Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-08-15
THE SUBSTITUTE SWINDLE.

How Petty Frauds Upon Customers Are
Practised by DeaIers-Cunning That
Cheats the People-When You Buy De-
mand the Genuine and Reject the
Spurious.
Chicago Tribune
Mr.. A. Frank Richardson, of New York,
has done the public good service by calling
attention in his recent address before the
National Editorial Association at ST. Paul,
to the petty but extensive frauds practised
upon customers through what is known as
the substitute swindle. The modus operandi
of these dishonest deals may be briefly ex-
planned. There are many standard articles,
such, for instance, as Pears Soap, Scott's
Emulsion, TUFTS Pills, Hoods Sarsaparilla,
Morgan's Sapolio, VOLTS Acme Blacking,
St. Jacobs Oil, Ayers Sarsaparilla. Syrup
of Figs, Carlsbad Sprudel water, Cuticura,
and others which have attained to a large
sale and widespread reputation by their
legitimate merits and the liberal advertising
of their proprietors. Certain unprincipled
druggists and small dealers have taken ad-
vantage of these circumstances to coun-
terfeit these goods by initiating them
just close enough to keep them
selves out of the clutches of the law. At
Detroit and in other cities there are houses
whose entire business consists in manufac-
turing limitations of these articles, or "sub-
| stitutes, which are made so as to closely
resemble the originals in materials used, in
! the name, and in the general appearance of
the boxes, bottles or wrappers. As an in
ducsment to these small dealers and the
better to enable them to carry out the
swindle, their names frequently are printed
on the packages by. the manufacturers, and
the false caption s'our own make is often
added. 1t is easy to see how the swindle is
worked. A customer goes into store and
asks for SCOTS Emulsion, for instance,
The dealer says that he has it, which is
probably lie, but recommends the
customer to buy a preparation put
up by himself, which he claims to
be equally good, and which, he says, he can
recommend, because, he pretends, he has
compounded it himself and it is his
town make,'' and besides, while Scott's
Emulsion may be 80 cents bottle, he can
sell his own preparation at % cents Nine
times out of ten the customer, relying upon
the statement of the druggist, will be in
duced by motives of economy to take the
substitute, which, of course, is worthless
and may be dangerous. The dealer is
enabled to do this, because he buys very
cheaply from the manufacturer, and thus
the two get the benefit of the advertising
of the genuine material and divide large
profits. Thus an unsuspecting public is
swindled.
1t is needless to say that the druggist or
dealer who will descend to this contemplate
business merely because he can make
larger profit upon the substitute than he
can upon the genuine article is a common
swindler and none the less a swindler be-
cause the trick is devised so cunningly as to
save him from prosecution and deserved
punishment 1t is a fraud upon manufac-
turers who are making legitimate article
and who have spent thousands of dollars to
bring it before the public, and a fraud upon
customers who are tricked into buying a
bogus article which is worthless, if not
something worse. 1t is time that this con-
temptible business was stopped, and it can
be if the press of the country will ventilate
and expose it and if the public will refuse
to patronize druggists who palm off these
nostrums upon it. Customers should de-
mand the article they have every reason to
believe is the best, and if dealer begins
the old story recommending preparation
he has made himself, which he knows to be
pure because he made it, which has his
name on the wrapper, ETC., it should be
sufficient cause to refuse it promptly and go
elsewhere for their goods. 1t is the lowest
and meanest form of common thieyery, and
if the public will join hands with the press
it can be broken up. 1t is certainly for the
interests of the former to do so, as it is the
principal sufferer.