Overview
Astute observers will notice that US Gillette Dating Information skips from P to R, omitting Q. This subject has been discussed on the forum from time to time.
There are several theories about why Gillette omitted Q from the date code sequence, and possibly all of them are true. First, the letter "Q" can be difficult to distinguish from the letter "O". Second, omitting "Q" reduced the sequence to 25 codes: most people find multiples of 5 and 10 easier to handle than multiples of 13 and 26. So the full sequence from A to Z is exactly 25 years.
This would have made even more sense if Gillette had started from A=1900 or A=1901, but in fact A represents 1930, 1955 and 1980. The date code system was originally developed for blades. That coding started with "A" in 1930. It skipped from P to R for the first time in 1946. Razors were first stamped with date codes in 1951.
There are several theories about why Gillette omitted Q from the date code sequence, and possibly all of them are true. First, the letter "Q" can be difficult to distinguish from the letter "O". Second, omitting "Q" reduced the sequence to 25 codes: most people find multiples of 5 and 10 easier to handle than multiples of 13 and 26. So the full sequence from A to Z is exactly 25 years.
This would have made even more sense if Gillette had started from A=1900 or A=1901, but in fact A represents 1930, 1955 and 1980. The date code system was originally developed for blades. That coding started with "A" in 1930. It skipped from P to R for the first time in 1946. Razors were first stamped with date codes in 1951.
