TIRE TRADE PRACTICES.

Evening Post, Volume CV, Issue 127, 31 May 1928, Page 14

TIRE TRADE PRACTICES.

.Mr. S. Forristal, Federal Government Prices Examiner, reports publiu means employed by traders or groups of traders to fix prices, and v maintain control of those prices. But for these reports the public would still be in ignorance. Mr. Forristal's exposure of the discount system operating in the tire trade is illuminating. He says that prior to 1927 the small retailers were allowed 25 per cent, off invoice, an additional 5 per cent, cash settlement, and a further rebate of VA per cent., making a total of 37% per cent., whilst large dealers were allowed as high a total net discount of 44 per cent. These huge discounts, the largest percentage of which the manufacturers contend, was passed on to the public, enabled the trade to sell much below list prices. When the Automobile Chamber of Commerce came into existence it tried to get a monopoly control of the tire industry, and to strengthen its hands it waged war against a company which refused to agree to its conditions. Mr. FSrristal's observation is that if the Chamber's conditions were to ensure real value to the motoring public, evidently the motoring public had previously been exploited.