St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1890-08-13
A CRACKER COMBINE,
In Which the East Proposes
to Starve Out Western
Bakers,
And, If Necessary, Give Away
Crackers for the Next
Three Years.
Ben Aarons, the Minneapolis
Enumeration, Captured
at Last.
State Fair Managers Get a
Great Hustle Upon Them
selves.

There is war to the knife between the
two enormous cracker combines now
controlling the biscuit manufacturing
trade of the East and West. When, a
few months ago, syndicate of capital
lists began buying up the cracker con-
Germs of the East it became evident that
the intention was to control the trade
from Atlantic to Pacific. Kennedy's
vast interests and eventually all con-
Germs of any importance east OF Chi
cago had been absorbed by the trust,
which opened business in New York on
July 1. under the title of the New York
Cracker company, with capital stock
of S6,OO0,0O0. In thesmeantlme, reor-
ganization of the American Cracker
association, with headquarters at Chi
cagO, had occurred. This company
now owns every important cracker man
ufacturing plant in the Northwest and
boasts capital of s10,00O,000. The
compact under which the former West
ern company had existed, regulating
prices and providing for uniform rate
Of discount in the trade, expired on July
l, leaving the field open. Immediately
the manufacturers in the different cities
of the West began cutting prices and
offering all sorts of discounts to secure
new trade. At the same time the
agents of the Eastern company made
their appearance in st. Paul, Minneap-
oils, Kansas City, and every other large
Western city, and proceeded to double
discount the prices of the Western COM
pany. The New York Biscuit COM
pany's crackers can be bought by re-
tailers all over the West on thirty days
time and 35 per cent. discount. The
Western concern is responding to every
cut made, and claims to be able to
stand any siege put up by the Eastern
trust. The situation at present is that
the companies are both giving away
goods by the thousand tons, and it is
only a question of which can stand it
the longest. A we'll known New York
man, and former owner OF a cracker
factory in New York State, said yester-
day about the situation, that the cap
ital stock quotations of the COM
panies did not represent their strength.
''There is no Disgusting the fact" he
said, ''the New York company is much
the stronger of the two. 1t is positive
fact that they can afford, depending on
their Eastern trade for support, to give
away every cracker used in the North
west in the next three years; and, more
than that, they have gone into the fight
fully prepared to do that very thing.
They are giving 40 per cent off on all
their goods now, and that is ruinous." A
GLOBE representative called on the firm
of Freedman & Lewis, OF st. Paul, yes
terday. EYES," said Mr.. Freedman, sit
is true enough, l guess, that the war
has opened, though it came on more
suddenly than either company expected.
Notwithstanding that it was inevitable.
1t is fact that the Eastern people
are making all sorts of discount rates,
but there is only one thing to be
said, and that is that the Western
Cracker company is in the West to sell
crackers. and proposes to sell them, no
matter what move the New York peo-
pie may make. AS was to be expected,
prices have gone to pieces in few
weeks, and there will probably be any
amount of crackers at anybody's price
for some time to come. No one can
tell as yet what the outcome of the fight
will be. We maintain that the Western
concern is as strong as The Eastern one,
and able to make as good fight"