Court Opinion

ID: 9636720
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 14:40:45.211892+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:09:48.571151
License: Public Domain

SWAN, Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
For reasons which may be‘briefly stated, I am unable to concur in the opinion of the court.
For an agreed monthly subscription price the Biddle Purchasing Company supplies a market informational and purchasing service to some 2,400 subscribers ¡olesalers and distributers). The Biddle ly keeps in touch with about 5,000' srs and gets prices and other mar-formation which it .transmits to its fcers. When a subscriber desires to purchase, he informs Biddle Comihis need, and the price he wants [and Biddle Company sends the one of the producers, who ships the goods direct to the subtThe seller pays Biddle Company Tge commission on the sale, and *693this is credited to the subscriber in reduction of the subscription price agreed to be paid for Biddle Company’s service. About 14 per cent, of the subscribers receive cash remittances after their subscriptions have been completely paid for by the crediting of commissions.
The Commission has found that Biddle Company does not act for the sellers but only for its subscribers. In my opinion this finding cannot be sustained. Biddle Company performs a regular brokerage service for the sellers and receives the same fee as they pay other brokers for a similar service. The fact that in many instances Biddle Company selects the seller, since the subscriber frequently does not designate from whom to buy, shows clearly that Biddle Company performs a service for the seller. It performs a further service in bringing the seller’s products and prices to the attention of the subscribers, even though no sale immediately results. Biddle Company also performs a service for the buyer by supplying market information in addition to the purchasing service when an order is placed. Unless the statute forbids it, there could be no objection to the Biddle Company getting the customary brokerage from the seller and also a fee from the buyer, since the parties know that it is to be compensated by both. In other words, if Biddle Company kept the commissions paid by the sellers, the statute would not forbid it. It would be within the exception “for services rendered.” Section 1(c) of the Robinson-Patman Price Discrimination Act, 49 Stat. 1526, 15 U.S.C.A. § 13(c) though ungrammatically phrased, expresses the intention to forbid a seller from paying a brokerage fee to a buyer or his agent unless the payee renders some service to the seller. Its object is to prevent unfair competitive conditions which are created when a buyer gets a lower price than competitors in the guise of a commission paid to the buyer or to some agent or dummy. In my opinion, it was not intended to eliminate such a business as the Biddle Company does for 86 per cent, of its subscribers. Their goods cost them as much as their competitors would pay for the same goods. In addition, they pay something to Biddle Company for the service it renders them. In effect, the arrangement is that the Biddle Company will charge for its informational and purchasing service the difference between what it collects from sellers as brokerage on orders placed by the subscriber, and the monthly subscription price. This means that different subscribers pay different sums for the Biddle service, and the less they order through the Biddle Company the more they pay for informational and purchasing service, but I see nothing in the statute forbidding that. Only when the Biddle Company pays over brokerage fees in excess of the subscriber’s subscription price does the buyer get a discriminatory rebate which gives him an advantage over a competitor who does not take the Biddle service. It seems to me that the statute should be construed to forbid Biddle Company’s method of doing business only with respect to the 14 per cent, of its customers who really get a price reduction on the goods through the commissions paid Biddle Company by the sellers. Such a construction will save a legitimate and useful business which has existed for half a century, and one which I do not believe Congress intended to outlaw by the statute in question.
I think the order of the Commission should be vacated except in so far as it forbids the Biddle Company from paying over to a subscriber any excess of commissions above the subscription price of the service.