I fell in with a jolly crowd of commercial men, some salesmen and some heads of houses, at the Tremont, and I have rarely enjoyed an evening more. Of course there were any number of stories told, many jokes cracked, and a deal of chaffing of each other. But if I could have written down all the points made about business they would have been eagerly read by my present audience. One man was cursing the book-keeper, as is usual, when a merchant said:
“There are always two sides to every question, and there is a good deal to be said from the book-keeper's stand-point. Other things being equal, a man who has had office experience makes the best man on the road. Very much of the trouble caused by the book-keeper's letters might be avoided if the traveling man knew enough, or had a little forethought. You say things to your customers ten times worse than the book-keeper ever writes, but a letter looks much more severe than the words you said sounded to the ear. One salesman when collecting will take pains to get certain bills balanced. If the customer offers to pay $50 on account and there is a bill of $53.36 due, or two bills of that sum, he suggests that it would be a good thing to make the payment that amount and wipe these out. Such a man helps the office at home. Another man takes the $50, and does not care a cent if anything is balanced or not. It may be necessary to have a scapegoat in every concern, but the traveler who runs down his office for doing its duty is not smart, and is sowing seed that will grow up to bother him in the near future.”
“Yes,” said another merchant, “and there's a sight more book-keeping than there is any need of. Every little item has to be charged, bill sent, statement sent, and then receipted for when paid. If a jobber wants an ax of a special size, just one, and has to order it from the factory, although he knows the exact cost, it never enters his head to send in cash with the order. He must have as much red-tape over it as if the order was a thousand dozen axes. So the retailer; if a customer wants a gross of screws sent on at once by express, the charge of 22 cents has to go through all the departments. There's too much of it. It's expensive in time, and foolish.”
“Don't talk of paying in advance,” said a salesman, “we're mighty glad to get the money after it's due.”
“Yes, I know; there's too much work there, too. Although the buyer knows the exact time that his bill is due, he is getting so of late that he will pay nothing until a statement is sent, and not then till it pleases him. Your small man, not in the amount of business, but small-minded, dearly loves to hold back until you have sent him notice of draft made on him; he at once sends on a remittance then and his little soul takes comfort in telling, when the draft on him is presented, 'I do not owe them anything; their bill is paid.' Or else he waits till the draft is presented and dishonors it because it is drawn 'with exchange.' But there ought to be a keener sense of the honor to be won in paying bills promptly. If Dun and Bradstreet were to put in a third rating to show whether dealers paid promptly or not, and whether mean in little things or not, it would be of vast help.”
“How would you have it?”
“Why, as it now is, we are told that John Smith is worth $2,000 to $5,000, and his credit good. I would add another column, and show prompt pay, slow pay, unpleasant in collecting, etc. You now trust a man on the basis of his capital and credit, but if you knew he was a smart Aleck you would not care to sell him no matter how much he was worth.”
“Well, boys,” said a New York man, “I don't have anything to do with the collecting, and I'm mighty glad of it. It's bad enough to sell goods without having to squeeze the pay out too. But I had a case the other day that surprised me a little. Last October I sold a bill to a concern in Canton, Ohio, on 60 days. When I started out this spring the book-keeper told me the bill was still unpaid. He said he sent statement in January, then drew through the Canton bank in February, but draft was returned unpaid. I told him the concern was good, and I didn't understand it. I was in Canton in April and intended to speak to the concern about our bill; but when I went into the store one of them met me very cordially, said our goods had gone well and he wanted some more. I took it for granted they had paid up, or they would not be so ready with another order, so sold them a bill and said nothing about the old one. But here is a letter from my house asking if anything was done about the October bill, and telling me it has not yet been remitted to them. Blest if I understand it! The longer I travel the more I get puzzled.”
“Well, quit cutlery and go selling coffee.”
“Coffee?”
“Yes, coffee. There are three things that must be selling well in these days: soap, tobacco, and coffee. Just look at the advertising pages of the papers and magazines. You see nothing but these three things and patent medicines. But then you expect patent medicines, so they don't count. Soap! Great Caesar! It's in everything. 'Queen Soap, 'Sulphur Soap, 'Ivory Soap', 'Pears' Soap,' and all the other soaps. The advertising is by all odds the largest expense, and the poor devil of a retailer is expected to sell at about 5 per cent. margin. Then see the whole country painted red on tobacco. And now we're catching it on coffee. If Arbuckle isn't a nephew of Barnum's he ought to be, for he knows how to advertise. I long ago gave up eating bread made from baking powder, because each manufacturer proved the other fellow's goods were poisonous, and I don't know but I must give up coffee since the advertisements expose how easy it is to doctor it. But at present I'm sort of holding on to Arbuckle's, and when my confidence in that goes then I'm done for.”
