GOOD TIMES.

Auckland Star, Volume XLII, Issue 136, 9 June 1911, Page 6

GOOD TIMES.

AUCKLAND BUSINESS BOOMING. SATISFIED TRADESPEOPLE. The prosperous times experienced in Auckland are evidently not shared to the same extent by Southern cities. From Christchurch comes the news that the head of one of the largest manufacturing businesses in Christchurch states that the present seavpn is the dullest as far as business is concerned that he has known for 15 years. "People seem to have plenty of money," he said, "but they do not spend it. There is a feeling of uncertainty in the air; but why it should exist I do not know. Goodness knows, there is no real cause for it. I suppose that it will soon pass away and leave us as we were." In Auckland business people are highly pleased with the existing state of affairs. A leading Qupen-street draper, interviewed by a "Star" representative this morning, said business had never been better. Last month's trade represented a record, the returns being 20 per cent better than those of the corresponding month last year, despite the {act that big discount sales were then in progress. This Tenia rkable increase in the volume of trade was only to be ascribed to the prosperity of the province. People had money to spend, and spent it freely. There was an improved demand for the better class of goods, and cash sales were becoming a more marked feature of every-day trade. In fact, his business—one of the biggest of the kind in the Dominion —showed less than 5 per cent of bad book debts on the whole of last year's transactions. This percentage was to be regarded as very low. Altogether, business in Auckland had never been more brisk, nor money more plentiful.

Other business people, including smaller tradespeople, also spoke enthusiastically of "good times prevailing" when interviewed on the subject of trade in Auckland at the present time.