Mineral Point tribune. (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1869-1938, 1885-12-10
MILLIONS OF PAPER BAGS.


An Industry Built Up Since the
War.
"When first went into the grocery
business, just after the war. said the
prosperous head of large retail gro
Gerry house uptown, lit was part of a
Young clerks trade to know how to
make his own paper bags. l began
my career in a retail store in lower
Broadway. At that time the delivery
clerks used to grumble If they had TO
make more than two deliveries day
above Twenty street On wet
afternoons or at ANY time when trade
was dull the boss used to bring out
some wooden mallets, a corresponding
number of chlsels, big tin paste pot
with four brushes in it, and then set
us to work making paper bags.
II think people would stare nova
daysif they were given such awkward
locking purcels to carry home as gro
cery clerks used to pass over the coun-
ter when / was a lad. can remember
when machine-made bags first came
into use. We clerks hailed them with
ioy, but the boss was mighty careful
with them at first, because, like every
thing else that is .ew, they were ex-
penslve. Children used TO save and
smooth out the bags that came with
the family groceries, and they felt
very we'll satisfied ON getting a stick
of candy, or big apple for bringing
them back to us. AT first the bags
were made from common cheap
paper. and they used TO break easily.
Now there are fifty regulation sizes in
our business alone, to say nothing Of
hundreds of different varieties made
TO order. / suppose that in my four
stores at least so, 900 paper bags are
used every week. 1t would be almost
impossible to conceive of the enormous
number of paper bags sold aud used IN
New York every year. The fig, res
would run into the millions. Very
little sheet wrapping paper compare
lively, is used in any trst-class gro
Gerry store in New York nowadays
Clerks will always use bags to save
trouble and proprietors prefer to have
them use them to save time. Come to
think of it, there are plenty Of reasons
why 1t pays better to use bags. When
you consider the unavoidable waste in
using sheet wrapping paper the bags
are cheaper. Let us see, continued
the grocer, making few figures with
a peHcil, "machipe-made bags cost
all the way from 81 to SIS thousand,
according to size. The latter price is
for big -four bags of stout paper. At
an average | should say that the retail
dealer gets seven bags of the smaller
sizes for a cent. Large ones may cost
a trIfe more. Really the price paid is
less than that, for large buyers can
always get a discount from the manu-
facturer, and smaller firms can usual
ly get a discount from the grocery
firms they patronize. Wholesale
groceries are about the heaviest job
bers in paper bags. They don't make
much profit on them, but keep stock
principally for the accommodation of
customers IN the trade who can't af-
ford to buy in large quantities.
An American in a grocery store
likes to be served promptly and if he
or she is compelled once in a while to
carry parcel home they want it TO
look like anything else in the world
but something to eat. You have TO
get behind counter to find out how
IL gals fastidlous young man TO car
ry home a loaf of bread in coarse
straw paper, no matter how long he
has been married. 1t makes a custo-
mer impatient TO watch a clumsy
clerk tumble over a package, tearing
sheet of paper ia two and biting off
the Irvine, end then pass over a par
eel that looks as much like pair of
old boots going TO the shoemaker for
half sole as anything else and did
you ever notice what shabby work
anybody but a shoemaker will turn
out Ia wrapping up pair of boots2
Long experience has taught me that
clerks who can always be relied up
on 10 do up neat, attractive parcel
with rapidity are as rare as young
women who can address envelopes
from the poll list without misspelling
half the names. Watch a new clerk
tie up four pounds of granulatea
sugar in sheet wrapping paper and
you will at once see what l mean.
Nothing had greater influence in
making possible the rapidity with
which business is discharged of in a
large grocery store OF to-day as com
pared with ten years ago than the
cheap prices and the rapid mapufact-
ure of paper bags. And even in the
form of bag used much labor has
been obviated by recent improvement.
Before a clerk could get few pounds
of oatmeal into an old fashioned flat
bag he had to put his hand inside to
tuck in the bottom corners. With the
square bags that are now coming in
to general use he has nothing to do
but empty his scoop right into the bag
and turn down the upper edges. The
American foudDess for goods put up
ready to hand over the counter at
moments notice has caused another
revolution in the paper bag business.
Cereals. coffee, spices, and all sorts OF
dry stuff are kept on the shelves in at
trsctive fancy wrappings made to
order. A good wrapper often sells
an article the same as the qDngrpl