Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1880-12-31
THE WHOLESALE TRADE.

trade of St. Paul. Probably no one thing
NOT even excepting its early settlement,
its location at the head of navigation on
the great Father of Waters, and the fact
that it is the focus and radiating point in
the railway system of the great North
west-haS done so much to build UP St.
Paul and give it its present high stand
ing in the commercial circles of the
country, as the character for business
conservatism and integrity commanded
and secured by its pioneer wholesale deal
ers, and maintained by them and those
who have since joined their ranks through
the many seasons of prosperity
and business depression to this
dav The commercial csc utcheon of
St. Paul is as pure gold. In times of
commercial prosperity its merchants have
always been prompt to realize the bene-
fits, but their operations have always
been governed by sound business prin-
ciples and confined to legitimate chan
nels, so that when period of depression
came, they were ever found ready for the
ClNlA1O1AtS III tliN NOAl-
position and characteristics of the st.
Paul wholesale merchant has been most
strikingly illustrated in the history of the
last ten years.
True to their conservative Instincts the
merchants of ST Paul withStood the mad
passion of wild speculation and expansion
which preceded and led to the years of
financial and commercial depression and
disaster which burst upon the country in
1873, and plunged the country into a
nightmare of distrust and dishonesty,
under the influence of which values every
where deprecated at RAILROAD speed and
large numbers of the leading commercial
houses of the trade centers of the country
were wrecked. During all that terrible
season our ST. Paul merchants husbanded
their resources and gathered themselves
together, as it were, in readiness to meet
and take advantage of the returning
wave of prosperity. This re-
turning wave found our merchants
with credit untarnished and capital I'M
impaired The sagacity that warned
them of the storm cloud clearly
foretold to them the dawning of an era
of returning prosperity, and St Paul was
among the first cities of the Union to
shake off the general lethargy and to
grasp the future possibilities. The his
tory of st. Paul since that awakening is
like chapter from a fairy tale The
growth of the city has been almost magi-
cal. The volume of business iii all de-
partments has increased in a ratio truly
wonderful The old houses, the found
ers of the city's prosperity, have doubled,
trebled, and often more than quadrupled
their business facilities, while large num-
bers of new business houses and enterprises
have come in and joined the forces united
in building up here the great commercial
city of the Northwest.
While everything going to make up a
great city has grown and flourished in St.
Paul during the year 1880, the wholesale
trade has enjoyed year of prosperity
unexampled in the history of the city In
1869 the wholesale trade of the city was
computed at 81, 800, 600 In 1877 it had
increased to So, 900, and
last year, 1879. it reached the
handsome figure, IN round numbers, of
$4,000, 600. In this computation of $751;
100000 for last year, it should be borne in
mind, was included the sales of farm ma
chinery and implements, lumber machin-
cry and machinists supplies, stock sales
of the year coal and other articles, all
properly classed in the wholesale and job
bing traffic of the city, and in some of
which the volume of business has been
more than quadrupled the past year, but
which in this review are not treated of in
this connection. Omitting these articles
to be treated more specifically elsewhere,
and we find that the Wholesale trade of
st. Paul, as classified below, was S23,-
179, 900, while the sales in the same lines
this year have reached s31, 76s, 900, an in
crease in the lines rated of SIS, 6S7, $50, an
average increase of fraction over 81 pei
cent
The grocery trade leads in the volume
VI DuolHCoo JldHSdCbCu anu pei CtHl. Oh Ill
crease of the leading lines here treated
of, with aggregate sales of $7,625 900, an
increase of $1,975, 900 over 1879. Next
comes dry goods, with sales of 81, 100, 900,
an increase of 5000, 900; boots and shoes,
with sales of $500, 900, an increase
of s950,000; hardware, with
sales of 81, loo, 600, an increase of 1874,
600; drugs, medicines, etc, with sales of
81 ,245 600, an increase of 1920, 900, and
so en- down through the entire list, the
lowest per cent of increase being 10 per
cent and the highest s71a.
The wholesale trade of the city Is con-
fined to nearly the same hands that il
was at the close of 1879 Thus we find
the exclusive wholesale dry goods bust
ness conducted by VIM. Lee & Co.,
Auerbach, Finch, Culbertson & Co., and
Indexes, Warner & Schumacher. Some
of the great retail houses OF
the city have a jobbing department
connected with their establishments, but
their sales have not been included in oul
figures. 1t should also be stated in this
connection that the sales under the dry
goods heading, embrace Yankee notion;
and furnishing goods