The Brinkley argus., 1920-01-22

invited me to be their guest here and deliver the same lecture, thinking pos sibly 1t might be of some benefit to the business people of the city of Dubuque. l might say in starting so that you will understand how I happen to be in this line of work, that I am just an ordinary merchant and not an ora tor like Mir. Karr, whom you heard last night.
 l understand you do not have a re- tail merchants organization. You are missing a grand thing. What is really the life of any city? It is the merchants. They are the real people who do things, keep everything mov- ing. Should they not work together as unit and shape the destinies of your city? And urge you to get to- gether in an organization, have a few banquets like this, and talk over the problems of your city, and your ad- vertising propositions. I am a great believer in collective advertising, where everybody in the town get to- gether and advertise, and really one of your greatest assets is a good press with q good big circulation. l have nlways said that l attribute a great deal of our success to the newspaper Wen.
 Borrowed Money to Pay Freight on
 First Stock.
 When l first started in business % years ago l bought out a grocery firm iB the city of Devils Lake, N. D. For tunateIy had letter of credit and a Minneapolis grocery firm let me have Sl,Go0 worth of merchandise. had worked in the grocery business. As q boy of twenty-one years of age the highest salary ever got was S3S a month. didn't have enough money to pay the freight on my merchandise and borrowed money from my father. I opened up that little store. had to pay Sl5 a month rent. Some of inc merchants failed in that town and l bought some of the fixtures, about S3J or $40 worth. When l got ready to open up the store, newspaper man d friend of mine, came in and said: "tred, you have your stock bere, and l believe you understand the grocery business You are pretty well known here and pretty well liked. l want to tell you something. If you want Co succeed you must advertise. I want you tn take a little space i'll my paper. Now don't think that you are merely giving it as a donation 10 the paper II will mean not only business for me, but business for you as we'll" He had book called Printers Ink" He said: "I get this book every week md l will bring it to you, Read it. Not only read 1t. but absorb it."
 did that and some way or other when l had that little store stocked and let the people know that was their patronage, l began to do busi- ness. Very fortunately for me my old boss did not believe in advertising We. kept putting litle ads in every week-Suappy live ads. My old boss thought 1t didn't amount to anything but it dlSnt work out that way, and the business began to come to me. The first year I sold with the aid of enc man S23,00O worth of groceries. Ilmade up my mind that it was ab- solutely necessary that l get the money for what I sold. l was always very careful on the credit and insist ed that they pay within at least thirty days. I told them I had to pay for the goods that way, and they under stood, and with very few exceptions and losses, they paid me. went along that way for three or four years. II kept increasing my advertising. Later l added dry goods and clothing. We began to grasp the idea that ad- vertising had helped to sell groceries and would naturally help any other line. l did the advertising. The busi- ness grew rapidly and in 1907 we built n very beautiful store. Everybody 1Haid l was going broke sure. The ;bui1ding cost me $75.000. It is 75 by la4o feet, two stories and basement, tNe only use the lower floor and the