The Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1865-1903, 1890-12-22
SOME POINTERS,

a Reporter Sees How ShopkCcpGr'A Might
Improve tho Effectiveness OF Their Win.
dow BisriajE.
Sometimes a man who has no expert.
ence In a business and no connection
with 1t can see where improvements
may be made much more readily than
one who has gotten into set way OF
doing things by long experience.
An I.TELLloENcER reporter was im.
pressed with this fact tho other evening
while standing in front Of an elegantly
dressed Wheeling show window. The
arrangement OF thu window was elabor.
ate, and probably several thousand dol.
lars worth OF goods were displayed
Everything looked fine, aud one would
naturally suppose everything In the win.
dow was very expensive.
While the reporter WAS there, two
gentlemen stepped up to tho window
and began admiring the display.
Said one: ~ would like very much TO
have those vases; know my wife would
DO pleased with them"
"Wtiy don't you buy them2' asked
tho other.
"Cost too much"
GLOW do you know what they cost? %
"Oh, | don't know, but lsuppose they
arc worth at lcas, SO. I'd DO willing 10
pay SO for them, and would buy them
this minute at that price,"
suppose you so in and ask how much
they are"
Indeed ] won't. I never 20 into n
store unless l know want something.
I'd feel too cheap to ask the price and
have. tho clerk tell Mo they cost five
times my pile"
The two men admired other things in
the window and went on, and the re.
porter having more nerve than the man
who wanted 10 buy the vases, went IN and
asked the price.
sixteen dollars" replied the clerk,
when the vases were pointed out.
There's a case where, had the shop keep.
er marked in plain figures, SIG, on the
articles, they would have been sold.
shop keepers would DO amazed II they
only knew the number OF sales they
MISS iu that way. Men, especially, are
tiu,id about asking prices, and hun.
dreds OF times pass by without buying
what they would gladly take il it did not
necesstate their passing through the
painful ordeal OF asking what things are
worth, aud imaginingt the clerks laugh al
them when the price is higher than they
can stand.
| 1t would pay every merchant who
makes even d pretense OF dressing his
windows to mark in figures large enough
to be read, the price OF every article in
them.
Another matter that shopkeepers
seem to loose sight OF is the number OF
people who are out at night. In day
lime the ladies' stop and blockade the
sidewalks looking at the displays, and
DO man With the proper sense OF dignity
will stop and crowd them away. For
thi. and other reasons men seldom do
any window shopping in day time. But
the shopkeeper should see how the men
take TO the windows after night. As
soon as the ladies leave the street the
men begin to look into the shop win
dows, but at about the same time the
shopseeper turns out his lights, and il
he keeps jewelry store begins to put
the goods into the sale.
| In Wheeling there ere enough men on
the streets till 3 a. III. to make it worth
the while OF every shop keeper to pay
the increase in his light bills that would
result ii he kept his window lighted all
night, and during the holiday season al
least, it would pay the jewellers to keer
watchmen at the front doors, and keet
the windows dressed all night. The
trouble Of dressing and redressing thu
windows would almost pay for the
watchman.