Retail trade

“ But the main cause of the great increase in retail trade is,—as expressed in a report submitted to the government of Saxony by the Dresden chamber of commerce,—that trade on a small scale has become the rallying place of many persons who despair of making their living in any other way. ”

“ Nearly all the best shops in the retail trade are in this street, some of them comparable to the richest of London and Paris, and the whole affording means for every device of elegant decoration and boundless expenditure. ”

“ Wholesale trade, bankers, brokers, and lawyers seek narrow streets. There must be swift communication between the opposite sides, and easy recognition of faces across the way. But retail trade requires no such conditions. ”

“ For a tradesman to open his shop in a place unresorted to, or in a place where his trade is not agreeable, and where it is not expected, it is no wonder if he has no trade. What retail trade would a milliner have among the fishmongers' shops on Fishstreet-hill, or a toyman about Queen-hithe? When a shop is ill chosen, the tradesman starves; he is out of the way, and business will not follow him that runs away from it: suppose a ship-chandler should set up in Holborn, or a block-maker in Whitecross Street, an anchor-smith at Moorgate, or a coachmaker in Redriff, and the like! ”

“ It is by this means that the multitudinous little box-shops which are a feature of the towns are enabled to pay their way, this being rendered possible by an expensive minutely retail trade. The average English tradesman is a wholesale dealer compared to these petty retailers, and very many middle-class English households take in sufficient supplies at a time to stock one of their shops. ”

“ It may sometimes happen that the fall in price never reaches the consumer, but stops short with the wholesale or retail trader, although this tendency is to some extent counteracted by the competition in retail trade. ”

“ Dealers in a small way, in cities and large towns, are frequently denominated shop-keepers; but those who do an extensive retail business, are usually called merchants or grocers, according as they deal in dry goods or groceries. In cities, the extensive [189] demand for goods enables retailers to confine their attention to particular classes of articles; such as groceries, hardware, crockery, a few kinds of dry goods, or some articles of domestic manufacture; but in other places, where trade is more limited, the merchant is obliged to keep a more general assortment. ”

“ The same influences have also to a great degree revolutionized the nature of retail trade, which has been aptly described as, "until lately, the recourse of men whose character, skill, thrift, and ambition, won credit, and enabled them to dispense with large capital." ”

“ It is clear then that the tendency to production on a [Pg 37] large scale is the logical result of machine methods, that it secures great economies, and that in industries of increasing returns it is absolutely inevitable.
But not only in manufacturing is this movement observable. More recently concentration in large establishments has revolutionized the retail trade. Department stores have supplanted the small shops because they can buy on better terms, get transportation cheaper, offer a greater variety to the customer at a lower price, and save time and trouble to the customer. ”

“ Dr Nystrom finds call for the course of instruction he lays down in ‘Retail store management’ in his conviction that a very large percentage of the three million and more Americans engaged in retail trade are incapable and inefficient. ”

“ As to the retail trade in these things, whether of barley or wheat set apart for meal and flour, or any other kind of food, no one shall sell them to citizens or their slaves, nor shall any one buy of a citizen; but let the stranger sell them in the market of strangers, to artisans and their slaves, making an exchange of wine and food, which is commonly called retail trade. ”

“ If this custom were universal, and strictly adhered to, competition indeed would still operate, but the consumer would not derive any benefit from it, at least as to price; the way in which it would diminish the advantages of those engaged in the retail trade, would be by a greater subdivision of the business. ”

“ One hears a good deal about the vast emporiums which are gathering the retail trade into themselves, and devastating the minor commerce, but there are perhaps a score of these at most, in New York; and on the shabbier avenues and cross-streets there are at least a hundred miles of little shops, where an immense population of little dealers levy tribute on the public through the profit they live by. ”

“ The difference between the apparent profit of the retail and that of the wholesale trade, is much less in the capital than in small towns and country villages. Where ten thousand pounds can be employed in the grocery trade, the wages of the grocer's labour must be a very trifling addition to the real profits of so great a stock. The apparent profits of the wealthy retailer, therefore, are there more nearly upon a level with these of the wholesale merchant. ”

“ Also included in Retail Trade are establishments primarily engaged in selling, to the general public, products produced on the same premises from which they are sold, such as bakeries, candy stores, ice cream parlors, and custom tailors. ”

“ On the other hand, where the articles are of a rarer and more expensive order, when it is likely that the purchaser will seek to compare price and character of wares, and will presumably be willing to make a special journey for the purpose, the centralising tendency prevails in retail trade. ”

“ Although the stores, as the coöperative warehouses are called, transact but a very small fraction of the retail trade of London, they are finding imitators so fast that an entire change in the methods of doing business is being brought about. The old way of selling goods on credit and charging in prices a percentage large enough to cover the loss and expenses entailed by the system can not stand before the economy of buying and selling for cash. ”

“ The various retail trades, in the cities and larger towns of all civilized countries, are accordingly being rapidly superseded by vast and skillfully organized establishments—and in Great Britain and Europe by co-operative associations which can sell at little over wholesale prices a great variety of merchandise—dry-goods, manufactures of leather, books, stationery, furs, ready-made clothing, hats and caps, and sometimes groceries and hardware—and at the same time give their customers far greater conveniences than can be offered by the ordinary shopkeeper or tradesman. ”

