The herald., 1896-11-01
Local, Eastern and Foreign
Commercial Dealings
WALL STREET SPECULATION
History Of Cooperative Merchandising
In the United States
Gives the Results of a Carefully Con-
Quoted Study-The Plan a Failure

The next bulletin of the department of
labor at Washington will contain his
tory of cooperative distribution in this
country, by Prof. e. w. Bemis, sum-
mary of which is given by the Washing
ton correspondent of the Journal of Com
mence, as follows:
Turning to distributive cooperation. the
special subject of his report, Prof. Bemis
sketches several plans for securing dis
counts and then takes up the cooperative
stores. The union stores established in
New England from 1S47 to 1852 which lin
tied dividends and sold goods a little above
COST either failed or were transformed
into private enterprises. None survived
in their original form of the 769 which were
started, although $50 of them, mostly in
New England, reported in 1857 a capital
OF WI, ,00O and an annual trade of 81, ,00O 900.
The grange stores organized by the Pat
rons of Husbandry suffered similar fate.
The oldest cooperative store in this coun-
try at the time of its failure in 1896 was the
Danvers Cooperative Union society with
capital of $500, in the shoe manufacture
ing town of Danvers, Mass. At first, how
eyer, from 1865 to 1869 it sold goods ex
clusiyely to its members, and at cost. af-
ter the methods of the other union stores
Kochdale plan until 1869. N The s r failure is is
SO disastrous as to leave the stockholders
only % per cent of their investment. The
store at kingston Mass, which was found
"a June IA, 1876, is still doing a successful
business. although the volume was only
$9517. with a capital of $3.50 in the present
year. The inquiry made for John Hop
kins' University in 1886 showed that thirty
stores We're in existence outside of New
England. of which seventeen seem to have
since disappeared. or twenty-seven dis
trbutive associations started in New Jer-
seX, since 1878 only eight are now running.
The total cooperative trade outside of
New England, Eng SO far as reported, was
about S1.000.000 in the associations making
even partial returns in 1886. Although it
IS believed that no large societies have
as complete, survey OF the field as was
made in 1886 might reveal a small growth
in the cooperative trade outside of New
England during the past ten years. Near
ly all the associations that have been
reached in this inquiry give dividends on
trade but in Kansas these dividends are
small at present, owing to the agricultural
depression there which is causing the fail
ure of many private stores. In New Eng
h the x q6ok o loo is ebneSuragndg
of $134, ,0C0 in 1886 are now closed. the trade
of the remaining thirteen of those in ex-
om s NE TO fGs%sG Psraa Sad mas nns Dw
stores report a trade. of $251 4o9.49. The
total cooperative trade IN New. England.
almost entirely on the Rochdale plan, is
thus over twice as great as ten years ago.
To the figures for the western and south
ern states should be added 1S4 labor ex-
cHanSeS, Wlln bUuU members, pursuing
methods of a slightly different character
1.-THE average rate of dividend on the
trade Of the members In twenty New Eng
land Rochdale stores in 1895 was 6S per
cent, and i'm thirteen outside of New Eng
land 3.5 per cent According to the returns
from 1892 English co-operators, as pub
ished in the English Labor Gazette for
June, 1896. only 1.3 per cent of the members
received 3 per cent or less. while 14.2 per
cent received from to 10 per cent. 54 per
cent of the members received from 10 to
Is per cent, and the remaining S0.5 per cent
received over Is per cent. In the thirty
three American associations just referred
to, only eight received over per cent, and
four of these over Q, the highest dividend
ton with $31, 900 trade at Sabattus, Me-"