The Ely miner., 1930-05-09

business, sixty one chain stores started
and apparently filled the places once
occupied by these three hundred re-
tiring from business, one hundred and
eighty eight owned their own build
ings while one hundred and twelve
cancelled valuable leases and the great
majority of these buildings remained
idle, thus further decreasing the tax
able values of these communities.
Notwithstanding, these stores had
been forced out of business by the
competition of the chain store. the
merchandise being sold by the chain
stores was no cheaper, and in many
instances higher, and of poorer
quality.
Each of the three hundred stores
which retired or failed, employed an
average of five people and furnished
a living to seven people, thus fifteen
hundred people were thrown out Of
employment and twenty-one hundred
deprived of their means of support.
Each of these twenty-one hundred
people were consumers of the pro-
ducts of the farms of that state, while
all of the fifteen hundred who were
thrown out of employment were tax
payers to a greater or lesser degree.
During this same period, or for the
year of 1927, one large chain whose
business is principally in the west,
reported sales for that period of $14-
10000 per month, per store, or an
average of $168,000.00 per year per
store. This would equal sales of $685.
10000 per year per store for three
prosperous independent stores, and
that is about the way in which the
business was formerly divided, except
that the three prosperous independent
merchants were all liberal taxpayer S
and their earnings were all invested in
the city or county in which they were
located, thus returning in part to the
people the profits of the business.
It was also found upon investigation
that not one single chain store owned
their own building, and not one of the
local managers owned his own home,
and so the only tax levy that could
be made against these sixty-one stores
was upon their stock of merchandise
which was always at its lowest point
at the assessment period, but they
were the stores the over burdened tax
payer patronized and for what reason
lic lllillSCll COulu llOO Chpletlii.
The seriousness of this situation
seemed clearly apparent to most
everyone except those who were
bringing it about by their patronage
of these chain stores, therefore sur
vey or investigation was made to de-
termine if possible the cause or ex-
cuse, if any, for the purchases being
made in these stores by tax-paying
public who by their own acts were
destroying the taxable assets of their
communities. In localities where even
small school bond issues had been pro-
posed, and defeated because of fear
on the part of the people that it
might in a small way incrase their
taxes. But they were apparently un-
able to realize that they were increas-
ing their taxes in a much greater sum,
through chain store buying.
And so, purchases were made in
several chain stores, and similar
number made in an equal number Of
independent stores. These purchases
were made without at any time re-
vealing the indentity of the purpose
of the purchaser, and it was found
that the purchases made in the in
dependent stores averaged less in price
and superior quality to the purchases
made in the chain stores, and this
made the problem more perplexlng.
It was discovered, however, that in
every chain store in which purchases
were made, that some two or three
items of known value were being sold
at much less than their real value,
while the stock as a whole averaged
higher than the prices of the indie
pendent merchant. 1t was also dis
covered that the articles on which a
low or cut price was made, were items
on which little or no profit was made
by any store, while items which
usually showed a fair profit were, as
a whole, priced much above the price
of the independent merchant, as these
were items with which the public was
not familiar
Another thing quite noticeable was
the fact that these chain stores had
managed to secure lines different from
those handled by their independent
competitors so that they would not be
shown up by comparison. However,
the independent merchants have
always been required by their patrons
to carry the old reliable and well
known brands of merchandise, and yet
their same buyers seemed willing to
take what the chain store had to offer
without even questioning its origin or
quality.
The chain store menace is growing,
and unless an intelligent population
can be made to see and understand, the
dependent merchant will soon be only
memory, and what must be the
answer?
The lowest of all assessed valuations
are those placed upon the farm, much
lower than upon the non-income pro-
ducing home, while the highest as
sessed valuation is that placed upon
merchandise, and while merchandise
may cease to exist, farms will remain
and be subject to taxation and at
much higher rate than this will apply
to the homes and any other taxable
property which can be located by the
local assessor.
To further enlighten the reader as
to the seriousness of this situation I
will offer some very interesting figures
taken from a recent survey of the
chain store situation. In order to
strike an average in retail merchan-
dising, eleven cities were chosen taking
the medium, along with one of our
largest cities. The cities chosen were:
Seattle, Fargo N. D., San Francisco,
Atlanta, Ga, Denver, Baltimore, Kan
sas City, Syracuse, Chicago, Provid-
ence r. l., Springfield, ILL.,
In these cities, the aggregate sales
of all grocery stores for one year
amounted to $488,509,OO0 The share
done by the independent stores
amounted to $286, ,767,OOO against
total done by the chain stores of