Ashland tidings. [volume] (Ashland, Or.) 1876-1919, 1916-03-23
Ashland, Ore, Thursday, Mar. %, 'ld
WHO'S WHO, AND WHY.

The Business Mems Association
had under consideration a TRADE
AT HOME" campaign. The object
was to make concerted effort to
educate the citizen to the unquestion-
able fact that he could better afford
TO pay his home merchant little
more for goods than he would have
TO pay mail order house for the
same article, because every dollar
spent with the home merchant stayed
in the community to enrich it with
ready cash, while the dollar sent
away was gone forever and left the
community that much the poorer.
The idea was a good one and the ar
gument absolutely true.
BUT.
Hiney Enders TOOK the floor to
advocate such a campaign and sug-
gested that the association get to-
gether and order a great lot Of bills
for a TRADE AT HOME campaign.
He said they could get them in big
lots from the east at a very cheap
price.
WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THAT?
Why not as we'll buy the TRADE
AT HOME CAMPAIGN bills from
Sears-Roebuck? They probably could
furnish them cheaper than the home
printer who spends his money in town
and pays taxes here, and might fur
nish them cheaper than they could be
had from the Portland printer who
pays taxes at least in the state.
There are a few definite reasons
why Ashland is not better town
commercially, and Enders has hit the
nail on the head without knowing it,
when he advocates having his TRADE
AT HOME bills printed by a mail
order house, while he boycots the
local printer.
The trouble with Ashland is that
there is no coordination or co-opera-
tion between either her merchants or
her citizens. None of them seems
to understand what it really takes to
build up a town. As soon as mer-
chant and citizen alike begin TO think
about the other fellow and to realize
the building power OF LEGAL co-cpera-
tion, Ashland will begin to look up.
But, as long az the EndeTs policy, as
illustrated in his proposal for TRADE
AT HOME bills, is continued, Ashland
commercially Will not amount to a
row OF pins. Mr.. Merchant, if you in
sist on buying out Of town because
you can get IL a little cheaper, why
in the name Of high heaven do you
complain when those in the market
for supplies you sell do the same
thing?
AS long as the Ashland druggist
buys his clothes of the mail order
house instead OF his neighbor cloth
ing merchant, he should not complain
81 other citizens send away for patent
medicines. As long al tie banker in
sists on buying his supplies from
Portland or San Francisco instead OF
one OF the merchants who carries his
account in the local bank, OF course
bank deposits will be low and money
tight.
II money is scarce, as 1t appears to
be, possibly the solution might be
found in the business men patroniz-
ing each other as we'll as insisting
that citizens be educated to the ad-
vantage OF spending their cash at
home.
What is sauce for the goose is sauce
for the gander.
II every business man in Ashland
would take a solemn pledge to see to
1t that every dollar he spends goes
to a local firm, when 1t is possible to
get what he wants here at any price,
he would likely find that half the
reason for trade at home campaign
has been automatically removed. Tit
for tat is a perfectly natural human
game.
Let's do the thing ourselves, before
we ask the other fellow to do it. We
may be surprised to find, when we