The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1894-05-05
BAKING POWDER.
WAR IN ICE AND BEER.
The Beer Men and Ice Companies G
Loggerheads and a Fight On.

The Beer Men and Ice Companies at
Loggerheads and a Fight On.
War has been declared between the ice
manufacturers and beer dealers. As the
result of the war ice is already down to
25 cents hundred. and beer is to be sold
at 81 keg next week. The beer dealers
put the price of ice down. and the ice
manufacturers propose to put the price of
beer down in retaliation. The result is
likely to be very pretty fight of which
the people will get the benefit. Cheap
ice ana cheap beer will add a great deal
to the comfort of the great majority of
the people uring the long hot summer.
The contestants are the Savannah Ice
Delivery Company on one side and the
Savannah Brewing Company, and Mr..
George Meyer on the other The news
has been circulated among all the retail
beer dealers that the ice company will
have several carloads of beer on hand
next week, which it will dispose of at 81
a keg, just half the present price. 1t is
understood the beer Will be brought from
Mobile. where the Central Ice Company,
which controls the Gorrie Ice Company,
also controls a brewery
The antagonism between the wholesale
beer dealers and the ice manufacturers is
an old story. The beer manufacturers and
wholesale agents are compelled to have
large quantities of ice in handling their
business. Business competition has also
forced them to furnish ice to their
customers at low rates. The ice manufac-
turers have always endeavored to contne
the ice business of the beer dealers
strictly to the customers of the latter,
for which purpose many agreements have
been made in time past. The ice COM
panies endeavored to furnish the beer
dealers with ice, but the latter claimed
that they could handle their business
more satisfactorily by furnishing their
own ice.
The Savannah Brewing Company man
ufactures its own ice for use in its bust
ness and In supplying its customers. Mr.
Meyer, who represents the Anheuser-
Busch Brewing Company IN Savannah
and is also the manager of the Georgia
Brewing Association on Bay street,
has boon importing natural
Ice for use in his business
for several seasons. Mr. Meyer
formerly got his ice from the Gorrie com
pany. He claimed that he could not get
fair treatment and two or three seasons
ago he branched out in the natural ice
business, importing ice for his own use as
well as for sale.
The Crystal Ice Company entered the
field at the same time and there was q
general drop in the price of ice. Last
season Mr.. Meyer entered into an agree
ment with the Gorrie company to supply
him with ice and ceased the importation
of natural ice The Crystal Ice Company
having been taken into the ice trust, Of
which about all the ice factories from
Charleston to New Orleans are members,
the Savannah Ice Delivery Company had
no competition, and the price of ice was
raised 10 nearly double that OF the pre-
vious season. There was a great cutlery
at the prices charged, but all the COM
panies being in the trust the people had
no recource, so high prices for ice ru ed all
summer. This season MIR. Meyer deci led
to enter the natural ice business again.
He had no difficulty in getting O large
trade, as natural ice seems TO be given
the preference. The competition resulted
in drop in the prices of ice from go and
% cents per hundred pounds to 30 cents
delivered and % cents per hundred at the
warehouse.
The Delivery company charged that
Mr.. Meyer and the Savannah Brewing
Company were not combining them
selves to their customers in the
sales of ice. The two beer COM
panies denied this, but said they could
not prevent their customers, the grocery
men, from retailing ice in small quanti-
ties to those who were not able to buy it
in any other way. The upshot of it all is
that the Delivery company proposes to
make it warm for the beer men In other
words, it proposes to freeze them out of
the ice business. The fight will be en-
joyed by the consumers.