saying 400 g.

Products where a description serves a need, keep it. Where it is usually ignored, drop it. Unless it is being ignored because people don't understand the imperial and the metric is not rounded. Maybe that is why there is Resistance. Because marketers know that people have a natural ability to understand rounded metric and make informed choices based on size, so they fight to keep the imperial which they know no one understands and thus ignores.

If you can't win the argument, remove the argument.

X-D