Omaha daily bee., 1893-11-19
OF 0MAHA'S TRADE
Gold Weather Has a Favorable Effect Upon
Business.
COLLECTIONS SHOW VERY LITTLE CHANGE
, Certain Lines Show n Decided Improve
ment In the Volume OF Goods Moving,
,yh,ie Others Have settled Down
to a Steady Thing.

Although the general run OF reports re-
soivcd from jobbers does not show any very
! radical change in the trade situation in this
market, still it has not been entirely devoid
OF interesting features. In some lines OF
! business, notablyi hardware, there has been
an Improvement in the demand for goods,
while the trade in dry goods, boots and
shoes, rubber goods and similar lines has
been very satisfactory. Without doubt the
colder weather has done much to stimulate
demand and with a continuance of good, solid
winter weather the jobocrs are generally
anticipating a very fair movement ofseason-
able goods for the balance OF the year. A
weather market, however, is not always 10
be depended upon in this latitude, as 1t hap
pens too often for the good of business that
/ tho weather is mild until after the first of
the year.
The jobbers of holiday goods have had a
very good week, as country merchants are
all making some preparation for the holidays
by putting in something to attract the atten-
tion of purchasers. From some quarters
come reports that the people are going to
buy very sparingly of luxuries and confine
! themselves more to the necessities than
usual. but so far it is not easy to note any
change in this respect. Where there has
been a falling off in the volume of business
the shrinhage has been pretty general on all
| classes OF goods.
While certain lines have shown improve
ment others have remained about steady,
without important change one way or the
other. Thus business i'll the jobbing branch
of the grocery trade was generally referred
to as well up TO the average, but as not
showing any Improvement over the previous
week.
There is very little indication in the trade,
either on the part of retailers OF jobbers,
toward anticipating wants. Orders. gener-
ally speaking, are for small lots of goods, but
the frequency of these orders makes up in a
large degree for the loss in size. The feel
ing appears to be gaining ground that bust
ness has settled down for the winter, and
that there will be Il good, steady demand for
goods, but that there Will be no rush or
boom. 1t promises to be n demand based al
most entirely upon the consuming ability of
the country.
Collections, while not so very good, are
fair for the season and about up to the aver
age. There has not been much complaint re-
garding collections for the past few weeks,
and it is more than likely that the territory
tributary TO Omaha is in better shape in
this respect than some parts of the country.
The bank clearings at Omaha have shown
j n decided improvement during the past six
days, the total being the largest in a good
many weeks. On Monday the clearings ex-
ceeded 81 600, 900 for the first time since the
month of July. While q good deal of the
gain was ascribed to the Union Pacific pay
checks, which came in in very large num-
bers the first of the week, the fact that a
gain was made shows a healthy condition of
business. AS compared with last year there
was n decrease of 16 per cent. While this
! decrease is larger than the friends of the
city would like to see it, it is small
to what other cities have suffered.
Thus the decrease in the clearlngs for the
past week as compared with a year ago was
50 per cent for Denver; Kansas City, "a per
cent; Milwaukee, al per cent: Minneapolis.
37sper cent; st. Paul, 33 per cent; Sioux
City, AZ per cent, and Lincoln % per cent.
= The decrease for the whole country was %. 8
per cent.
There is no doubt but what business is
being injured by the 'timidity of that class
of mon. through whom the larger operations
are usually carried on. They incline to the
view that after the severe experiences of
the summer business cannot be expected
to Immediately recover the ground
that was lost, but that. the re-
vival must be gradual. Some even
go so far as to declare that the uncertainty
of tariff and financial legislation will be a
disturbing factor sufficient to delay the COM
plete restoration of business until spring.
How far this may prove to be true remains
TO be seen, but at the present time there is
1 no question but what business Is gradually
J recovering, and it is reasonable TO anticipate
n continuation Of this process unless some
unforeseen event should intervene to change
the course of events in the business world.