Dawson Black: Retail Merchant Part 15

aluminum saucepan. Jones had waited on her, and had replied:

"Sorry, madam, but we are out of that size."

The customer had turned and left, and I had watched her make a bee line for Stigler's. Then and there I began to consider whether it would not have been possible to have sold her something, instead of allowing her to turn away. I reasoned that, while she asked for an 8-in. saucepan, she might have been just as well satisfied with a 7-in. or a 9-in. or something else. Jones had not, however, made any attempt to see if something else would suit her. I reasoned that there were also many cases like this coming up every week, and that if we could only outline some standard method of handling such cases, it would mean quite a lot of sales saved--and, better still, in customers saved. That customer who went out, if she found what she asked for at Stigler's, would probably figure that we did not have a very complete stock, and, in any case, when we forced a customer to buy somewhere else it tended to cultivate the habit of trading there.

I figured that here was a good subject to bring up for our meeting the following Monday, and I sat down to work out some general rule to cover such situations.

It took a long time for my inexperienced mind to put in writing that I wanted to say, but finally, with the help of Betty, I evolved the following, and then, deciding that it was such an important matter that it ought not to be delayed until the next Monday, I had it typewritten, and gave a copy to each of the force.

This is what I wrote:

"Never tell a customer we are out of stock of anything.

If something is asked for that is not in stock, offer the customer something else that will, in your judgment, satisfy her. If a customer, for example, should ask for an 8-in. aluminum saucepan and we are out of that size, bring her both a 7-in. and a 9-in.

size and say: 'These are the nearest we have to the 8-in. size. Which of these would suit you best?' If the customer should hesitate, impress upon her the benefit of buying a saucepan rather larger than she antic.i.p.ates needing. If the customer says that nothing but the 8-in. size will suit her, suggest that you can give her an enameled pan in that size, and if that won't do, ask her to leave her name and address and we will have one expressed to her promptly from the manufacturer. Apply methods similar to these in every case when we are asked for something of which we are out of stock. Make it a rule never to allow a customer to leave the store without making every attempt to sell her something that will be satisfactory to her."

I was really pleased with myself when I heard an animated discussion on this new rule. Jones exclaimed:

"Jiminny Christmas, the Boss has got more sense than I thought he had!"

I told Betty that, when I got home, and she immediately fingered all my vest b.u.t.tons.

"What's that for?" I asked.

"I think," she said gravely, but with a twinkle in her eye, "you had better take off your vest and let me fasten those b.u.t.tons with wires, or else you'll be bursting them, through swelling with pride!"

CHAPTER XVI

A PROPER USE FOR EYES

I met Barlow one morning taking his "const.i.tutional." While I was working for him we fellows always used to laugh at his plan of going for a walk every day for fifteen or twenty minutes. We used to think it was a freak notion of his for keeping in health.

Barlow shook hands with me and asked me how business was going. I told him that sales were picking up very slowly. Then he asked me:

"And how is friend Stigler affecting you now?"

I told him about the scheme I had been working on Stigler.

"But," I concluded, "I don't bother much with thinking about him now."

"That's excellent!" he exclaimed. "He isn't doing any too well, I know, and he has some time on his hands to talk. You forget him as much as possible and just go ahead and 'saw wood.'"

"That's what I'm trying to do. But I'm still keeping up that plan of marking down the goods in the window for an hour in the morning until he cuts his goods."

Barlow chuckled at that: "It is amusing," he said, "that Stigler hasn't yet realized that you are not cutting your own prices but merely making him cut his!"

"But, really," I said, "so much is always happening that I've forgotten almost everything but business."

"I'm very glad to hear it, Dawson," he replied, "and you'll find that, as long as you are going on the right track, that same spirit will continue. I find business so crowded with interesting things that I can hardly tear myself away from it at night."

"I notice, though," I said, with a sly smile, "that you still take your half hour's const.i.tutional every morning."

"Surely you know what I do that for?"

"What is it, if it isn't to keep yourself in trim or something of that kind?"

"I'll tell you, Dawson: A man can't be in the same surroundings long without becoming blind to their physical aspects. If I were to stay in the store all the time, I would soon become blind to poor window displays, to disorderliness and neglect about the store--to those hundred and one defects which creep up in a store and which react unfavorably on customers. So I make a point every day of putting on my hat and walking around a few blocks, looking at the other stores, familiarizing myself with the window trims, keeping a line on new ideas, and the like. And by the way, Dawson, I have obtained some of my best ideas of window tr.i.m.m.i.n.g from displays in other stores--not hardware stores, I mean. I had a splendid idea for a trim one time from a display at Middal's." Middal ran a stationery store. "Tony once had an arrangement of fruit in his window that gave me a good idea for a tool display.

"I tell you, Dawson, there are good ideas lying around everywhere, and it only requires a little imagination to adapt them to your own uses.

It's a poor sort of merchant who cannot use the good ideas from other lines of business and adapt them to his own requirements."

"So that's why you take your morning const.i.tutional?" I asked. "To see what good ideas you can pick up!"

"Yes, I see what good ideas I can pick up, but that's only one part of it. My main idea is to let my eyes see something other than what they are in the habit of seeing. I want them to get away from looking at the environment of the store, so that when I return from my 'const.i.tutional,' as you call it, I can look at my store as if I were a casual visitor. Every time I approach it I say to myself, 'What would I, as a stranger, think of that store?' And I find that, by looking at it in this way, I keep my viewpoint fresh. I quickly notice any flaws in the store management."

"Then all that time I was working with you and thought, with all the other fellows, that it was a crank idea of yours, you were really following out a definite store policy, as it were?"

"Exactly."

"Then," I blurted out, "why didn't you ever tell us what it was for? We could perhaps have done the same thing!"

"I never told you," he answered, "because I felt it wouldn't help you fellows, and I didn't think it wise to tell my help what I was doing.

You see my point?" he said, with a smile.

"I feel foolish to think of disagreeing with you, Mr. Barlow," I said, "but candidly, I think it would have paid to have told us. I believe a boss gets more out of his men when he tells them what he is working for. I think, too, that many bosses are afraid to let the men see the wheels go round. I may be wrong, but I am going on the plan of telling the fellows as much as possible about the business. I believe that the more they know about the business, the more interest they will take in it, and the better they will be able to work in its interests."

We were strolling toward my store and were just pa.s.sing Stigler's at that minute. Stigler was standing at the door, and, as we pa.s.sed, he said with a grin:

"Good morning, gentlemen. Hatching up a new conspiracy to corner the hardware trade in the town? If so, don't fail to let me in. I'm always looking for an easy thing, you know. K-ha!"

Barlow turned around with a laugh, and said:

"You always will have your bit of fun, won't you, Stigler?"

I was too mad to say anything.

"I'm surprised you can joke with him like that!" I said to Barlow. But then he turned around, and I saw a snap in his eye, which told me that he was really angry, just as much as I was, but had learned to control his feelings better.

Well, we shook hands, and I left him to go into the store. His closing remark was:

"Stick to it, Dawson! Call on me if I can help you at any time, and, while you don't want to be spying on Stigler, of course, keep your eye open."

But when we parted I suddenly decided, instead of going into the store, to try Barlow's plan and take a stroll around the block and then try to view the store as if I were a customer. I felt a little disappointed, then, at the general appearance of the outside of the store. More paint would certainly improve it. In fact, it was a kind of joke to find on the big side door an old sign, the letters half worn off and the rest dirty and dusty, reading:

"Fresh paint improves your property. Use Star Brand."