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When Kasper TV & Appliance Co. Inc. was started by Joseph A. Kasper, television was in its infancy -- in fact, it was originally called Kasper Radio.
Beginning as a repair service on a shoestring in the late 1940s, the business has seen many changes since it was established in 1949 at 11th and Washington streets in Reading: the burgeoning of television ownership, the explosion of TV-related technology and, most recently, increased competition from superstores.
According to company President Barry Kasper -- the 51-year-old son of Joseph, who is now retired -- the business grew steadily from 1950, when it moved to 524 Windsor St., Reading, until the early 1970s, having added retail sales, first of televisions and then of large appliances.
When he joined his father in the business 1972, Barry saw a slowdown as Reading's population began moving west, and proposed a move to the present location at 33 E. Lancaster Ave. in Shillington. His father agreed, and business increased dramatically from then until 1984. Even now, "what we sell in two or three months equates to what we did in a year in 1974," he says.
As the TV and...