The Washington critic., 1886-03-30
NOW TO JUDGE A DRUG STORE.
[From the Cincinnati (Ohio) Sun.1

ITOHt UC tttCtfUttt ONiOD sun.
Probably the largest concern of its
kind that has grown up amongst us in
the past decade Is The Duffy Malt
Whisley Company of Baltimore, Md.
The other day the writer met repre-
sentative of this house, and among
other of the interesting questions that
came up, was one as to how this Com
pany could afford to cxpend such large
sums of money in advertising such an
excellent brand of whiskcy, an1 on
which the margin of profit Is nccesja-
rily small.
"Well sir, replied the gentleman,
''it is done entirely on the strength of a
good article, In the merit and purity of
which we have the utmost confidence.
This Is probably the first instance of
the kind In the business of the coun-
try where IL has paid q business like
ours to extensively advertise its whs.
key, and we are to-day the only general
advertisers who are selling their goods
by the carload, and this too, to drug
| gists who have never been known to
handle advertised articles In such quan.
| titles before.
Heretofore large newspaper adver-
| tising has been confined almost exclu-
sively to patent medicines and other
| proprietary preparations on which
| there Is usually profit of from 200 to
300 per cent. (never less), rs in the case
of so.called bittcrs, for instance, which
frequently consist, as analysis has
shown, of the cheapest of poi.
sonous kinds of alcohol as a
base Uhe Government allows 30
per cent?, the rest of the compound
being a few inexpensive flavoring ex.
tracts to make it palatable. These de-
coctions have now had their day, and
at last the people are beginning to
awaken to the fact that If they must
have q stimulant 1t is better to use
straight article, of the purity Of
which they are assured, than to drench
their stomachs with vile compounds
which derange the system. It was
with the idea that people would sooner
or later come to realize this
fact, that we determined to put
our whislkey on the market under
Its true name, merit and medicinal
uses, and although we have received
numerous propositions from prominent
religious papers, and clergymen have
| written us personal letters, stating that
they had derived great benefit from its
use, and that they would like to recon.
mend 1t but did not dare to do so un-
der the name of whiskey, we have
steadily held out against any change of
title or any disguise of Its character,
and yet, despite the natural prejudice
which exists against the use of liquor
in any form, we have received in the
past three months over 5000 unso-
licited testimonials from persons who
have been cured or benefited by our
whiskey, and who, out of pure sense
of gratitude, are willing that their
names be published. You see our
whisley is distilled by secret
| process, whereby every trace of
fusel oil is eliminated, and to-
| day we are the discoverers
and only manufacturers in the country
of an absolutely pure article. There is
only one difficulty that we experience,
and this comes from source we least
expected-that is, opposition on the
part of few druggists. You would
naturally think that they of all others
would be the most eager for the sale of
pure whiskey, but not so. Our whis.
key, aside from its being absolutely
pure, is also one of the best and Oldest
whiskies, excelled by none, and for
this reason is necessarily expensive.
Druggists, therefore, have very little
margin on it as compared with the
cheap and poisonous whisllies which
many of them have the reputation OF
handling. 1t is consequently not
profitable to them to handle our goods
so that we have been obliged to warn
our friends and consumers Of this fact
and cause them to insist upon receiving
what they want and to be satisfied with
nothing but the genuine Dufly's pure
malt whiskey."
The reporter was surprised to learn
that druggists in whose hands life was
often at stake would, for mere merce
nary motives, lend themselves to sucl
opposition, and he went away reason
ing that in the future he would alway.
judge a drug store by the character o.
the whiskcy it kept.