Vagabond Editorials

By Jack Dionne

It looks to me as though the lumber industry right now is in the exact position of the dog in the old, old story. ,'The bear was chasing the dog," so that old story went, "and, seeing that the bear was gaining o4 him, the dog just ran up a tree." "Wait a minute," said the skeptical listener, "a dog can't climb a tree." "Can't, Hell !" replied the story teller, "this dog HAD TO CLIMB A TREE." ttrN

I really think it's that way now. The industry is full of these doubting Thomases who always doubt if certain things can be done. They've always doubted that they COULD get out and create business by suggestion, by creating desire, by changing the passive prospect into the active one. ft was all right to doubt in times when they were doing a fairly satisfactory am.ount of business just following the old, old linE of least resistance. But how about this year? The old dependable just-enough-to-get-by volume isn't showing up. It isn't going to show up. The business we get this year is going to be largely what we go out after. The bear is close behind. It looks as though, like the dog in the story, yotr've GOT TO CLIMB THAT TREE YOU'VE BEEN,SHYING FROM SO LONG. Got to do it "or elset'. ++*

The kick-back from our go-out-and-sell edito,rials of lite is great. It comes from everlr direction. And here, there, and everywhere I see bobbing up live merchandisers with practical and useful helps for those who want to go out and create some business. The lumber dealer who sees the handwriting on the wall and wants to get started MAKING some business for himself, doesn't have to go out unaided. Many agencies are holding out to him thoughts and things and helps of a very useful and*ph]rsical character.

Note the following. It is part of an advertisCment of a big sawmill concern:

"Times are hard," says the Lumber Industry. "No one is buying lumber." True enough, but HOW MANY ARE SELLING LUMBER? And selling is not done by waiting for someone to buy. As long as a building remains in need of repair and as long as there are houses without modern built-in utilities and conveniences. there is'a lumber market. A systematic canvass offering practical suggestio'ns is bound to yield profitable returns. The building owner who makes a small improvement today is often stimulated thereby to larger profits tomorrow. Dealer and mill man are partners in production and distribution. It is the mill man's job to provide materials to meet modern merchandising requirements and the dealer's job is to sell it to the consumer. He must sell IDEAS and the DESIRE FOR IMPROVEMENT as well as materid.

THAT'S what that "Y"T*"I*I said.

Amen, I say. And still again, Amen. It was about eighteen months ago that I guoted in this column an editorial from Forbes' Magazine of business, in which was asked the question: "Why not keep our homes as up-to-date as our automobiles?" That seerned to the editor like a practical question. It WAS. If any other industry had such a practical possibility facing it, it would rejoicg in times like these'

Of course, the answer to Mr. Forbes' question is that keeping our hornes as up-to-date as our automobiles re. quires of the building industry the same sort of merchandising as that which keeps our automobiles up-to.the-minut€, and we don't seem to have it. The answer is that the average retailer can't seem to place himself in the position of being the birilding thinker of his community. He is accustomed to quoting on material bills that are brought to him, etc., but when it comes to going out to see what he can do to modernize and repair and improve the dwellings in his community, he just doesn't sEem to fit hirnself to the job. I'm talking about the majority. Not of the always live number who jump at and profit by these opportunities. ***

Mr. Jones buys a new car. Sixty days later the makers of that car have a new model on the market. There are little changes here and there, little niceties in the new car that were not in the old, things that catch the eye and create desire. And JONES WANTS THAT NEW MODEL. His new car isn't well broken in yet, BUT HE WANTS THAT NEW CAR.

Jones probably lives in a house ten or fifteen years old, that hasn't had one single improvement since he bought or built it. It is probably just as far behind the times as a car would be built when that house was built. But Jones doesn't think of that-isn't conscious of it. Jo,nes thinks AUTOMOBILE because the auto people keep parading in front of him new things, dazzling him, making him think, arousing his craving for possession, continually appealing to his dollars. He lives in the old-fashioned home because no one is making him think H*OME IMPROVEMENTS.

That's all there is to it. I say it's the retail lumberrnan's job to sell him new building ideas. ft's not only his job, it's his duty. It is a responsibility that he assumed when he became a retail lumberman. It's a stewardship. Ffe owes something to the people of his town, to keep them uptodate in HIS line of business. THIS year it is not only his

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