II The Wholesale Merchant
Exercise 263
Oral
Each of the following should be developed into a paragraph:
1. You are a manufacturer and wholesale distributor with a factory on the outskirts of a town; would you have a warehouse in the center of the town? Give reasons for your answer.
2. What would be the advantage of having your warehouse near the railroad freight depots? Near the docks?
3. What would be the advantage of being located in a large city with many railroads and with water transportation facilities—Chicago, for example?
4. Speed gets orders. With this in view, what would you recommend with respect to the equipment for handling? What would you suggest about the number of people through whose hands the order would have to go before being shipped?
5. If you were looking for big trade in a big city, what kind of stock would you carry? Musical instruments? Clothing?
6. Would it be a good plan to make a specialty of certain brands for leaders and to quote a special price on them?
7. If you were just starting a wholesale hardware or grocery business, state which you think would be the better policy: (1) to concentrate on one kind of goods in one territory and to take on other kinds and territories later, or (2) to work all kinds of goods as widely as possible from the very beginning. Explain fully.
8. Would you bear part of the expense of retailers’ advertising, especially of window displays, provided they handled your goods?
9. Would it be good business for the salesmen of the firm to suggest selling methods to retailers and to plan window displays for them? Give your reasons.
10. Do you think it would increase sales to offer a money prize to the retailer selling the largest amount of a certain kind of your goods, the sale of which you wished materially to increase?
11. Tell which you think would be the better policy: (1) to undersell your competitors for a time and then, when you had the trade, to raise your prices, or (2) to set one price and maintain it from the beginning. Give your reasons.
12. If you were getting out a new brand of carpenters’ tools, where would you advertise? Would you conduct an extensive national campaign?
13. If you were bringing out a new soap or washing powder, where would you advertise? Would you conduct an extensive national advertising campaign? What would your answer be if you were introducing a new brand of crackers?
14. Would bringing out novelties from time to time help the sale of your staple articles? Explain.
15. Do you think it would pay to send circulars to the housewives of a certain locality to get the local grocers’ trade? After you had the local grocers’ trade?