Warren sheaf., 1911-05-11

dlviduals who sometimes come
around. It would be like Judging the
reputability of the newspaper press Of
the state by the Crookston Times
not fair comparison.
Not finding it practical to dispense
with the services of travelling sales
men, the wholesale houses must seek
other means and introduce other eco
, Monies IN meeting the competition of
the catalogue houses They may do
IT. Dy selling a higher grade OF goods
tnan the catalogue houses do, closer
study OF the needs and demands of
the various communities as to the
KIND OF goods required, buying goods
IN large quantities and taking adj
vantage of every turn in the market
and saving in freight rates, and IN
other conceivable ways. Doing a
purely wholesale business. the whole
sale houses need not divide and weak
en- their efforts by attention to the re
tail trade, as the catalogue house
must do But in some way or other
the competition of the mail order
mouse has to be met, and the cost of
maintaining travelling statesmen over
come, because people will buy where
they can buy the cheapest no
one can blame them for that. The
merchants of Warren are underselling
the mail order houses every day of
the year on nearly all classes of
goods
Mr. Smith seems to labor under the
misapprehension that the travelling
man leads an easy life. We do not
think so. To be away from home
and all the time on the go, catching
trains at all hours Of the night and
day, irregular meals and sometimes
no meals at all, irregular hours of
sleep on beds that always are not
| beds of roses-these are some of the
things which we for one do not envy
him. Most commercial statesmen
would very much prefer to be employ
ed at home where they could have
chance to see their family and loved
ones once a day.
| The Crookston Times in it's efforts
to shed crocodile tears for the travel
ling men, falls into it's usual error Of
barking up wrong tree. 1t accuses
rural mail carrier j. II. Smith of be.
ing the writer of the communication
in the Sheaf ,and having set up it's
man of straw, it proceeds to annihi-
late him in an editorial TRADE, which
leaves the sympathy of the reader de-
cidedly with the mail carrier, who in
this case is as innocent as new born
babe. Charles ]. Smith is an entire
ly different person. The Times al
ways has the faculty of hurti-- -
cause it is supposed to favor. Every
body in Crookston knows that. The
Sheaf entertains none but the friend
liest feelings for the travelling men
and those who allege the contrary are
only trying to deceive. But we have
also high opinion of the farmers,
Who are the backbone of the country,
and when we receive duly signed
:, communication from a farmer discuss
ing some phase of business, we will
! publish it, if we like, even though we
may wholly disagree with his views
Farmers do not generally mince their
words and we respect them for it. But
j we always reserve the right to dis
agree with them and to show up flaws
in their argument if we can. Had
we not been so busy last week, part
of this article would have appeared
then, in connection with Mr. Smiths
letter, but that would probably have
taken the edge off Mr. Smiths article
and then the world would never have
known how sharp it was.