Obvious Opportunities for Increasing Demand and Sales

(Continued from Page 23) better homes and more home life. The Department of Agriculture has formed a farm-modernizing bureau. Many, if not all, of the agricultural colleges of the several states have farm engineers who devote a large part of their time to planning construction work for the Iarmers. eouhty Agents all over the country are being trained to_ instruct farmers how to build dairy barns so that they can produce Grade "A" milk; how to build chicken houses so that the eggs will all be standard or better. We all want to live better-it is a National characteristic internationally commented on-and now that this movement is seemingly under way, why not put forth our utmost efiort to aid in and profit by it?

My feeling is that everything connected with the marketing of lumber has been done on the *rong basis and, after having made this broad statement, if I am asked to give a simple statement as to how it can be done right I will only need to use four words, and here they are: "Pull instead of push."

As far as my observation goes, sellers push timber on the loggers, the loggers push the logs on the sawmill and after the lumber is sawn the real puihing process begin and wholesalers and manufacturers alike vie for honors in this particular. When the lumber gets into the hands of the retailer, however, the pushing process stops and as a rule, with notable exceptions, he waits to see what will happen.

Out beyond the retail yards are six million larms which need, a-c- 'cording to fairly authentic surveys, 31,500 feet to the farm or 200 billion-feet of lumber to bring them up to a modern and efficient state so that the owners can meet the demands of the public for properly certified and properly marketed farm products; and these larms need 2,000 feet each of lumber per year, or a total of 12 billion feet, to take care of repairs and new things that are needed,

Recently, the head of the Agricultural Engineering Department of the University of Missouri made a personal survey of approximately 200 farms located on varying types of soil to determine whether or not the farmer is spending too much money for his buildings. A boiled-down report of the result of his investigations is that each of the twenty most profitable farms had over $1,600.00 more invested in service buildings, not including the home, than an equal number of the least profitable farmqs, The:farm which had the highest income had a present $'orth in Tarm-service buildings per acre of over two and one-half times that of the average of all the farms studied. In figuring the cost of pro{uction for the average farm, it was found that buildings (exclusive of the home) were chalgeable with less than 6 per cent of the total. On the most profitable farm, with two and one-half times the average investment in building, less than 4 per cent of the total cost of production could be charged to the buildings.

This tends to prove the thought that on these farms lying out from the retail lumber yards there is almost a vacuum, as far as lumber is concerned, and if we can do that which will measurably fill this vacuum lumber will be drawn from the retail yards, and by them from. the wholesalers and manufacturers, and the drawing process will continue back to the timber, and that is my thought as to what must come to pass. This theory is right unless you can deinonstrate that there are not this many farms, that the farmers have no money, that they havb no desife for better homes and service buildings or that-all those things being true-we cannot get salesmen who can go out and supply the demand.

,dll have heard the criticism that the lumberman. unlike his com- petitors, does not help the retail merchant to get rid of his stock after having pushed it into his yard, and I propose that we do away with this criticism through National and regional Association eftort. I think we can do it, and have been successful in convincing the Directors of the National Lumber Manufacturers Association to the extent that they are puttihg men and money behind the idea.

If we were to follow some of our competitors and put out a force commensurate with the size of the industry, we would send some thousands of skilled farm engineers in the field to work with all the retailers to whom we sell lumber, helping these men to interest the farmers in our product. \Me are hardly able to do this, as perhaps we could if all of the lumber mills were owned by a very few cor' porations and a Gary or Farrell or Schwab or Rosenwald could make and carry out the sales policy. We can, however, do practically the same thing with only a minimum of expense, when compared with what the other would cost, and with proper support may be able to do it better, for reasons having to do with the personnel of the field force.

The National Association now is arranging for Dr. Compton, Mr. Shaw, St. Elmo Lewis, Mr. Crosby of the Kansas City office, Messrs. Miller, Upson and others of the Trade Extension Department to meet with and address approximately 5,000 retailers within the next ninety days, this being at the time of the retail conventions and other retail group gatherings. It is expected that this will be a continuous proiess and will not end with the Spring meetings of the retail associations. Of course neither Dr. Compton nor Mr. Shaw will be able to attend many of these meetings, because of their other duties, but the other men will be more or less continuously at it. In addition, Mr. Moulton (representing the Hoo-Hoo organization) and Mr. Grifee, the latter'of whom has been loaned by the Nationat to Hoo-Hoo, will do the same kind of work and with the same type of groups but, of course, lvill probably come more in contact with members or prospective members of Hoo-Hoo than will the others.

It would do you all good if you could see the correspondence indicating the warm cooperation on the part of the farm engineers at the agricultural colleges, farm agents in hundreds of counties, retail secreAries from all sections, railroad agricultural agents (such as that of the New York Central) and, in fact, almost everyone who is given an gpportunity to cooperate seems to be pleased to embrace it.

