A Man of Samples. Something about the men he met "On the Road" Part 21

"Certainly I would, and pay salaries on that basis. Then the salesman would have strong inducements to get good prices. As it is now all he need ask himself is: 'Will the old man stand the cut?' and if he does it is as much a feather in his cap to make the sale as if it was at better prices. Take the matter of steel squares. One of my men writes in that a Cleveland jobber is selling them to the smallest trade at 75 and 10 per cent. off. I investigate and find that they can be bought at 80 off. But the several manufacturers shake their heads and say this price is a positive loss, etc., etc. Then what the d--l do they sell at that price for? Neither dealers nor consumers were complaining of the old prices, and all the extra stock that is sold by the cut goes on to the dealers' shelves. The decline is made to a few jobbers, and they at once start out their men to give it to the retailers, and to use it as a bait, and when other jobbers learn it they combine to squeeze the price down so that all can get it. This is a sample of generals.h.i.+p that the square makers ought to be ashamed of."

"Yes, but the carriage-bolt men of the country have been playing just that same kind of a fool game for several years. Who is benefited? No one, unless it is the big wagon concerns, or the big machine men. I am told that men in bolt factories at present prices do not make $1 a day. Why should they work for starvation wages so that the concerns using bolts can save 40 per cent on their purchase? It's a cursed outrage! The older manufacturers can stand it, because they just coined money a few years ago, but now they must squeeze their poor devils of workmen down in order that they can sell goods at nothing.

If the Knights of Labor were devoting themselves to righting wrongs of this kind, the whole country would back them up."

"I often feel sorry for some of the concerns," said the other, "when I have met the 'managers.' I came back from New York three years ago and told my partner if Lawson & Goodrow could make money as their New York office was run, that no one else need worry about his business. Here was an old concern, with every facility for making goods cheap, with a reputation for quality second to none in the country, with experienced workmen, and a good hold on the trade, yet they failed a year or two ago, and made so bad a failure I supposed they were swamped forever."

"But they are going on."

"Yes; I'm glad to see it, and understand that new brains have taken hold of it. But think of putting in as manager of such a business a young man just out of college! He was a very pleasant gentleman; I remember him with a warm sense of his courtesy, but he did not know the A, B, C of business. Fancy such a man competing with Oakman or Charley Landers!"

"You've got to get up early to get ahead of Landers.'

"Yes, Landers is a man of resources and thoroughly understands human nature. I rode down on the New Haven boat with him one night, and I spent two very pleasant hours on deck talking with him. He makes a good impression on you, both as to his shrewdness and his breadth. You get the idea that he is not small in his methods, and that he has an active mind. I imagine that when he took hold of the management of his concern, after Jim Frary had stepped down and out, he had about as unpromising a job on his bands as a man could have. Frary was a terrible cuss to pile up goods, I'm told, and the stock was in horrible shape. But Landers rode through the storm, and his business has seen some mighty prosperous years."

"Did you know Rubel?"

"Of Chicago? Yes, indeed. Poor fellow, I received a card a day or two ago announcing his death. He ought to have been good for twenty years yet. I bought some of his patent goods sixteen or eighteen years ago, and sold more or less of his brand ever since. His plant in Chicago shows what was in him. I hated, like thunder, to sell his goods when they were branded 'Chicago,' but when he changed that to 'American' I bought as freely of him as from others. He was jovial, sociable, and wide awake. I wish he might have lived to enjoy his well-earned success."

"What has become of Jim Frary?"

"I have lost sight of him. If any man ever had a good chance to make a strike I think Frary is the man. With Weibusch back of him, furnis.h.i.+ng money and brains, with a combination in prices on a profitable basis, and with the boom in business, that concern ought to have made piles of money. But it is not generally supposed that they did. Frary has become temporarily eclipsed, and General Trunk manages it as if it was an orchestra. I don't know if he gets much music out, but he probably enjoys bossing things; that's worth a great deal to him." [Footnote: As is known to the trade, within a very few weeks after the above article was written the Frary Cutlery Co. failed, and have since been sold out under the hammer. And prices of table cutlery are once more "booming."]

"Don't you like Trunk?"

"Like him? Of course I do. You would if you were to meet him. He's one of the most una.s.suming and gentle-mannered men you ever met. If he only had a little confidence in himself he would be the Napoleon of the table cutlery trade, but he is inclined to listen to everybody's advice and not a.s.sert himself."

"I had a deal with Frary once that amused me. I had been handling a small, one-bladed knife that we paid about 40 cents per dozen for. We made quite a leader of it, but were told, in answer to our last order sent, that the stock was out. We tried to get it two or three times afterward, but without success. The next time I saw one of the men I asked him why the d.i.c.kens we couldn't get that knife again. 'We have given it up,' I was told; our cost book showed the cost to be 36 cents per dozen, so we supposed we were getting our money back, but somebody had the curiosity to foot up the items not long ago, and found an error in adding of 20 cents; the knife had really cost 56 cents! Fancy a concern doing business in that way!"

"There are any numbers of just such concerns. Every little while you see changes made in prices to correct errors. There's a deal of guessing done around factories, and also a good deal of figuring on what a compet.i.tor does. One man learns of a compet.i.tor making a certain price, and says, 'If he can sell at that, I can,' and that becomes his price, without his even knowing that he is making money or losing at these figures."

"I think a good many dealers sell goods by guess, as well as the manufacturers. This is especially true of retailers. A level-headed man, named Root, has got up a series of cost cards that will be of help to the hardware trade, but other lines need them just as much."

"But all the cards in the world will not keep the blank fools from selling goods at cost. Here is an item in an Eastern paper about two Connecticut concerns who sold 'crazy cloth' (whatever that is) under each other's price, till at last one fool offered it at 1 cent a yard, and then the other came down to ten yards for 5 cents. That was in Sargent's town; probably they had been listening to his free trade slush."

CHAPTER XXIV.

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 advertis.e.m.e.nts 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 cla.s.s 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 princ.i.p.ally 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 be 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 a.s.sume 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-cla.s.s 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 to be boycotted. I know it's a mean word, but it is a good one for use with mean men."

CHAPTER XXV.

The last day on the road must always seem a long day. One figures out just what train he will take, the hour he will arrive at the end of the journey, and the minute he will be with his family or in the store. I had reached my last day and was putting in my "best licks" so as to have a good batch of orders to carry in with me, to make my welcome all the greater. But as luck would have it no day of my trip had been so uncertain and tantalizing.