Grocer

“ Now, John, Harry, Willie, if you want to be a grocer when you grow up, be a grocer and a big one—a wholesale grocer if you wish, and be a good one—the very best in town, if you can, but say—don't let your grocery business swallow you up till you are not good for anything else but to buy and sell groceries! Be a good grocer, but be a better, bigger MAN!! ”

“ As a grocer, sir—g-r-o-c-e-r—grocer, a man who stands behind a counter in a white apron and his shirt-sleeves; who sells tea and sugar and candied peel and such-like things to customers—old ladies, little girls; who rises at six in the morning, takes down the shutters, sweeps out the shop, cleans the windows; who has half an hour for his dinner of corned beef and bread; who puts up the shutters at ten o’clock at night, tidies up the shop, has his supper, and goes to bed, feeling his day has not been wasted. ”

“ The Squire watched him until he had turned the distant corner; then he locked the door again, and commenced to search every cupboard, drawer, and corner as he had done at Grange. Taking the grocer's keys— (the grocer was a bachelor, and the maid-of-all-work was away at the village school) —he went all over the house, looking in everything—even the pockets of the grocer's clothes; then he searched the shop, poked about under the rice and sugar and lentils, peered into the tea and coffee reservoirs, the till, the scales, the drawers, the empty jars. ”

“ There was a grocer not above selling orange marmalade, brown sugar, and Durham mustard. I remember buying a penny cake of chocolate of him one morning; but I find the shop now expanded into a magnificent emporium, where are sold wines, and spirits, sweetmeats and preserves, liqueurs and condiments, Bayonne ham, Narbonne honey, Bologna sausages, Russian caviare, Iceland moss, clotted cream, and terrines of pâté de foie gras. ”

“ All who grew or made [125] more things than they could use brought them to the grocer to be sold. So the grocer helped them and they helped him, and the people went to the store for their supplies.
“You must remember, children,” went on Mr. Duwell, “the old-fashioned country store was very different from Parker’s grocery around the corner. Besides groceries, it sold harness, horse blankets, hardware, shoes, and everything people needed.”
II. The Modern Grocer
“Suppose Wallace were a grocer, Ruth, how would you like his store to be kept?” asked her mother. ”

“ But by this time they had reached the little grocery-shop, and all proceeded inside while their new friend made her purchases. These she read off slowly from a slip of paper, and the grocer packed them in her basket. But when it came to paying for them and making change, she became entangled in a fresh puzzle. ”

“ A grocer cannot manufacture spices or sugar, grow wine, distil whisky or brew beer, but he can, as generations of grocers have done before him, sell good tea out of an honest tea-chest,—or caddy—and make a respectable living, if not money, out of it for himself and not for others, while serving the public well at the same time. ”

“ He starts in talking about the price of green-groceries, drifts along for five or ten minutes, and keeps squinting over the cracker boxes. To stave off suspicion he buys an apple, peels it carefully and eats it slowly, while he incidentally craves a cracker and proceeds to pump the innocent grocer on his cracker business. He writes out his notes in full after [Pg 65] ward and that grocer is then described on a card index at the main office as handling such and such goods. I ought to know what rubber-necks are, having been around groceries enough. ”

“ There's a grocer just round the corner from where we live; he is newly started in business; his prices are reasonable, and it would be convenient for us to deal with him, but he is a white-haired, whey-faced, abject man with pinkish eyes, and it's too painful to go into his shop. ”

“ A good stand is not likely to be idle long. The fall, I was told, was a bad season for a retail grocery in New York. Many small groceries in New York are owned by men, whose wives attend the stores while they are at work. I saw a nice little grocer, whose husband is a tailor, and who works at his trade in a room back of the grocery. This seemed to be reversing the general order of things. The husbands of some grocer women keep stalls in the markets, and furnish the groceries of their wives with vegetables. I called in a neat grocery store and bought some apples. ”

