Page 202 - One Thousand Ways to Make $1000

Keller first brought two cases of eggs into Chicago. He called from door to
door, selling butter and eggs at a fraction under store prices and guaranteed
them to be right from the farm. When these two cases of eggs were sold,
Keller drove back to his father’s farm and returned with seven cases. His
profit on each case was four dollars. Noticing that aside from groceries and
markets, there was no place where one could secure eggs, and considering the
friendly way in which the public received him, Harvey decided to open what
he calls a “hennery.” He rented a small store on a side street a few doors from
a street car line for fifteen dollars a month, and stocked this with eggs and
several crates of live chickens.

“I didn’t have opening a store in mind at first. I saw there was money
bringing in cases of fresh eggs, but it was apparent that I was wasting a lot of
time driving to the farm and back. I arranged to bring in a truck load of eggs
and needed a place to stock them. I had my father send the chickens, hoping
to find a market for them. People passing the store stopped and watched me
stack the crates of eggs in the store. Some came inside and asked if I was
opening an egg store. I replied that I just brought the eggs from the farm, and
would sell them at regular store prices. In a little while, I had sold fifteen
dozen, and was convinced a store selling eggs and chickens exclusively
would pay in that locality. I locked up and made my rounds of the
neighborhood and when I asked for orders, told my customers about the line.
I sold a case of eggs and three chickens before noon, and returning to the
store, fixed the door so it would remain open. That afternoon, I put in a
counter. But business didn’t rush in as I expected.

Advertising Brings in Customers

“The corner druggist told me, when I dropped into his store for cigarettes,
that if he were in my place he would have some circulars printed, explaining
that I had opened the store and offered chickens and selected fresh eggs
brought in by truck from my father’s farm, and to distribute these circulars
wherever I went. This sounded like a good idea. ‘Don’t put these in the mail
boxes,’ the printer warned me when I picked up the circulars. ‘Hand one to
the woman when she opens the door.’ Most women I called upon didn’t buy
from me, you know, for only one in a dozen needed eggs at the moment I