Storekeeper

“ The storekeeper is another who, by reason of his extreme officiousness and parsimonious manner in dealing out the stores, is not beloved of the toilers in the shed. He treats every applicant for stores with fantastic ceremony, examining the foreman’s slip half-a-dozen times or more, and turning it round and round and over and over until the exasperated workman can stand it no longer, and sets about him with, “Come on, mate! ”

“ The storekeeper enters into a contract with the owner of vast lands to cultivate it, either on rent or on shares of the value of the produce. This storekeeper is a middleman, often a sweater. Though I have no doubt there are honourable exceptions, he is often a thief into the bargain. ”

“ It is many a journey around the store that John Marion makes in a day. The decision to purchase each article is announced slowly and as tho it were the only thing desired. The plump and genial storekeeper goes leisurely for it, and with a smile of satisfaction places it before the customer. There is a moment of silence, then a journey for the next need, and it is only in balancing the barter that the merchant makes a suggestion. ”

“ In between—that happy medium which I mentioned to you—stand the Harriman Lines with division stores under the division superintendent, who in turn as to supply matters is under the general storekeeper or other chief supply official, the latter already having in some cases the title and status of an assistant general manager. The man in direct charge of the one general store which is allowed each general jurisdiction is called a storekeeper. ”

“ The storekeeper kept a watch over the waterhole, and it was only in the morning that he found out that he was the dupe of people who were too cunning for him, and who had made themselves scarce before he was aware of their duplicity. ”

“ The storekeeper should then go around a job at least once a day, and get from the foremen their requisition slips; and an intelligent storekeeper will see to it that useless and unnecessary material or superfluous material is not ordered. Material that is ordered on requisition, and is not in the storehouse, should be purchased if necessary on a rush order, because, contrary to the ordinary apparent belief, it is economical to spend a dollar for material in order to save two dollars in labor. ”

“ Before the store building squatted another group of savages. Perhaps in time one of the lot expected to buy something; or possibly they just sat. Nobody but a storekeeper would ever have time to find out. Such is the native way. The storekeeper in this case was named John. Besides being storekeeper, he had charge of the issuing of all the house supplies, and those for the white men's mess; he must do all the worrying about the upper class natives; he must occasionally kill a buck for the meat supply ”

“ That the internal-revenue officer holding the combined office of storekeeper and gauger shall hereafter be known and denominated as a storekeeper-gauger, and when performing the combined duties of storekeeper-gauger, or when assigned by the Commissioner of Internal Revenue to perform the duties of a storekeeper only at any distillery, or at any general or special bonded warehouse, he shall receive for his services the compensation of storekeeper only ”

“ Though a store is, in fact, nothing better than what we should call in the country towns at home a "general shop," yet the storekeeper in Canada holds a very different rank from the shopkeeper of the English village. The storekeepers are the merchants and bankers of the places in which they reside. Almost all money matters are transacted by them, and they are often men of landed property and consequence, not unfrequently filling the situations of magistrates, commissioners, and even members of the provincial parliament. ”

“ Time rolled on, and the years that gather, an ever-increasing load, upon poor and rich alike, began to bow the forms of the two storekeepers. Old age overtook them, and finally the hour when each in turn must leave store and ledger to know them no more. ”

“ Villagers beginning to read do not care for this class of work; like children, they look for something more amusing, and want something to wonder at for their money.
At the post-office there is often an assortment of cheap stationery on sale, for where one cottager wrote a letter a few years ago ten write them now. But the shopkeeper—most likely a grocer or storekeeper of some kind—knows nothing of books, and will tell you, if you ask him, that he never sells any or has any orders. How should he sell any, pray, when he does not put the right sort into his window? ”

“ American Storekeeper Never in the history of the mercantile world has anything created so radical a change in the methods of storekeeping as that of the Department Store System of the present day. The "Department Store" is the outgrowth of the cheap counter business originated by Butler Brothers in Boston about ten years ago. The little "Five Cent Counter" then became a cornerstone from which the largest of all the world's branches of merchandising was to be reared. It was the "Cheap Counter" which proved to the progressive merchant his ability to sell all lines of wares under one roof. ”

“ As the articles are requisitioned by the factory management, the numbers or weight extracted from bins or racks are noted on the cards and the supply made up from outside, the aim of a good storekeeper being to maintain a certain high-water mark, below which the stock is not permitted to fall. ”

“ Therefore, kind friends, take pride in the Department Store of your town and see to it that it is patronized in a liberal manner by rich and poor alike, and if the storekeeper be but the right sort of a merchant, and one disposed to build up a large trade by small profit inducements, you will soon discover that the town center has changed its base, and that the threshold of the Department Store is now the hub from which all people radiate. ”

“ It is too narrow an understanding of production which confines it merely to the making of things. Production includes not merely the making of things, but the bringing of them to the consumer. The merchant or storekeeper is thus as truly a producer as is the manufacturer, or farmer, and his stock or capital is as much devoted to production as is theirs. ”

“ As a store-keeper was a person on whom much dependence must necessarily be placed, it being his duty to be constantly present whenever the stores were opened, and with a vigilant eye to observe the conduct of the inferior servants, at the strong recommendation of the officers under whom he had served, Sergeant Thomas Smyth was discharged from the marine detachment, and placed upon the list of superintendants of convicts as a storekeeper. ”

“ Many small storekeepers have been weeded out this year: some because they, having hardly a gross out-turn of ten pounds per month, buying cash and selling cash, could not afford to keep any books at all, as is not unoften done even among small European storekeepers; and some because they could not afford to comply with the requirements of the Sanitary Inspector having connection, not with the cleanliness of the premises, but with their structural arrangements. ”