“ Holiday-makers waiting for the shower to blow over should certainly try it.
Coloured grocery sugars, the Food Controller announces, are to be freed from control on September 6th. A coloured grocery is one in which the grocer is not as black as he is painted. ”

“ Long live grocers! they sell all day, count their gains in the evening, take their pleasure from time to time at some frightful melodrama—and behold them happy! Yes, but they pass their time between cheese and soap. Long live rather men of letters! ”

“ Good morning, sir.”
The grocer softly whispered, “There Won’t Anybody Play with Me,” and whittled a little lead out of one of his weights, in an absentminded way.
Answers to Inquiries
Dear Editor: I want to ask a question in arithmetic. I am a school boy and am anxious to know the solution. If my pa, who keeps a grocery on Milam Street, sells four cans of tomatoes for twenty-five cents, and twenty-two pounds of sugar, and one can of extra evaporated apples and three cans of superior California plums, for only—
There! ”

“ Those who desire pure articles can almost always obtain them of a reputable grocer by paying their value. But in order to supply the demand for cheaper goods and meet competition, such 7articles as powdered spices, etc., are extensively prepared, mixed with harmless substances, and containing the largest quantity of pure material which can be furnished at the price for which they are sold. Perhaps, also, such articles are more economical in the using, and admixtures are sometimes improvements.
Adulteration Laws. ”

“ One will not find the delicatessen 18flourishing in France—one will not find it at all—and the fancy grocery, above mentioned, is another pitfall for the American housewife. She likes the sight of food done up in fancy containers, in glass, perhaps, and buys them, not realizing that she is paying a large price for perfectly unnecessary and totally unnourishing “pretties.” ”

“ There were always plenty of plates, for the store supplied the crockery of the neighborhood. There were also plenty of spoons, for everything was to be had at the grocery. What more could the most exacting man need? On a particularly reckless night the feast ended with several tins of peaches, which needed no cooking, but only a sprinkling of sugar. The grocer was always an expert at cooking cove oysters and at opening tins of peaches. ”

“ The modern grocer sells tinned meats, cakes, wine, tea-pots, and Christmas cards, the draper sells every sort of ornamental ware, the stationer, the oil shop, the china shop set out an increasing and miscellaneous number of differing wares, moving towards the position of a general dealer. ”

“ And we are aiming to bring about direct connection between producer and consumer—farmer and housewife.”
“But what of that wagon,” inquired Claire, indicated a huge delivery wagon bearing the name of a prominent down-town department store, “does that firm sell fresh food?”
“No; staple groceries which they can buy in huge quantities, like five pounds of granulated sugar at twenty-three cents, when your grocer and mine are charging us at the rate of three and one-half pounds for eighteen cents. This firm delivers orders. The farmers, the hucksters and stand men can not. ”

“ I was frankly told by the leading grocery store that they did not expect to deliver to people who had their own motors, and when I occasionally insist on a few necessities being sent up to my house, they arrive after dark conveyed by an ancient horse, as the grocery manager is conservative. ”

“ The grocer on the block where I live fills his baskets with large potatoes and gives in actual quantity only three pecks to the basket.
“Finally, the question of premiums. In modern 177 business methods we merchants never give something for nothing. If you receive premiums for buying a certain quantity of groceries, you must pay in the weight or the quality of the groceries. In a certain chain of stores in this city they sell what they call ‘Our Own Blend’ coffee, which they advertise as pure Mocha and Java. It is sold at thirty-four cents a pound, with a cup and saucer for a premium. ”

“ The Grocery Supply Company is one of them. I buy barrels of sugar, barrels of flour, big boxes of prunes, and so on, from this company. Then I sell a few pounds of sugar, flour or prunes [145] at a time and make a little money each time I sell. You see I don't pay as much for the flour and sugar as I sell it for. The difference in price comes to me, and is what I live on, and sometimes it's little enough. ”

