Evening star., 1896-11-14

were 1,IS6 co-opera-
tive societies in Great Britain, and their
total annual business was reported as more
than s166,0GO.OOO.
Cooperation began in England and It is
an assured success there. In this country it
Is sun experimental. The first co-operator
III England was man named Owen. He
i'iu az 'luea that all profit was wrong
that goods should be sold fer the cost of
production and handling. He preached his
theory industriously and persuaded a great
1uany people to establish cooperative
stores. But there was a fatal defect in his
system 1t was not organized on business
principles. There was no surplus on which
the store could rely in emergencies Conse-
quently a great many of the Owen stores
rallied. and the plan grew unpopular Ont
Of the hundreds of stores established prob
ably fifteen or twenty remain in existence
today.
1hen came the famous Rochdaie pioneers
twenty -eight poor weaverS in the little
town Oh Rochdale used to meet every night
TO talk about politics and the condition of
the laborlng man. just as thousands of lt-
lie groups meet in the towns and cities of
the United States today Discussing cost
and profit. they evolved the idea of estab-
ilshlng a store of their own so AS to save
the prohtS OF the middle man in the DUR
chase of their supplies. Each man con-
'rlbuted three-pence a week to the fund
and when Ii amounted to tWenty-eipht
pounds they established their store This
was the famous Rochdale store on which
almost all the cooperative stores in the
world are modelled. The idea is not to sell
goods at cost, but to sell them at the
market Price, keep an account of the pur-
chaSeS OF each member of the store and di-
vide the profits of the store at the end of g.
year in proportion to the purchases made.
Sharing the Profits.
There are variations of this original plan.
In some cooperative stores only members
are allowed to trade. They are the stock
holders Of the business in proportion to
their purchases, but no one but themselves
Is allowed to contribute to the profits In
others: any one may buy. bat the profits
are divided among the members. 'rhe
more advanced type of cooperative store
Is the one in which every purchaser shares
IN the profits. He receives q token inii-
catng the amount of his purchase and
when the dividend Is declared at the end
of a year he is entitled to receive that
dividend on the amount of the tokens he
has received.
These stores sell in competition with the
other retail stores In Great Britain and
Yet the dividends are very large Last
year out OF reports received from more
than million co-operators it was shown
. Una. 'o5s per cent of the buyers received
more than 10 per cent of their purchase
money back in the form of dividends. while
more than one-half a million purcbascrs
received dividends ranging from 10 to Is
per cent. These dividends were declared
OF course. after paying not only the whole
safe price OF the goods, but all cost of
handling. the rent of stores, ETC.
i"o OF three causes operate against the
cooperative store in the United States
one OF them is the fact that the Arnc-ic5n
"ofkinSmdn, who should be mosr inter
ested In 1t. does not have to look after the
pennies SO closely as his English hrotber
nf
must be greater on this side the wafer
Where salaries are much higher than
they are abroad. A man who would ms n
age the enormous business Of the co-opera
i've stores of all England as the late Mr.
Mitchell did. would be worth $4,000 to
SZo,Voo a year to big commercial enter
l1 pr,se E mere. but Mr.. Mitchells salary was
$500 year. The trust system. almost
universal in the United States is nrohih
lted by the RochGae PLAN vet ,nos- or
the failures of cooperative stores I'm the
Tiil'ea nm I states nave been due TO bad debts.
i ne English societies have the same fault
tnouRh not In so great degree OF 570
OF them making reports last year 20 ner
more fade Sred But they seem to do it
stores in the United States. NV
Union Stores.
After the Rochdale movement had gained
favor In England there was q wave Of
enthusiasm In the United States for the
organization of union" stores. Its crest
was in New England. Between 1917 and
1859 100 union stores were organized. srd
they were fairly prospero IS for time
Less than one-half that number reported
m m 1891, an aggregate annual trade Of s.
WO.OOO. Not one of these stores survives
In 1864 the Rochdale plan was introdu ,ad
in Philadelphia, and two years later the
Patrons of Husbandry started another
union store" movement. All the stores or
ganiZed under this movement are now ont
existence
failed after less than three years Of exist
ence-ts failure due in the most part to
bad debts
Between 1884 and 1883 the Knights of
Labor were gaining in Importance at a
wonderfully rapid rate, and a great many
Incidental labor movements resulted, among
them the organization of cooperative in
dustries OF various kinds. In connection
with these were established cooperative
stores. But for the most part these failed
because the people who organized them
had the vagueSt notions of the principleS
of cooperation.
OF the cooperative industries which
were organized at this Time very few re-
main. There were eight cooperage shops
established in Minneapolis. and the eyes
of the labor world were on them for q
long time. Only four Of these survive The
Minnesota bureau of LABOR reports that one
good result of the cooperation Is the pre-
vention of strikes; because If the men in
other shops want to strike they cannot
persuade the cooperative workers to strike
against themselves, and the cooperative
shops can furnish all the barrels needed
by the manufacturers Of Minneapolis. The
state mine inspectors Of Illinois report
that the few cooperative coal mines in
that state for the same reason exercise
an adverse influence on wages; because
being producers we'll laporers, they
will sell at any price rather than not sell
at ALL and in dull times they interfere
with the work of other miners in the same
district and compel them to work at lower
r,nf a. all 1r or inv,