SHOPS VERSUS STORES.

Timaru Herald, Volume XXX, Issue 1476, 14 June 1879, Page 3

SHOPS VERSUS STORES.

The advocates of co-operative stores as again at the present shop system are not (says a recent Scotch paper), to have it all their own way. A word m defence of traders, or "distributors," as they are sometimes called, has been said m the current number of the Nineteet\th Century, by one who " feels " as well as " knows." Mr Lord has been iv the " shirt trade " since 1843, a year before Hood's famous f'Song of the Shirt," was written, and takes occasion by the way to "reduce" that iHiichrfluoted and tear-bedewed poem from the ranks of fact, to which it was popularly supposed to belong, to those of fiction. Good shirt makers at that time working about 12 hours a day were making from 15s to 20a, extra hands from 25s to 30s per week. If any were starving over their needles, it must have been " amateurs " who had never learned the work, and could aot of couse on sound trade principles be paid more than the standard prices. This is, however, only by the way, the main question between stores and shops being through which, channel the public is likely to get the best article at the lowest price. It would be surprising if m this controversy nothing could bo said for the private trader, and Mr Lord does, along with much that is ineffective, succed m saying a few words . worthy of consideration. Is it at all probable, he asks, that cooperative manager* Btibuld be able, as

they aver, to purchase more economically than the private trader? It is almost axiomatic that to traiiK.-ict any piece of business m the; most < fticient manner the transactor must have a direct personal interest m the result. The managers of co-operative stores have no such interest ; they are employes at fixed salaries, while the directors and members are engaged m other businesses or have no praticitl knowledge of the matter. The private trader, on the other hand, has that direct personal interest and that practical experience which are tho strongest guarantees that he will secure the articles m which he deals ol the best quality and at the lowest market quotation. It is by private enterprise that undertakings small or great are, as a rule, most successfully prosecuted. When Governments want a job cheaply and quickly done, they must do it by contract. When they want it well done, they must pay by results. As a matter of fact, Mr Lord tells us, cooperative buyers are m certain inner trado circles named " city scavengers," that "it is not an uncommon thing for goods otherwise unsaleable, or which have been returned as faulty, to be laid aside m anticipation of the co-operative buyer's arrival. Anything, it is said, will do for the stores." How far this is the oase we have no means of knowing, but certainly from an a priori point of view one would conclude that purchase transactions will be to the full as keenly conducted by the personally interested private trader. But suppose the goods well purchased, are they supplied to consumers at the least possible advance. Mr Lord considers that the severe competition which exists amongst private traders is certain to secure this. As yet there is no combination amongst them to keep up prices. It is a general struggle for existence, and the fittest that survive are those who serve the public most efficiently at the lowest cost. Shopkeepers, us a rule, make but a bare living by very hard work, and is it likely that co-operative companies, with highly-paid managers, buyers, &c, whose yearly salaries are m many cases as largeor larger than theannuul profits of the average shopkeeper, will be able permanently to supply goods at a smaller advance on the cost of production ? To whatever extent they accomplish this — and it must be granted that m some cases they do — is attributable, according to Mr Lord, to some unjust advantages which m the meantime they enjoy. These societies which are connected with the Government Civil and other Services " are frequently through the medium of members who are m office m possession of private information which enables them to forestall a market." So far as this use o ! official knowledge goes to benefit one society at the expense of others it is, of course, unjustifiable, and will be felt as a grievance beyond the class which Mr Lord represents. But further, co-operative societies m general pay no income-tax. Traders, of course, do so, and their profits are usually calculated by the assessor on the annual turnover. The calculation goes on the assumption that, on an average, 10 per cent of the sales is taxable as profit. The displacement of private business houses by co-operative stores is therefore a process which tells on tho national exchequer, as well as helps the hitter to undertrade the former. Were the stores to be taxed on 10 per cent of (heir turnover, as they ought to be, they would find it impossible, Mr Lord thinks, to compete for any length of time with private traders. These considerations, as we have said, are perhaps not unworthy of attention, and it only requires the public to be convinced that under the present distributive system goods are supplied at a fair price, and m perfect purity (for this is a strong point with the stores), to secure its continuance for an indefinite time to come. But when Mr Lord threatens us with such a union among traders as shall turn Parliament round its little finger, with such a revolutionary outcome of co-opera-tion as will imperil the social fabric, and when he appeals to the aesthetic faculty by calling upon us to consider what town streets would be like were the gay and gaudy shops to be replaced by a few gloomy, unattractive stores — we are obliged to bid him good-bye.