Perhaps there are 20,000 retail yards in the United States and there are no accurate figures which would show whether this figure is correct or a little too large or too small; but, at any rate, there are plenty for us to work on. It is the plan that the men I have mentioned, cooperationg with the other agencies referred to, will try to enthuse many thousands of these retailers to provide themselves or their salesmen with the books on farm buildings gotten out by the colleges in each of the states and by the National and regio-nal asso' ciations, and with all other necessary material to aid the farmer in deciding what he wants and how and where to get it and then to conclude the sale.

A lot of purchases are not made because it is too much trouble to sketch what is wanted, make a bill of material, get the material on the ground, find some one to make use of it and otherwise attend to all o-f the minor details that have to be looked after- in even putting a small addition on a house, It is our hope and intention that these difficulties can all be minimized, and we have proven by the tests that have been made that they cah be and that normal sales resistance can be reduced.

- I said that perhaps we can do this job better than a large corpora- tion can. What I had in mind was that each of these salesmen will be working among people he knows, who are living under conditions that he is familiar with, and he will have the local atmosphere, the local knowledge of credits and in every way an entree that at least most strangers would not have.

Perhaps I am too enthusiastic, but surely this is something to get enthusiastic about. It is an apparent opportunity to sell a lot of goods, and salesmanship has sufficient attraction for me so that I do not want to see the opportunity go by without bringing it to the attention of everyone who might be able to give us a reason why it will not succeed or who can put their shoulders to the wheel and help it to succeed.

This work can only be done through nationally organized effort. The reasons, I think, are apparent and this illustrates one of the many potential values to be unearthed when digging into the why and wherefor of the National Lumber Manufacturers Association and, while I say that the work can only be done through the National Association, it can only be done successfully through the help of the regional associations.

Figures I have show that in 1906 the per capita consumption ol lumber in the United States was 525 feet, in 1916 it was 395 feet and in 1930 it was about 225 Leet. This is a drop of 25 per cent from 1906 to 1916 and a drop of 57 per cent from 1906 to 1930. Using 1916 as a base, the drop from 395 feet to 225 leet is 43 per cent.

It is interesting to think what an increase proportionate to the per capita difference would mean to the West Coast industry if we could go back to the 1916 figures of 395 feet, against 225 feet, or an increase over last year of almost 76 per cent if we could get our share of the business.

I_t is --y opinion that, if the substitute folks would quit advertising and doing trade extension and other associated merchandising work, in ten years (and, I believe, less) we would put the per capita consumption back up to 395 feet. I am equally firm in the belief that, if we quit our National and regional trade extension work, within ten years it wi{ be down to 100 to 120 feet. I think the percentage drop in the last fourteen years and the ratio of the drop from yearlo yeai clearly indicates this. The per capita consumption dropped 170 feet in fourteen years when construction was active and, aJ an industry, we were doing some considerable amount of trade extension work, so what can we expect during normal times if we discontinue our efiorts ?

Some of us contribute, considering normal values, two-fifths of I per cent of our sales to National trade extension work, while all of us give away in unearned discounts and price concessions several times this much-and give it some thought but nevertheless continue to do it. If we could have I or 2 per cent of the sales income of the industry to spend in selling its product to the public and to individ. uals, it would be an easy matter to put the per capita consumption back where it was a few years ago and give us all the businesl we might reasonably expect.

O. H. Cheney, well-known speaker and writer on inancial and business affairs, has recently said: "We cannot learn much about plant or store efficiency by reading about car-loadings." I take this as.a suggestion-for more work and less dependence on statistics and, being in accord, my suggestion is that since we have not secured a dictator nor devised any other scheme to put the industry in the place where_it belongs, we put a little into a iommon chest f6r.super- vision and the necessary planning and advertising, and then try the old-fashioned idea of pritting the"entire industry ii work: Retiilers first to create the desire and consumer-use, and later the rest of us to back them up with up-to-date merchandising service and the best material that any of us have 6yss kri6q/n-Certlfied American Standard Lumber.

Dr. M. L. Smith

Dr. M. L. Smith, 61, retired dentist and owner of the D & S Lumber Company, Mountain View, was killed on the -highway nea.r Palo Alto, February 15, when standing behind his stalled automobile, by another car which crashed into him.

Dr. Smith came to California some years ago from India.

A. B. Anderson Appointed Manager

A. B. Anderson has been appointed'mariager of the Hay- ward Lumber & Investment Co.. yard at Los Banos. He succeeds W. H. Sloan who recently resigned.

DOORS

Li"rt introduced 4' years ago

-now largest seller on market Largest seller, fa,stest seller, because b e r t. Guaranteed X)/o or more red heartwood with lW% oil'content. And packed itr '.metal,bound cartons for good measure.

For quotations and literature address Calilortia distributorst