Original price for a Bernina 830 in Canada
Someday post a few days ago a Singer brochure with the prices for each model hand written... I looked into the documents coming with my Bernina 831 that I got this summer from a very nice lady and I found something similar.
If you were living in Montreal, Quebec, Canada in 1973, the price you have to pay for a Bernina 830 was 549$. For a 831 (same machine with only "utility" stitches), 469$.
If I remember correctly, my dad was earning something like 50$ a week when I was born. So these sewing machine were worth a few thousand dollars in today money. Seems Bernina where worth almost two times the price of a comparable Singer. I wonder why some people with modest revenue (like the original owner of my sewing machine) decided at the time to choose a Bernina instead of a Singer; after all, Singer was a well known brand, made in Canada at this time, compared to a foreign imported one...