The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1897-05-25
QUESTION OF FAIR PLAY
IT Pays . Druggist: to Give Customers
What They Want.

Nearly every one who sets out to buy
any advertised medicine at the drug
store knows what it is TO be met with the
assertion: mo, we haven't that, blu,
here's something else just as good. -
Perhaps the remark is added: I'VE put
IL up ourselves" or Its larger bottle
for the money"
What the druggist says usually sounds
quite reasonable, and as often as not the
purchaser goes out of the store with a
package of something different from
what was asked for.
IfthiS only happens once or twice, il
doesn't seem TO amount TO much, but
when dozen people in one day go to the
same store and ask for q bottle of
Jones Tonic" for example, and are
given something else. and when this re-
suit is multiplied by a thousand drug
gists in a thousand different towns, the
propriesors of Jones Tonic" naturally
get to feel pretty mad about it.
They argue in this way: 1--WE spend
great deal OF money advertising in the
papers 10 let people know about our
tonic When they go TO drug store
60 get Ii, IL is our advertising which
eends them, and it is no more than fair
to US that the druggist sell them what
they ask for
Some druggists agree with this view,
and some do not. One druggist says:
Business is business, that's all There's
no earthly reason why shouldn't sell a
preparation which / put UP myself in
preference 10 selling one that is adver-
tised in the papers. 1 know what mine
Is made of, and 1 think il is just as good,
If not better. Why shouldn't 1 say SO.
and sell il. if CAM"
Many millions of dollars are spent
every year in the business of making
and selling proprietary medicines, and in
spite of frequent skeptical snsers, some
of these remedies are originated and pre-
pared by experienced physicians and
Ekillful chemists of genuine scholarly at
tainmen'ts. Some druggists who possess
a comparatively small capital are in
clined 10 look upon a proprietary con-
Germ as if il were a big trust or power
full enemy 10 be resisted. but, on the
other hand, an increasing number of
advertised proprietary remedy of real
merit is a powerful ally of the retail
druggist
One druggist who was interviewed on |
the subject said: Il always sell people |
exactly what they ask for if / have il. |
When any one simply asks for a good
:cnic' or good cough medicine or any,
thing in THAI general way, if II is a thing |
put up myself. l sell them that if can, |
bu, II any one asks specially for Jones'
sell him Jones and nothing else. I |
know that people don't like 10 be |
switched off on 10 a different thing from |
what they ask for. They may take the
something else. but they're no; satisfied,
and they so somewhere else another
time. and You lose part Of their trade l |
know this is so. for I've watched il.
know that substituting something else
Tor what people ask for doesn't pay the
druggist in the long run
This sounds like fair play and good
business sense combined. The druggist
has a perfectly legal RICH; to sell the
goods ne favors or which pay him the
best profit; yet il the advertising of ,
certain proprietary article is the direct
means Of sending a customer 10 his store
il seems only right, morally speaking.
Tor him 10 sell the article asked Tor. ana
she customer. by insisting on getting the
thing he wants, would az least preserve
his or her own self-respects. The al
mighty public is the much-interss;ed
third party 70 this discussion. and ough:
20 be q Die 20 settle IL the ricb- nv.
Americans are altogether TOO good
about some things. and ALLOW
themselves 10 be imposed upon in many