Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1885-10-22

provocation, and the very poor can
avoid both doctors expenses and the
cost of patent medicines by going to
dispensaries, where they are treated
gratuitously. Much is claimed for the
efficiency of these medicines-too much,
indeed, for some of them. But, as
rule, they possess certain virtue.
Many of them are merely physicians
prescriptions made up on grand scale,
and are stated to cure only specific
cases of bodily arrangement. The day
of the 'cure-alr medicines is as good as
gone by. Some of the medicines are
really excellent for the purposes they
are applied to. There are new RENE
dies constantly coming into the field,
but unless backed by heavy capital they
and their projectors invariably come to
grief Not even plenty of money can
bolster up a remedy if it be worthless,
or if there be too many articles of the
same kind in the market.
ALLOWING the remedy to be all that
is claimed for it, that it is backed up
heavily. advertised well, and has elbow
room in its ewn particular field,
there still remain the usual contingent
cies and risks related to all business
ventures. The business is not all profit,
as many people think. The manufacture
er sees but a small proportion of the
dollar that the customer pays the retail
er for his bottle of medicine. A dollar
bottle of medicine is generally sold to
the trade through the jobber at 81 per
dozen. Before the manufacturer be-
gins to think of profit he must figure on
labor, material, rent, freight, express,
clerk hire and advertising bills. The
last expense is an important item. 1t
has been estimated that in the last
twenty years S100,O00,000 have been
spent in advertising proprietary medi-
cines. The small advertiser is nowhere.
So, in the end, if the proprietor makes
twelve cents on the dollar-bottle of med
icine he is lucky. The retailers net
profit is nearly double that amount.
When the stamp tax on proprietary
medicines was levied-about four per
cent. on the retail price, in reality ten
per cent. ON the manufacturer price
the manufacturers made even less than
now. In four years only the stamp tax
thus levied rolled into the Government
Golfers an average of at least 81, 800, 900
a year. The stamp tax has been done
away with, but the tax of S1.80 gal
Ion on alcohol principal ingredient
Ill the IuduuldCGuEo VI LleulCluoS SILL
exists.
According to the last United States
census there are 563 establishments in
this country devoted to the proprietary
medicine business, employing 4,015
operatives, with an aggregate invest
ment of capital amounting to $40, &c.
600, and the annual product is valued
at S14, $500 New York State leads
all others with an invested capital of
SO, SIP, AGO. which is about .one-third of
the entire country investment. Penn
sylvania comes next andjMissouriiranks
third in invested capital, followed re-
spectively by Ohio and Massachusetts,.
In the amount of annual product New
York again stands first, followed in
order by Massachusetts and Pennsyl-
vania, the other States standing about
even. The foreign trade in our proprie-
tary medicines is light, owing to the
drawback of the heavy tax on alcohol.
but the trade is slowly increasing. A
fair calculation is that about twenty-five
American proprietary medicines have
at present very large sale in En-
gland. IN Y. Herald.