OLD-TIME TE AWAMUTU

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 53, Issue 3783, 17 July 1936, Page 6

OLD-TIME TE AWAMUTU

SOME RECOLLECTIONS. BUSINESS CONDITIONS AND ETHICS. The formation of the Waikato branch of the N.Z. European Retail P ruiterers’ Association is unique inasmuch as this is the first occasion on which Waikato fruiterers have met as a body to consider the betterment of the conditions of their trade. It is a notable coincidence that the president elected, who has had a lengthy association with the retail fruit trade, established the first fruit business in Te Awamutu in the year 1908 2B years ago. The business inaugurated by Mr Heerdegen is still in existence (although housed in different premises) under the control of Mr W. Hebden, who was elected a vice-president of the association, ot which Mr Heerdegen is president. Prior to 1908 the distribution of fruit in the Te Awamutu district was in the hands of storekeepers, whose sales aggregated about three cases each ot oranges and bananas per In conversation with our reporter, Mr Heerdegen recalled that Alexandra Street was a river of mud in winter, and that on occasions customers would co-ee out from across the street, whereat the proprietor, shod in gumboots, would wade across to deliver the fruit to his anxious patrons! Te Awamutu then was not without some amenities. It possessed a metal street crossing from the post office to Mr Ahier’s store, so that citizens desiring to cross the street from the Bank of New Zealand to the opposite side in a reasonable degree of comfort could do so by a detour of half a mile via Ahier’s concrete crossing. Business in Te Awamutu 28 years ago was not so strenuously competitive as it generally is to-day. “And,” continued Mr Heerdegen, “I look back with appreciation to the kindly attitude of Messrs Gifford and Dunkley (who were the chief distributors of fruit), who refrained from selling this commodity to give the new fruiterer a chance. Business specialisation was then considered desirable, and the piracy of another’s business as bad business ethics. But now we have the unfortunate position of everyone wanting to be Universal providers—a characterisation of a dog chasing its own tail and no one better off or happier in the process. “The year 1908 marked the start of a new era in the commercial life of Te Awamutu. Fresh business people were attracted to the town. The foundation of a new business was laid which subsequently established itself as the Waipa Post. Business people thus had an avenue of expression previously denied them, and probably few there are who adequately recognise the enormous constructive influence exercised by your newspaper in the commercial and social life Of your community, "It would probably be amazing to actually know the growth of fruit distribution from the meagre six cases per week in Te Awamutu in 1908 to the weekly aggregate which is distributed to-day. And what has occurred in Te Awamutu has happened right throughout New Zealand. Fruit has assumed an all-important place in the diet of the people. Unfortunately the disparity between producing costs and consumer costs has grown prodigiously. We have the position that the grower is grossly under remunerated, and on the other hand the prices which consumers have to pay are only too often unnecessarily prohibitive. “The fruit retailer is only too often unjustly blamed by the public. In response to a request by. fruit retailers the Government has promised an investigation into the whole problem of production and distribution. It is timely. It is necessary. The public has been unduly penalised by restrictions which have reacted to the benefit of a few manipulators. Supplies are not regulated in accordance with consumptive demand, but restricted to ensure a fictitious price level which is detrimental to retail distributors and the consuming public."