The morning call., 1893-06-08
FAILURES IN THE BOOK TRADE.

There is small increase in the number
of Eastern failures, but it is not notable
enough to excite remark. The banks which
are closing their doors are mostly wildcat
concerns. many of them apparently cot up
for the purpose OF failing when they secured
a deposit line which made it worth while.
The Grant Locomotive Works used TO be
a solid institution with large business,
which was conducted at Paterson, n. j.
Some years ago it got into trouble and re-
moved to Chicago. The stringency in
money. caused in part by the expenditure
for the fair, has embarrassed number of
firms in the grain States. Those which
were hanging on by the eyelids have taken
this opportunity of going into liquidation.
Another failure in the book trade-that
of Potter & Potter of Boston-will attract
notice. Only few weeks ago a large pub
fishing concern in New York. which had
been formed By combining several firms,
engaged in publishing cheap novels, also
went by the board. The trouble in this
latter case was that the concern worked
on too narrow margin for profit. There
was little or no money in publishing Sea-
side and Lakeside and Munro libraries at
the price which their output commanded
in the market, and when the banks cur
tailed their purchases of book paper the
publishers naturally went to the wall.
The failure of the publishers of the
Ne1o England Magazine is not unex-
pected. They undertook business which
requires enormous capital and the highest
order of literary ability. AT the present
day nc magazine can hope to live unless it
can comrete, or nearly compete, with such
standards as Hdrper'S and the Century,
and these publications spend a fortune
every year. They pick out the brightest
writers of the day, and send them all over
the world at the publishers expense TO
write articles of travel. Thus the Hdrper'S
kept Theodore Child and the Century Mr..
Kennan on the road for years: each was
accompanied by an artist charged with the
duty of illustrating the writer's text. To
writer's of fiction they off er price for the
serial production of their works which
makes the copyright on the sales in book
form trivial in comparison. Both in their
literary and in their artistic departments
these magazines are content with nothing
short Of perfection: cost is apparently
little thought Of The series of personal
"reminiscences of the war published in the
Century constitutes literary and historical
monument which is almost without equal
in the language, and it is safe to say that
no English publisher ever issued such
picturesque panorama of famous places iE
England, with such excellent illustrations.
as has appeared in late numbers of
Hdrper's Magazine
No such lavish expenditure as these
articles involved could be afforded by
publication which did not enjoy the
circulation and above all the advertising
patronage which these periodicals COM
mand. Thus a publisher who proposes to
start rival magazine is required to go to
an outlay which his receipts will
not cover for years, and unless his
nurse is very long he will fail
before he reaches the turning point be-
tween loss and profit. William Waldorf
AStor can afford to enter the race. II the
Pail Mall Magazine loses half million
year for the next six or seven years it will
matter little to him. But when men of
small means embark in the business on
the vague notion that the public do not
know a good magazine from bad one, or
that they would as soon give quarter for
a periodical full of dull matter as buy one
they make mistake which will some day
land them in distress.
With perhaps the single exception of the
hardware trade no business has been as
steadily lucrative when conducted by men
of prudence ard ability as the business of
publisher. Most of the old houses have
become very wealthy and are making more
money than ever. This was certain from
the nature OF the business. Between writ
ers and publishers there is partnership
in which the profits are mostly absorbed
by the latter, and bare subsistence al
lowed to many of thu former. A writer is
doing we'll when he can support his family
decently; publisher is doing badly if he
has lot rows of well-built houses and a
trunk full of bonds Such publishers can
afford to indulge in luxuries like maga-
zines, but when their example is followed
by houses of limited experience and capi-
tai, or by writers burning for emancipation
from tie booksellers thralI, the outlook
is apt to be gloomy.