Spirit of Jefferson. [volume] (Charles Town, Va. [W. Va.]) 1844-1948, 1886-09-07
MISCELLANEOUS.
NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS..
These are the Heys that open the Great
Gates to Prestige, Popularity and
Prosperity.

from the Monthly Auction Trade journal of
Chas. Broadway Rouss.l
Why do we sell cheaper? Several
reasons-We plank down the eloquent
coin and everybody knows that this
will always bring a bargain at a lower
figure than credit competitor pays.
The auction machines are fed by
merchants hard pressed for money
and when goods are slaughtered it is
for bullion and never on time-it
would only add to his distres to give
up his stock for the negotiable which
will not pay the note but the omnipo-
tent cash lifts the load instanter-
Then again we have Away advocated
and followed the "nigh cut'' beliving
that close quick margin of five per
cent will drive a man to the top in
half the time of ten and on this fatal
rock are shiprecked the big majority
who blieve in small sales with big
percentage instead of the modern,
progressive, live way-close rapid
turning, raking in the everlasting
stuff as you deliver the big values.
Still again, we follow the Red Flag
man from the cargo sale to the wind
ing up of the Liliputian whose total
stock in one bid (the sheriffs wav) is
often less than one hundred dollars
What would the perfumed aristocrat-
ic sweIhead buyer of the hitOned credit
concerns do if caught in such place
at such 4 time presuming they had
the money to spare to buy as it gen
Ill 70
pay past due Indebtedness starved off
with renewed ncgotiablcs-nor would
they have the courage to wade in on
thousand dollar bids on pile of mis-
cellancous merchandise, broken lots
and odds and cnds-they would want
a day or two to figure up whilst the
auctiOncer's hamer falls with but a
moments warning often without dis
cretion always without mercy for SEN
timent is an utter stranger amid these
final scenes of mercantile tragedy
where pluck backed by the Ninth Ma
tiOnal gathers in some of its grandest
landslides and in turn scattcrs them
among the level headed pioneers who
shorted the road to success by the
double edged damascus blade SOLID
vALUEL, always below the market.
These unanswerable leaders do the
decisive work and drive the masters
to the front with arapidity and solid
ity that surprises himself. Little did
Ridley, in his dininutiv corner store,
dream twenty years ago of the big
broad mark he was destined to carve
into the anals of mercantile story by
his progressive ideas of rapid sales,
close profits, and cash before deliv-
cry, that the day would come when
his little store and others around it,
would be swept out of existence, and
an iron palace covering the entire
block as a monument to the great
master whose unaproachable values,
underbought and undersold, made
terrific work with credit antedeluvians.
At best the little life is short and
hard enough, why then add to the
weary load by carrying the surplus
agonies of evaporation and torture
in fighting, begging and worrying with
people who never pay. Do you not
know that this wear and tear of brain
and nerve, this intense strain upon
the " big wheel" will make short
and decisive work with the big masses
who dance to the delusive music of
the siren of unlimited time? Try for
one short year that souId inspiring
enthusiasm, cald by the victims
t Balm of GiIead," by the victors
the almighty dollar, then you will
sleep like an OK, eat like horse and
fight like a giant, and the fantom of
credit will be like dream of the past.
Let us go back forty years ago into
Stewarts-the Stewart of 1S46-At
that day he was among the head
statesmen of his modest 20 by 20, two
floors, but not the largest in amount
of sales-there were four who would
sell more goods, they worked twelve
hours, he twenty-four per day-The
secret of his amazing prosperity, far
more rapid than he could anticipate
-underbuy and underseI. drove from
behind the counter into the Office and
into the markets and acros to the
great marts of the other continents
The big balance wheel was real
values, the wheel within the wheel