The Farmington times. (Farmington, St. Francois County, Mo.) 1905-1926, 1921-08-19
THERE ARE NO DULL SEASONS
IF THE MERCHANT KNOWS
HOW TO BUY, HAS THE RIGHT
PRICES AND ADvERTISES.

PRICES AND ADVERTISES.
The tragedy OF business in the
smaller towns is that at certain sea-
sons of the year most of the mer-
chants take it as matter of course
that there must be a suspension of
business when the "dul" season ar
rives and many sit down and lose
money. They do not seem to grasp
the big idea that it is during this pc
riod that hard thinking and heavier
advertising artillery should be brought
into play. Most any man can sell
goods when everybody has plenty of
money, when there is no ore out Of
job, and when veritable mania for
buying has a grip on the people, but
in these days of money stringency,
when prices of practically all commo-
dities are paying tribute to debated
values, when the spirit of unrest and
uncertainty has possessed the minds
OF the people, it takes a real merchant
to put the job over"
NOTHING BUT PERSISTENT AID
VERTISING, backed by the right pric-
es, will accomplish the feat.
Down in this secti of the South
the heaviest blow to business has been
administered. 1t is primarily a cot
ton section. Last fall the price on
this staple dropped far below the cost
of production. The previous year the
rainy spell from September till De-
cember destroyed the hay and corn
crops and all feed stuff was bought
at high price. This made last years
cotton crop cost more to produce than
any crop in the history of the South.
The people were in debt to their eyes,
and many became discouraged. OF
course this condition Stacked business,
especially to those who began to
economic on the wrong end of the
line by cutting advertising space.
But here is a story worth passing
on. The hero is a young merchant
who has caught the vision of success
full merchandising. He knows the
value of advertising. He is not afraid
to invest in printers ink to the limit
for he has many times put it to the
test and go results. He is young and
aggressive. He has the genuine
American spirit of "get up and CO."
He has enough of the sporting element
in him to plunge when the faint-hearted
business men are sitting around won
dering how they can sell enough goods
to pay expenses. The first of June,
Sam Foust, of the leading dry goods
firm of Foust Bros, decided to put on
sale that would break any record
made during the period just after the
war when the whole country was still
intoxicated on victory and buying, and
when a spirit of ignomf nj possessed
the people. Sam Foust, the buyer for
this firm, is a sound business man.
He watched the trend of the times.
He waited until the big concerns in
St. Louis had reached a point when
they were anxious to UNLOAD" at a
tremendous sacrifice. He went to
market and bought seasonable, desir-
able merchandise. at very low price.
This good buy made it possible for him
to sell at a profit and beat any price
on the local market. He bought only
goods of quality and worth more on
regular sales than he was asking. He
was scrupulously careful to maintain
his enviable reputation as "the store
of Quality" He contracted with the
local paper for two pages of space
and flooded the country with circulars
of the same size. He offered 100 free
tickets to the picture show to the first
100 customers entering his store on
opening morning. He gave $500
Counterpart to the first customer pur-
chasing $35 worth. This gave every
clerk in the store a customer and all
were buying with rush to get the
prize. The following week he repeat
ed this offer for tickets to the show
and gave another prize for the first
purchase of $50. 'As a result he start
led the natives with his tremendously
low prices and made believers out of
the skeptical competitors who had
prophesied all manner of bAdl uck at
this season Of the year, when no one
had money" But his firm found the