The world advances and in time outgrows JAMES RUSSELL Lowell. & A REPUBLIC OF CONSUMERS How Cooperation Is Revolutionizing British Industry Reprinted by courtesy of the Saturday Evening Post The Owners of the Wholesale. At bottom the principle of the wholesale is the principle of the retail, except that members of the retail are men and women, while members of the wholesale are the retails. It is a union of retails. Eleven hundred and sixty-three retails are federated in the English wholesale and two hundred and seventy-six retails are federated in the Scottish wholesale. As the retail saves the consumer the profits of retailing, so the wholesale saves the retails the profits of wholesaling. In the retail each consumer buys with thousands of other consumers back of him. In the wholesale each consumer buys with millions of consumers behind him. The retail societies own the wholesale. Each retail, in proportion to its own members, contributes to the share capital of the wholesale and receives a fixed dividend upon that capital. The Bolton retail, with thirty-six thousand members, will take more shares in the wholesale than will Macclesfield, with five thousand members, and will receive a larger dividend on this capital. The chief dividend, however, as in the case of the retail society, goes to the purchaser. If the wholesale sells ten times as much to the Huddersfield retail as to the Scarborough retail, then its dividend to Huddersfield will be ten times as large as its dividend to Scarborough. in a little manufacturing town on the Thames. I soon discovered that, though the groom and bride might pick out their special furniture and have it shipped directly to their very door, still the order had to come from their retail society, which, in turn, sold the goods to the bride and groom. John Doe and Jane Roe, though cooperators in good standing, may not buy directly from the wholesale, becaues the wholesale sells only to retails. Nevertheless, all profits, of wholesale and retail alike, filter down eventually to the great silent army of two and a half million cooperators. Last year the English wholesale made a profit of two and a half per cent on its business. If, during the year, John Doe's retail bought a million dollars' worth of goods from the wholesale, then its dividend of two and a half per cent would amount to twenty-five thousand dollars. When the retail declared its dividend to its own members this sum of twenty-five thousand dollars would be included in its own profits, and would be divided up among John Doe and Jane Roe and the other members of John Doe's retail in proportion to the purchases of each. Thus the profits of the wholesale come ultimately to the ultimate consumer. The net profits of the two cooperative wholesales now amount to about four and a half million dollars. It is only a small part of the fifty-four millions that the retails annually distribute among members. The margin on wholesale trading is much smaller than in retail business. The importance of the wholesale, however, is not to be measured by a mere fourand a half-million-dollar dividend, even though that is not to be despised. What the wholesale has done has been to create a feeling of common fellowship among all retail societies, large and small. It has given to each retail a sense of the power that comes from union. Almost from the first it was recognized that some form of wholesale cooperative store was necessary. Some of the retails | found it difficult to buy supplies. Jobbers and wholesalers were often threatened with the loss of their regular business unless they refused to sell to the obnoxious coop erators. Many of the retail managerswho were working men fresh from the bench-knew little or nothing of the art of buying; and the wholesale, by bringing the retails together, was as much a school as a market. The managers of retail stores, meeting periodically for the government of the wholesale society, began to get a view of a wider situation. Moreover, the formation of a wholesale was a logical step in the direction of cooperative development. If consumers saved money by buying cooperatively why could not the retails-the associations of consumers-save money by buying at wholesale cooperatively? The early attempts to start a wholesale cooperative department failed. At one time the Rochdale society opened up a wholesale department to supply its own needs and the needs of neighboring stores, but the sole result was suspicion and dissatisfaction. The cooperative stores did not wish to accord to Rochdale or to any other society a practical guardianship of the movement; and it was not until the year 1862 that English law made it possible to organize an independent society to unite all the retail cooperative stores. It was in 1863, almost twenty years after the first retail cooperative store was opened at Rochdale, that the English wholesale society-then under a different name-was established. The beginnings were small. Forty-five societies made themselves responsible for thirty-five thousand dollars' worth of capital stock. The sales during the first year amounted to only nine thousand dollars a week. The progress of the society was rapid. By 1868 the English wholesale did a business of two million dollars; by 1882 of twenty millions; by 1909 of one hundred and twenty-five millions. During the forty years ending December, 1910, the English wholesale did a business of over two thousand millions; while the Scotish wholesale, since it opened its doors in 1868, has done a business of six hundred and twenty-five million dollars. The wholesales have been successful because they have been ably and democratically managed. They have sold first-class goods-made, on the whole, under fair conditions. Moreover, they have benefited by the loyalty and interested adherence of both managers and members of retail societies. When a man who has always been poor is raised to the position of manager of a large retail, buying, let us say, half a million a year, he is immediately beset by temptation. It may not be the temptation of a direct bribe or even of a favor conferred upon himself or upon some relative. The Enamel for Practical Use Inside and out-homes, clubs, hotels and public buildings-this is the enamel that works right for the painter on the job, and advertises the painter when the job is finished. SHERWIN-WILLIAMS OLD DUTCH ENAMEL is a white enamel, made by the old Dutch process, suitable for interior and exterior work of the highest class. Our booklet gives the de-... tails-write for it today. THE SHERWIN-WILLIAMS CO. 608 CANAL ROAD, N. W It may be the nod of a great man, the flattery of a facile salesman. It may be even subtler; and yet the interests of the whole democracy of the store may be threatened. Now, however, that the retail manager buys from the C. W. S.