Page 73 - Past Chair Book-Pre 2020

First Annual ConZ'cntion

You would say you know the size of these people from your past
experience. If you are a small dealer, and your goods are changed
from an unprofitable line to a profitable line, you should be
satisfied.
A Mem ber: I understood him to say that he thought it one
of the worst things we could do to put it on the basis of quantity.

M r. M cI ntosh : Quantity for the past and not quantity for
the future. If we have been buying $?0,000 of files in the past,
we do not want them to come out and put it on that. It does not
do any harm to base it on past sales, but it makes an inducement
for you to increase your sales.
P resident S t r o n g: I would suggest that the manufacturers
would be governed largely by the character of the house without
reference to what they have done in the past.
Take, for instance, this Association: Any member of this
Association that has business enough, and character enough, and
reputation enough, can get an established rate right through.
M r. F e r n l e y : We go to the manufacturer and say we want
a differential in the shape of a premium or rebate for every one
you recognize as a jobber, be he large or small. The manufac­
turer says, “Do you want us to sell the smallest concern of your
Association at the same prices we sell the Simmons Hardware
Company ?” We say that is not the point we come to discuss, but
we want the proper differential for every one you recognize as a
jobber. We say if you want to pick out a few people you have
always compensated a little confidentially at the end of the year,
and continue that, we, as an Association, do not advocate it, but
we do not object. You may have in your Association some people
who have been getting two and a half per cent better than the
other buyers.
I speak by the card, because I did conduct, before I was
forced to take this position, a little jobbing house in Philadelphia,
and I had an idea that the big houses bought every thing cheaper
than the small ones; but I have been behind the scenes and know
better. They were telling the large houses differently.

Don’t you see the position your Secretary would be in, or I

would be in, if T say, “Xo, you prevent my getting that extra