“You are right,” said a grocer. “Arbuckle has made an immense business in coffee, and made it by his brains. It's encouraging to see a concern get out of the rut and show folks that the end of everything hasn't been reached yet.”
“Seems to me,” said a manufacturer, “that you grocers have done more to demoralize business, by your gift enterprises, than any other class has done. Is the thing holding its own?”
“No, there is a decided feeling growing against it. The large wholesale grocers of New York, Austin, Nichols & Co., say, in a recently published letter:
“'We do not believe in “gift schemes” of any sort, and are not in the “give away” business. When the time arrives (if it ever does) when we are unable to sell good goods on their respective merits we will quietly retire from business.'”
“And a Ypsilanti, Mich., grocer writes: 'One fellow carries a shotgun around with him, another a saw, but they principally run to clocks. Of course you don't have to pay anything for these fine articles, provided you buy the goods which call for them (in your mind). The retailers, too, now are striving their very best to see which can give the most with a pound of baking powder. That is, a great many retailers are. They do not seem to care anything about the quality, if they can only give the largest prize. Quality is not considered at all. They buy the thing for the great prize offered. When the retail merchants of this country shut down on this despicable way of doing business and sell goods on their merits, without a prize package attached, just so soon will a blow have been struck at the root of the whole matter.' These pretty fairly represent the growing sentiment among large and small traders of brains. They see that the moment an article ceases to be sold on its merit, just that moment a dealer is losing his hold on trade. I met a man from Ohio on the cars a day or two ago. He had been sent out to Iowa by his house to sell coffee and spices on the prize-package basis. He said he was almost turned out of doors by the Iowa merchants as soon as he had told his story. The dealers there said they wanted no goods that had to be worked off in that way, and had no confidence in goods that could not sell themselves. Now that was a healthy sign.”
“When I see it,” said another grocer, “I at once assume that the concern is sending out cheap goods, or that it has been losing trade and catches at this straw to save itself. When an old and reliable house like Lorillard goes into the give-a-prize-away-with-every-package business, it only goes to show to what an extent this matter is carried on. The Lorillards are now introducing a tobacco called 'Splendid.' They say it is a 'splendid' thing, makes one feel 'splendid,' etc. If it is, why not sell it on its merits; advertise it in a legitimate way; make the price an inducement, and if it is a splendid article the public will soon find it out. Lately they have been offering a pack of cards with every 10-cent piece, besides giving a first-class cutter to the retailer with a single box, and a combination truck and ladder with five boxes.”
“It is really one sign of the hard times. When business recovers itself, and that time is not so far distant, consumers will not be attracted by the cheap gifts. Every day they are being educated to understand that they pay for all their 'gifts,' and pay well, too.”
“In times like these you can't blame men for jumping at everything. Every buyer wants 'a leetle adwantage,' and, like a Chicago man that the boys tell of, tells you your price is 'stereotyped' unless you cut down below every one else. So dealers try low prices and try gifts, but by and by they will have to sell on a rising market, and things will change.”
“You think prices will go up?”
“They must go up, and it is right that they should. There is no reason why the girl at work at a loom should starve just that your wife should save a cent or two a yard on her gingham dress. Wages must go up, and goods advance too.”
“But if wages advance and the cost of living advances too, where is the girl to be benefited?”
“Don't fool yourself on that stuff; that is the stale argument of some of the smart young men who write for posterity. Rent is probably as high to-day as it was when wages were twice as high. The prices of flour, pork, and beef are regulated by the crop, not by the buyers' wages. If I were hammering at an anvil I would take my increased wages and pay increased prices if I had to, and feel pretty sure I was going to be benefited. There are some theories, like this one and free-trade, that sound very plausible, but do not stand any chance when actual tests are made in every day life. The cry of all merchants to-day should be, 'Pay decent wages to your help and add it to your goods.' And any factory that held out ought with mean men.”
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