“ Through the processes of Trade, myriads of commodities for the satisfaction of human wants, commodities produced by human service to the point of delivery to ultimate consumers, flow to ultimate consumers out of retail stores. These depots for final delivery in Trade are the customary terminals of production, where certifications of service in terms of Money are usually exchanged for products of service in the form of commodities. ”

“ Once the merchant has opened his store or shop and purchased his goods he seeks to establish trade relations with as many individual customers as he can attract. Mercantile business is carried on in two kinds of stores, those which supply one kind of goods in wholesale or retail quantities, like groceries or dry goods, and those which maintain numerous departments for different kinds of manufactured goods. ”

“ The state of trade is at present dull; but that there is a great deal of business done must be evident from the quantity of 'dry goods' and 'grocery stores,' many of the proprietors of which have stocks as heavy as the majority of London retail dealers. ”

“ This want, then, creates a class of retail-traders in our State. Is not 'retailer' the term which is applied to those who sit in the market-place engaged in buying and selling, while those who wander from one city to another are called merchants? ”

“ On the other hand, large manufacturers in many trades (of which the boot trade is an example which must have come under the notice of every reader) are tending to open retail shops of their own in favourable localities, so as to obtain the retailer’s commission as well as the manufacturer’s profit. Evidently these large manufacturer-shopkeepers are more likely to be extensive advertisers than small one-shop retailers. ”

“ From the hands of the wholesale merchant all goods were transferred to retail dealers, and by them placed within the reach of the people at large. In order to prevent the largest capitalists from absorbing the whole of the national trade, different branches were not permitted to be adopted by one merchant or retail dealer. ”

“ We draw such fine distinctions between the wholesale and retail traders that our cotton-spinners, calico-makers, and general merchants seem to think that they belong to a totally different sphere, from which they look down on the lady who has had sufficient brains, capital, and courage to open a shop. ”

“ In regard to the latter class of goods, it is a matter of common knowledge that there has been an increasing tendency of late years to eliminate the middleman, and establish direct trading between producer and consumer. Just as the small shopkeeper will purchase from the manufacturer, and avoid the wholesale dealer, so, also, there are individual householders and others who eliminate even the shopkeeper, and deal direct with advertising manufacturers willing to supply to them the same quantities as could be obtained from a retail trader. ”

“ The only reason that retail traders find business at all is, that they save the working community trouble by collecting, from the different places where they are produced, the silks, woollens, cottons, the meats, vegetables, and grains, that it needs for its food and clothing. If the retail trader, either singly or in league with the manufacturer, adulterate his goods, or if he make an intolerable profit upon them, the community, as in the case of the Rochdale Pioneers, may combine against him and supersede him. ”

“ The classification of retail trades as a group distinct from the Skilled Trades and the Provision Trades is somewhat arbitrary, because under the system of Family Industry, the maker of the goods was often his own salesman, or the middlemen who sold the goods to the consumers were themselves organised into gilds. ”

“ We will merely remark, in passing, that one of the largest retail stores in the New York dry-goods trade sells at its counters ten million dollars' worth of fabrics per annum, and that another concern in the wholesale branch of the same trade does a yearly business of between thirty and forty millions. ”

“ Yet these societies have engaged with the most remarkable success in the ordinary retail trades, conducted by grocers, drapers, chemists, wine-merchants, coal-merchants, bakers, butchers, &c The success of these societies not only proves that the disadvantages of the joint-stock system have been much exaggerated, but also indicates how the most prominent of these disadvantages may be overcome. ”

“ Assortments must be complete at all times, and there must be a constant income of new goods. As fast as one thing sells, another must take its place, and no interest must be overlooked in the buying. Buying in great quantities, they are enabled to send buyers regularly to the great manufacturing centers and leading sources of supply. Prices are low in proportion as orders are large, and ready cash secures the best trade discounts. To collect such a wealth of [Pg 26] goods and have styles and qualities just right, means a good deal. It means that the whole range of merchandise must be known. ”

“ Whatever means are adopted to benefit the retailer and advertise the business by brighter windows, cleaner shops, less faded goods, and healthier financial conditions must contribute to the general prosperity of the trade, from the bottom step to the top rung of the ladder.
It should be the aim of all amateurs to study quality rather than price. Goods well made, carefully flavored, and nicely displayed will always command a ready sale at a fair price, giving satisfaction to the consumer and credit to the maker. ”

“ The wholesale jobbers of course advance the price, and in the retail stores they are higher yet; so that each tradesman through whose hands they pass has his trifle of profit in helping to shoe the feet of the doll-people. They retail from a dollar and a dollar and a quarter a dozen, to three dollars and seventy-five cents, according to the style. ”

“ On every article sold there is first of all the profit of the manufacturer, then of the wholesale dealer, and finally of the retailer. There is commonly a fourth, that of the freighter. If you keep a retail store, you must pay the man who makes the goods, the man who transports the goods, and the man who keeps the goods in large stock, and all this leaves you only a small margin of profit. ”

“ The day are gone when the merchant adventurer sent out his ships, laden with merchandise, which were to bring home to him the produce of distant lands. There are, of course, a number of merchants who, having their own establishments in foreign parts, do both an import and an export business, balancing their own transactions without many bills of exchange passing; but, on the whole, trade is now much more specialised, there are importers and exporters, and their transactions are entirely independent of each other. ”