“ Usually Toodles was sent foraging to the delicatessen shops for fresh rolls, cold meats and sandwiches, eggs, fruit, tomatoes, and bakery dainties, and the hotel filled our thermos-bottles with hot coffee. We carried salt and11 pepper, mustard, sweet and sour pickles, or a relish, orange marmalade, or a fruit jam, in the hamper, and beyond that we took no staple supplies on the whole trip. We met so many people who carried with them a whole grocery-store, even to sacks of flour, that you would imagine there was not a place to get food from the Atlantic to the Pacific. ”

“ Take one of those elevators up," Jennie would have ridden up to the fourth floor, and stupidly gazed at pink silk and val lace negligees in glass cases.
Tell me, have you ever visited the grocery department of a great store on the wrong side of State Street? It's a mouth-watering experience. A department store grocery is a glorified mixture of delicatessen shop, meat market, and vaudeville. ”

“ I voiced a thought.
"There must be an awful lot of old timers died this spring. You can't cut them off short and hope to save them."
Bill grunted.
We entered the store. It smelled good, as such stores always do—soap, leather, ground coffee, bacon, cheese—all sorts of things. On the right ran a counter and shelves of dry goods and clothing; on the left groceries, cigars, and provisions generally. Down the middle saddles, ropes, spurs, pack outfits, harness, hardware. ”

“ Buy only small quantities of perishable things [Pg 16] such as green vegetables, fruit, fish, eggs, cream, and fresh butter; buy dry groceries and preserved stores in quantities large enough to entitle you to wholesale prices; and pay cash in order to avail yourself of the lowest market price. Make your purchases as early in the day as possible in order to secure a choice of fresh articles; and trade with respectable dealers who give full weight and honest measure. ”

“ She [336] and I ran about the house like two madcaps, after supper and until bedtime, calling out excitedly at each fresh discovery.
Two barrels of flour and one of corn-meal; two of apples and one of potatoes; a half-barrel of sugar, and other staple groceries, in divers measures, made the foundation of the abundant supply for creature wants. The upper shelves of the store-room were crowded with pickles, preserves, and all manner of conserved fruits for which the Virginia housewife was justly famed. ”

“ The grocery men there say that their customers taste so much before they can make up their minds to buy anything, that what with gratuitous slices of cheese and specimen mouthfuls of sugar and sample spoonfuls of molasses, the shop-keeper's profits are most dolefully diminished. ”

“ Should you have liked your sister to have been noticed by a grocer's assistant for doing so?"
"In the first place, as it is not many years since I myself was a draper's assistant, the mere circumstance of a grocer's assistant noticing any act does not alter the character of the act to me. ”

“ Anyone familiar with the operations of a modern-day supermarket knows the importance of the so-called 'pick-up zone' an area where the frequently numerous bags of groceries bought in the store can be loaded conveniently into the customers' cars. The phenomenon of the supermarket combined with widespread ownership of automobiles and refrigeration facilities has made the purchase of large quantities of groceries on a single shopping trip a common occurrence in this country. ”

“ As I was leaving the shop I thought how fond mother was of rusks when she was ill. I turned back and got some. I was now quite laden with parcels, and as I knew I must purchase several more, and could not possibly carry them all in my hands, the next thing was to secure a basket. I was not long in discovering a sort of bazaar, where miscellaneous articles of every description were to be had. I chose a serviceable basket, paid for it, popped my groceries in, and went out. I soon added to the store a chicken, two pounds of beef for beef-tea, a loaf of bread, and some fresh butter. ”

“ It takes every good thing in a grocery, from ginger to preserved cherries, to go in it, and it is best hot. Uncle Pompey said for me to wait until the second pan came out of the stove to call you, because it is always best. ”

“ We might profit by carrying meat, butter, vegetables, salt, sugar, flour, pepper, and lard from home or bought in quantity at some point on the way, if we have a way to keep them from the effects of the sun. Carrots, potatoes, milk, lettuce, radishes, bread, fruit, canned goods, coffee, and groceries in general can be bought in or near most of the camps at the prices about the same as the home grocer charges. Carrying too much loads down the car excessively. ”