The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1897-12-01
WITH THE J0BBERS
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE NEW
QUARTERS OF l.. l.. MAY
& co.
HAVE FIFTY BRANCH STORES.
NICoLs & DEAN SHIPPING WOOD
AND STEEL FOR KLoNDIKE
SLEDS.
NEW INDUSTRY AT SEATTLE.
Description of the sIeds Intended
for Use in Alaska-Notes OF
the Wholesalers.
HAVE FIFTY BRANCH STORES.
NEW INDUSTRY AT SEATTLE

Few people have any idea of the
magnitude of the seed business. and
especially of that representative West
ern concern, L. L. May & Co., of this
city L. L. May & Co. are now COM
fortably settled in their new quarters
at Sixth and Minnesota streets, occu-
plying four large floors on the Mime
sofa street side and two on Sixth street.
While cellar runs the entire length of
the building. They also have potato
cellars in West ST. Paul with a ca
pacity of 10000 bushels and a large
warehouse and twenty-five greenhouses
at Como, occupying an entire block.
They employ $50 to 400 people, send out
lie, 900 catalogues annually, and their
postage bill on these and for packets
of seeds foots up the snug little sum
of $4,000 to $685. 900 year.
The concern has over fifty branch
stores in the Northwest and handles
from thirty to forty carloads of seeds
neutrality-suspicious. of packets. Orders
for these come in from every state in
the Union and from foreign countries.
Yesterdays mail brought orders from
Norway and from far off Australia. The
East contributes heavy buyers, some
of the large department stores in New
York purchasing a hundred thousand
packets at one order.
A Globe reporter. was shown
through May & Co.'S new down town
establishment yesterday. The offices
occupy large space on the Minnesota
street side. On the floor above are
novel and intricate machines automati-
cally filling envelopes with seeds, put
ting a certain quantity in each packet.
One large apartment IS given up en-
tirely to the catalogue room, whence
the brightly colored little books will be
sent out to the world. Other rooms are
used for packing and shipping, and sew
eral floors are filled with hundreds of
bags of seeds.
At the Minnesota street entrance is
the local salesroom and opening off
this a. beautiful conservatory, filled
with rare plants and flowers, tinkling
fountains and sweet-tuned, feathered
songsters. A number of cosy seats, ar
ranged in this enchanting spot, offer
welcome rest to the ladies when they
are down town on shopping eXpedi-
tons
The seasons business will shortly
open and for three months there Will
be a rush. During the past couple or
weeks there was a large buslnes5-the
Thanksgiving trade-which Mr.. Darrow
reports as very satisfactory
A new industry has sprung up in
Seattle-the manufacture of Klondlke
sleds. Nieols e. Dean have just shipped
four carloads of wood and steel to that
city to be used in making these sleds,
and the magnitude 'sS the business
may be seen by the fact that one con-
Germ alone is turning cut 5000 of these
vehicles to convey supplies to the Alas
kan miner The following description
of these sleds was given to G OBJ
reporter by Jesse A. Gregg:
They are seven feet long and sixteen
inches wide, similar to a boys hand
sled only longer. They are constructed
of the best hickory with steel shoe
one and three-fourths inches wide and
one and one sixteenth inches thick, on
the runner The sleds are light and
very strong.
The offices of Finch, Van Slyck,
Young & Co., are being entirely rear
ranged to afford better facilities and
more office room, which is necessitated
by the increased and steadily fncreas-
ms office force. When completed they
will be a model of convenience. The
improvement is under the direct super
vision of e. A. Young.
The Mullen McFadden company re-
ports a steadily increasing demand for
their two specialties, those tOOthsome
dainties "Crack-a Jack" and Nut
Poi" These articles are being pushed
by the manufacturers and are now
household words throughout the North
west They are also putting up line
of cough drops in penny packages, more
as an advertisement than for the direct
profit therein
o. P. Lanpher, of Lanpher. Finch &
Skinner reports that the seasons bust
ness in their line is drawing to a close,
although the cold weather causes con-
siderable demand, especially in small
orders to fill out stocks. And it has
been very satisfactory season too,
was Mr.. Lanpher's comment.