Litchfield enquirer., 1875-03-11
CHANGERS AND THEIR 'PRlM- .-E -. CiPLES.

1. O1RAESs s.& s.A4s.s- ADVANCE OR DAlAGE THE INTERESTS OF OUR NEW ENGLAND TowNs ia 3s84 E g If understand aright, the Grange prin-
 ciple is to discard all commission men and ] dealers of all kinds, and bring the manu-
 facturer and consumer directly together.
 Now is this a possible and practicable
 thing to do in this great country of ours.
 Manufacturing is carried on wherever wa ter power abounds, and is scattered from
 the Atlantic to the Pacific, from Montreal l to New Orleans, no two articles being
 made ill the same establishment and, many l times. no two in the same place. Of course
 we are all familiar. or ought to be, with the manner in which the manufacturer
 disposes of his goods under the present system, but to bring it directly to our no- tice we will take, for instance. the cotton manufactory at Lowell, and follow the goods to the consumer. They employ say 1000 men, they have their authorized agent Tn N. '. Each days manufacture,
 consisting of two or three hundred cases, are consigned to this agent by the car load, at as low freight rates as can be ob- tained. The agent is allowed perhaps one or two per cent. According to the class of goods) for handling, which of course would be on insignificant item to the re- taller and particularly to the consumer, but to the agent it amounts to living busi- ness, where he disposes of from twenty five to fifty thousand dollars worth per day. ... 4z.-
 The 'jobber" takes the goods from the agent by the case. By spending very little time among the different agents, the jobber is enabled to get his full stock of goods without the expense of going or sending to all the different factories; he is now ready to furnish almost any kind of goods to the country merchants and re- tailers. If the retailers business is large enough to warrant it, he goes to the agent and buys by the case, and ifnot, he steps over the way and buys of the jobber, with whom he can make the best of terms. Of course he has to pay the jobber 8 con- mission of from 5 to 10 per cent. for the privilege of selecting whatever goods he wants, of the different styles and makes, and for interest on capital invested, &c. This commission, again, is insignificant in the eyes of the consumer, who wants or 10 yards of several different styles. The country merchant selects his entire stock of g pods and sends them home in one shipment. The retailer is now ready to furnish the consumer with everything he wants (and he is in need of something nearly every day). It is impossible for the head Of family to make plans and lay in stock of everything they want for the next 30 or 60 days; he is constantly in want of some little article for immediate use. If there is no middle-man in his own town to keep this stock of necessa- ries, then where can he get them? We will suppose, for a moment, that the Grange principle is thoroughly carried out (though believe nearly all Gran gers admit that it is rather necessary that there be little stock of goods kept In their town, although it is directly in op- position to their platform). But we will suppose that the country merchant and the manufacturer are brought difectly to- gether, which will be one step easier than to bring the consumer and manufacturer together. A man comes to Washington, erects store, goes into his office and or ders his complete assortment of goods from the manufacturers. I am told that a stock of goods for country store calls for something over one thousand different articles. He orders then one thousand different articles in quantities to suit his trade. From the Atlantic cotton mills he orders 6 pieces; he must have at least 5 different grades both in bleached and un- bleached goods, each one made in differ. ent factories. The same in regard to cam. brio, cassimeres, shawls, pins and needles, and in fact everything in dry goods, hard- ware. boots and shoes, agricultural tools. spices and groceries of all kinds, but nevertheless he goes on with his task and orders from every factory far and near. This you will see is the very cheapest way he could order.- He has had no agent around with samples. but has ordered from descriptions of the goods sent around by the manufacturers. In some lines of goods, l suppose it is absolutely necessa- " that the merchant select from stock or sample, but of course he could not go around to all the manufactures and se- lect what little he wants, so he orders and runs the risk of the goods being what will suit the consumers in his locality. II1
 After three or four weeks his last order comes in, and he is ready to furnish his customers with anything. they want, but when he pays his freight bill of 30 cents on each railroad for every article he has bought, what per cent. does it amount to on his stock of 5000 or $6,000 Wouldn't it pay the manufacturer agent in New York, treble hls usual commission? After little time his stock runs low, and he must b6 continually sending all over the country and paying enormous freight bills in proportion to the amount of his business. His freight by the present sys- tenn comes by the hundred weight and 10Ofbs perhaps will include 9 of these small articles. But they argue that if all middlemen were done away with, the man. ufacturers would devise some means of getting the goods to the country merchant and consumer; but think of the expense that would follow the Lowell and other mills attempting to dispose of their 300 cases per day by sending agents through the country selling 6 or 10 pieces of goods in each knvn Tha ax,,,..,..g - a s..-