TRADE TOPICS.

Otago Witness, Issue 3111, 29 October 1913, Page 13

TRADE TOPICS.

(From Our Own* Correspondent.) LONDON, September 3. ATTAR OF ROSES. The principal ingredients of perfumes are being quoted at extremely high prices, and blenders are now paying two or even three times the normal price for at least two of the essential oils which enter into the composition of many popular scents. Attar of roses, for instance, is worth about three-halfpence a drop. This precious essence forms the basis of a large proportion of the favourite perfumes, and, owing to the extreme prices which the distilleries in Bulgaria are demanding, the product is so cleverly adulterated that no manufacturer will conclude a purchase until ho has had samples submitted to analytical examination. The bulk of the world s

supply of attar of rosea comes from Bulgaria, and to a large extent its scarcity and dearness are due to the recent war in the Near East, and the consequent unrest in the rose-growing area. One effect of the exorbitant figure at which Bulgarian attar is quoted has been to stimulate the distillers in the South of France to produce a similar article, which is likely to become a keen rival. FORTUNES IN WASTE. Hundreds df thousands of pounds of capital are invested in the waste material business. In fact, to start as a rag merchant in a good way of business as much as from £20,000 to £30,000 of capital ie needed. Rag-hunting is an exciting business, for it possesses a great element of chance. The rag man sorts the articles out and sells them to the marine stores. Flannel trousers fetch approximately 60s a hundredweight, discarded stockings even

more. Nearly all the stockings are sent to stocking-sorting centres in Yorkshire. High-class rags o£ this description are turned into shoddy, and again blended with wool into mantles, overcoats, and cheap suits. Bottles return to the chemists, bones go to the making of soap and fertilisers. The inferior rags are used for making paper.