-the cooperative wholesale society-everybody knows that he gets nothing. He is above suspicion. He is true to the cooperative principle. Even in his buying he earns a dividend for his members. The tremendous success of the wholesale society, like the success of the retail cooperatives, has had the effect of demolishing a good many business superstitions. It has made us change our opinion with regard to the ability of consumers-and especially of working-men consumers-to unite, to agree, to stick, to elect proper leaders, to trust their leaders when elected, to take a large view and to abide by success or defeat. When the first cooperative retail was opened it was freely predicted that the shop would soon close its doors. A hundred men could not run a store. What was everybody's business would be nobody's business. You could not change human nature. It was not necessary to change human nature. It was found that, with a good working principle, each cooperator could be made interested in all. It was found that under cooperation every successful retail manager was not only willing but anxious to teach other managers the methods of his success. Instead of the secrecy and lack of coordination of small, competing British tradesmen, the cooperators opened their books to every one, both within and without the movement. When the cooperative wholesales were started the same pessimistic predictions were heard from. Workmen, it was now conceded, could run little shops-for, even before the advent of cooperation, the exmechanic or former servant was likely to become a greengrocer or tobacconist-but, it was contended no working man or committee of working men could run huge wholesale stores doing a business of millions of dollars a year. It could not be done. It was done. Capital was forthcoming. Patronage was forthcoming. Leadership was forthcoming. The wholesale cooperators, it is true, have produced no business geniuses-no Stewart, Wanamaker or Marshall Field. For big business men they are too cautious. Perhaps they are not sufficiently speculative. Nevertheless, the wholesale managers, who are constantly under the fire of a searching criticism, have developed the qualities as well as the defects of the conservative banker or of the guardian of trust funds. They are content with a gain which, if moderate, is at least permanent; they are willing to build slowly toward a solid, steady success. To be continued.) COLLECTIVE AGREEMENTS IN GERMANY By HANS FEHLINGER, Munich, Germany HE strike was the original method employed by workmen in their efforts to increase their share of the product of industry. Collective bargaining, the commercial method of higgling over terms and prices, is of comparatively recent origin. It took place as soon as organized labor could persuade or compel employers to deal with their employees collectively or by common rules. Regular and formal collective bargaining began in England about 50 years ago when the first successful conciliation and arbitration board was established in 1860 for the hosiery and glove trade of Nottingham by Mr. A. J. Mundella, a manufacturer, who had risen from the working classes. The time seemed ripe for the movement. In March, 1864, and it appears independently of the Nottingham movement, a somewhat similar board was formed in the Wolverhampton building trade; and on March 22, 1869, the iron manufacturers in the north of England and their workmen united in the formation of the celebrated Board of Arbitration and Conciliation for the North of England Manufactured Iron Trade, which has operated with wonderful success since that time. On the continent of Europe collective bargaining was hardly heard of 20 years ago. In Germany the working classes distrusted agreements with the employers for a long time and it was only in 1899 that the trade unions congress gave to the "wages agreement" movement formal approval. The employers were still slower to embrace the principle of collective agreements, and the Central Association of Manufacturers voiced the apprehensions of a large section of employers when, in May of 1905, it passed a resolution asserting wages agreements to be dangerous to German industry, inasmuch as they were calculated to place "obstacles in the way of technical progress and the organization of industry." However, in the course of the last few years the method of regulating working conditions by collective agreement has gained in favor. In many important trades the wages and other matters in dispute are now frequently and satisfactorily settled, for given periods of time, by means of conferences between the representatives of the two parties primarily concerned, at which conference written agreements prescribing the terms of employment are adopted. Local agreements applying to a single place or two or more adjacent places prevail in most of the trades. Indvidual firm agreements are often found where local agreements have not as yet been popular. It frequently happens, moreover, that the employers are without associations where the workmen are more or less effectively organized, and in such cases the former enter General the contract as individual firms. agreements applying to the whole empire are still rare exceptions. In the painting trade a general agreement was concluded in 1910; a large minority of the union members opposed it, but now almost everybody is satisfied with its working. While the agreements are for the most part concluded as the result of direct negotiation, many have been concluded by the help, and even at the instigation of the local industrial courts (Gewerbegerichte). The duration of the agreements varies from one to five years; the great majority are concluded for two or three years at a time. The shorter agreements are generally found in industries where the conditions are liable to frequent change, whether in technical processes or in public fashions and taste. In 1905 the German Labor Department ascertained the existence of 1558 collective agreements involving 46,272 establishments and 477,328 workmen. In 1910 the number of agreements had increased to 8293 with 173,727 establishments and 1,361,086 workmen involved. The collective agreements in force at the close of 1910 are grouped according to trades in the following table: CARTER It is to your advantage to use the lead that requires the least effort to brush it out. Carter not only works more easily under the brush but it covers better and goes farther. Carter whiteness means purity, fineness and unexcelled spreading qualities. The White The Carter Times, our little magazine for painters, is of much interest and practical value to those starting for themselves. It will be sent to you free on request. CARTER WHITE LEAD CO. White Lead The 313 collective agreements existing in the painting trade involved 17,195 establishments and 58,838 workmen. Although the number of industrial work-people covered by the agreements has considerably increased within the last few years it represents only a small proportion of the total number employed in Germany. The mass of wage-earners stand still outside of collective bargaining. The subjects with which collective agreements deal are numerous and varied in character, not only wages and hours, but, to a greater or less extent in different cases, many other circumstances affecting the con ditions of labor being included, frequently in elaborate detail. In a large number of instances, particularly in the more important industries, the collective agreements also provide machinery for the purpose of effecting the pacific settlement of differences which may arise either as to the interpretation and application of existing agreements or as to the terms upon which fresh contracts of the kind shall be concluded. It is a remarkable fact that a decided opposition to piecework finds expression in many agreements, some of which expressly prohibit it, while others stipulate that it shall be restricted as much as possible. Restrictions as to piecework are commonly enforced not only in dangerous trades, but also in those trades which are free from special risks. "A whir of dust is sweeping the hill, A sortie of ghouls aloose from the tomb, -Hudson Maxim in Plain Talk. |