“ He cannot live without the store and the store cannot live without the customer. A basis of agreement must be reached. Cannot you give me a little better trade? We speak of a storekeeper as in trade in a large city. ”

“ We will take a storekeeper, for instance—a grocer or a dry goods’ dealer. He has served, in the first place, an apprenticeship at the business, industriously working with his hands, as well as with his mind, for one, two, three, or four years. ”

“ The problems of the storekeeper who arranges his windows, however, overlap the problems of the manufacturer who prepares his goods for the world-market, and who must from the start take care that the outer appearance of his goods stimulate the readiness to buy. ”

“ In the modern methods of shop management, all these things are changed. The specialization of workmanship, the division of duties, the limiting of responsibilities—each restricted within narrow limits by sharply defined regulations—have reduced the variety of operations of the workman, and of responsibilities and duties of the men who direct manufacturing work.
We find the purchasing of material and supplies in charge of a Purchasing Agent. We find these purchases checked by a Receiving Clerk, turned over to a Storekeeper, and subject to examination by a regular Inspector. ”

“ The merchant, however, in fixing the value, makes a large deduction on account of the long and difficult conveyance; besides, as he carries on trade on a small scale and without competition, he exacts high profits, and has the farmer a good deal at his mercy. Commercial transactions in all the country districts of America are usually carried on by an individual named a storekeeper, who keeps an assortment of all the commodities likely to be wanted, and receives in return the produce of the cultivator. ”

“ The storekeeper, he always has kep’ his books with marks, like, on the boards of his cabin. He makes a short mark, like, fer two bits, an’ a long one fer four bits, an’ he’ll have some sort of picture fer each man that he’s a-trustin’ out goods to. Sometimes he has to make signs fer to show what he’s done sold. A few month ago Arch Morrison come in, and they liken to have a diffikilty over his account. The storekeeper said he’d sold Archie a cheese, an’ Archie he done denied of it. ‘Thar’s a pictur of it,’ says the storekeeper, an’ sure enough, thar was a big, round thing like a cheese. ”

“ The provision should be weighed out weekly to the men, and stock taken once a month, and a return of what has been issued and what remains given by the storekeeper to him. Such regularity inspires confidence. ”

“ Storekeepers who had dumped their stocks down in the open air were desperately busy, serving profane customers, or running up hasty structures over their goods. Newcomers were pouring in like visitors to a fair, shouting as they came, and of all the people Jim could see, Mike Burton and the Peetrees alone were prepared to take things calmly. ”

“ The store thief saunters down-town to the dry goods district, watches the wholesale houses, notes the interior of the stores, and carefully makes his selection of some one suitable to his purpose. The next morning, bright and early, he attires himself like a country store-keeper, and, taking his satchel in his hand, he makes haste to reach the store he intends to work, appearing to the quietly-observant porter like an out-of-town buyer, just come off some early incoming train. ”

“ This warehouse-keeper, or wholesale-man, sells the goods which he buys of the merchant—I say, he sells them to the retailers, and it is for that reason I place it first there. Now, as they buy in smaller quantities than he did of the merchant, so he deals with more of them in number, and he goes about among them the same Saturday, to get in money that he may pay his merchant, and he receives his bag full of promises, too, every where instead of money, and is put off from week to week, perhaps by fifty shopkeepers in a day ”

“ Our shop has given us a living, but these two discoveries have made the hundred and sixty thousand francs which we possess, net and clear! Without my genius, for I certainly have talent as a perfumer, we should now be petty retail shopkeepers, pulling the devil's tail to make both ends meet. I shouldn't be a distinguished merchant, competing in the election of judges for the department of commerce; I should be neither a judge nor a deputy-mayor. Do you know what I should be? A shopkeeper like Pere Ragon,—be it said without offence, for I respect shopkeeping; the best of our kidney are in it. ”

“ Shopkeeper set in the hand of the pedlar."
"Who is the pedlar, hunchback?"
"The pedlar is he that carries the pack on his back."
"What carries he in the pack?"
"He carries what the Shopkeeper gave him—for he had no money and no choice."
"Who is the Shopkeeper, dwarf?"
"The Shopkeeper—the Shopkeeper is the father of dwarfs and angels and children—and fools."
"What does he sell, poor man?"
"He sells harness for men and cattle, and you give your lives for the harness."
"What is this you carry, dwarf?"
"I carry home the harness of a soul." ”

“ Another set are actually in trade at the moment, if that can be called a trade, which consists of a shop of all sorts; these are called "general dealers," and partake much of the character of the jobbers; only that the latter for a shop, keep a "warehouse," upstairs in a garret; or their lodging room at the public house serves the purpose of a warehouse! I have known one of these, at the same time a dealer in cutlery, coffins, pictures, paper, hose, books, bandanas, and other heterogeneous articles ”

“ The center shelving will always have stock boxes piled on top and that will throw one side of the store always in shadow. Besides, this arrangement divides the trade and screens half of it from view.
“The stock is cut in two and looks small.
“One salesman can not wait on the furnishing goods trade without neglecting half of it all the time. If you have two clerks, a customer must be taken from one side to the other for his ties or underwear, and there you are again, both on one side at the same time. ”

“ The current of our daily life, the springs of our activity or fortitude, may be supplied as well from hope as fear, from ‘cheerful and confident thoughts’ as the apparition of famine stalking just behind us. The merchant attends to his business, settles his accounts, and answers his correspondents as diligently and punctually as the shop-keeper. The shop-keeper minds his customers, and puffs off his goods, tells more lies, is a greater drudge, and gets less for his pains than the merchant. ”