The labor world. [volume] (Duluth, Minn.) 1896-current, 1906-07-21
UNITED ] :. CIGAR STORES -.
D00Ms SMALL DEALERS
Unsuitable Octopus to Open
Stores in. Duluth-Small
Cigar Stores Doomed.
Its Purpose is to Control Sale
Of Trust Made Cigars-To
Destroy Our Factories.

That Unsuitable octopus, the United
Cigar Stores company, Is to open
store In Duluth in the Lyceum build
ing.
1t Is very natural for a labor paper
TO resent the coming Of such an in
stitution to the city.
There are number of local retail
cigar dealers in Duluth who are eking
out an existence selling cigars. This
trust makes it a business to drive out
all small dealers so that it may enjoy
a monopoly of the cigar trade, and so
that 1t may dispose, Of nothing but
trust-made cigars.
When It succeeds in it's nefarious
scheme 1t also drives out of business
every local cigar manufacturer. Think
what calamity that would be to Du-
luth where over $50 c1garmakers are
employed at exceptionally good wages.
The cigar and tobacco trust does not
turn out class of cigars like those
manufactured In Duluth. We are proud
OF Duluth's products, and SO is every
smoker In Duluth. The trust will lose
no time In putting our factories out of
business
The following article taken from a
Chicago paper may be of interest to
our readers, and may give them clear
idea of the purpose. of the trust:
wherever one goes in New York
are to be seen the stores of the United
Cigar Stores Company, the retail cigar
trust. There are about 400 OF these
stores in this city alone. They are on
the busiest thoroughfares and they
seem to be prospecting.
These stores are causing a revolu-
ton IN the retail cigar business in New
York. The opening of trust store
on block is the signal for the early,
if not immediate, disappearance Of long
established Independent stores Usu-
ally the proprietors of these stores
are approached beforehand by
representative of the trust and given
an opportunity to sell It, If the inde-
pendent dealer is wise man, he'll sell
at once"
Some time ago the proprietor of a
olga store twenty years old, established
on busy street, was waited upon by
a trust agent and asked his figure.
The dealer wanted bid. Three
thousand dollars said the agent.
"shoo,"' said the dealer, I'm clearing
that as net profit every year. You'll
have to do better than that"
YOU'D better sell now" said the
agent, It'll pay you. We're going to
open store on this block, and we'd
prefer to have your stand. We'd rather
not fight you"
But the dealer held out. The trust
opened shortly after. Six months later
the dealer; sold.@to the trust. for five
hundred dollars and was glad to get
it. The trust. paid him understanding
ly, as if it were making gift-which,
in fact, it was.
Another dealer who did ten thous-
and dollar business last year. says he'll
do well to take in two thausand this
year. He's trying to sell out now.
These are only instances. Similar
stories are told all along the track of
the trust stores.
The retail cigar trust hits the I'M
ions as hard as the retailers, for union
cigars are tabooed and the non-union
brands have all the sale. The induce
ment of cut-rate cigars is proving
stronger than the average union man
can withstand.
The elimination of the small capital
list on the distributive field has only
begun. When the little manufacturers
were crowded out of the productive
field, the number of retailers rapidly
increased. This was cited as an II
dication that the middle class was
not being crowded out and that
wealth. was more widely
diffused than ever before.
But with the monopolization of the
productive forces, the great capitalists
are compelled to invest their surplus
in other directions. Consequently,
concentration in the realm of distribu
ton follows. Undoubtedly behind the
United Cigar Stores Company are the
dustrial kings.
THE retail cigar trade is not the
only one affected in this manner. The
James Butler Company has over 200
retail grocery stores in New York,
with more coming. And a confectionery
store trust is also beginning. to get
in its work.
What is true Of New York is true
of the whole country,in lesser de-
gree, of course. The small dealers will
have to become wage workers, and
they will listen more readily than form
erly to Socialist argument. They will
see that any hope Of becoming indie