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Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff from house stuff works dot com

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Speaker 1: where smart happens. H. I am Marshall Brain with today's question,

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Speaker 1: why do most zippers say y k K on the

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Speaker 1: poll tab? Y k K is a huge company that

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Speaker 1: makes zippers. Founded in Japan in nineteen thirty four, y

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Speaker 1: k K was called the Yoshita Kagyo Kabushi. I can't

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Speaker 1: even say it anyway, But sixty years later the company

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Speaker 1: changed its name to the much shorter y k K

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Speaker 1: to match its brand name. The privately held y k

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Speaker 1: K company is headquartered in Japan and is made up

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Speaker 1: of dozens of companies at hundreds of facilities in more

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Speaker 1: than fifty countries. Y KK makes the entire zipper, including

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Speaker 1: the dyed cloth and the brass or plastic that make

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Speaker 1: up the teeth of the zipper. White KK zippers are

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Speaker 1: found in clothing, furniture, automobile's luggage, sports equipment, just about

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Speaker 1: anything that has a fastener on it. A y KK

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Speaker 1: factory site in Making, Georgia produces millions of zippers every

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Speaker 1: day in a total of fift hundred styles in more

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Speaker 1: than four seven standard colors. It's the largest zipper factory

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Speaker 1: in the world. The making site produces its own brass

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Speaker 1: to make the teeth and slighter parts of the zipper.

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Speaker 1: The same factory also produces and dyes the yarn that's

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Speaker 1: woven into the fabric portion of the zipper, and y

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Speaker 1: KK also produces the machines that make the zippers. White

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Speaker 1: KK has leveraged its knowledge of working with metals to

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Speaker 1: form an aluminum building products division that now it counts

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Speaker 1: for two thirds of white kk's worldwide sales, So it's

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Speaker 1: not just zippers anymore. Be sure to check out our

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Speaker 1: new video podcast, Stuff from the Future. Join Housteffork's staff

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Speaker 1: as we explore the most promising and perplexing possibilities of tomorrow.

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