How West Coast Mills Can Constructively Develop Their California Cargo Trade

An Addtess by H. W. Bunker, President, Coos Bay Lumber Company, San Francisco, Ca'lifornia.

When the recent group meeting at Aberdeen was being organized Colonel Greeley asked me to join in a discussion rei-ative to California market conditions. Unfortunately, I was unable to attend the Aberdeen meeting, and two weeks ago today when this meeting was being programed the Colonel again asked me if I would undertake a discussion of the subject.

To avoid the possibility of misinterpretation of what I have to say I have prepared my remarks inwritten form and request your indulgence while I, from time to time, rerer to the text thereof.

If I were called upon to reduce to the fewest possible -rords my conclusions as to what could best be done to rmprove 'California marketing conditions, those words would be "identified quality.'

The California market is by far the largest and best softwood lumber market that we have, but it is very vulnerable because it is so accessible. In the old days when lumber was carried in sailing vessels the California market was apparently under the command of vessel owners. Large stocks had to be carried at California ports due to the uncertainties of delivery. Nowadays, with rapid steamer transportation and the modern mechanical equipment at the mills, even special cutting orders are possible of delivery at San Francisco and Los Angeles within from one to two weeks of the dates of receipts of orders.

It is becoming increasingly clear that the methods and practices long followed in serving the California trade are going to have to be completely renovated and changed if profitability is to be had in that market. I do not believe there is anyone present here today who will contend that there is any profit accruing to him from his present California business. Therefore, is notthis the ideal time to revise methods and practices when, as a matter of fact, a lesser volume of business would simply result in lesser losses ?

To revert to the first topic; How the West Coast mills can constructively develop the California cargo trade. I think four separate but correlated answers can be given to this proposition.

First. More potential California production must be gotten into the West Coast Lumbermen's Association, to the end that more uniformity of practice and better exchange of experiences may be had. In the absence of any other available trade association whatsoever, logically those mills serving or anticipating serving California should join forces with us.

Second. The mills that are members oi the Association, and as many non-member mills as can be prevailed upon to do so, should agree to manufacture lumber only according to the gradinglules of the Association. That is to say, they should agree to indulge in no deviation from the No. 9 rules. There is certainly a grade for every purpose to be found in that rule book. Furthermore, they should agree to segregate their products according to the rule book and. should not indulge in the mixing of common grades, as has heretofore been the practice.

Third. The manufacturer must identify his products; the manufacturer's name, the grade for which he sold it, and the West Coast insignia to show that the designated grade was that of the only trade association in the field, should all be imprinted in some fashion upon every piece of lumber shipped.

Fourth. Every effort of the mills now cutting or intending to cut California business should be put behind the California campaign of the West Coast Lumbermen's Association and the National Lumber Manufacturers' Association to introduce and have specified wherever possible identified quality lumber. A11 of .us should use our best efforts to further the demand for quality products in the form of trade marked and grade marked lumber, identified lumber, if you please.

To discuss briefly these four specific answers one by one. In the first place, and regardless of the many differences of individual opinion regarding this Association, the need for it is so obvious as to almost preclude the necessity for reference to it. I shall, therefore, take up no more of your time in an endeavor to tell you why more mills should become members of this Association ; that is the jobof the Membership .Committee, and I have the pleasure of serving as Chairman of the Committee for the present year.

The second exposition opens up a very prolific field of discussion. There can be no fair basis of competition between individual mills unless they are each making the same quality of product in the different grades ordinarily quoted. The production of lumber must, like the production of almost every other standard commodity, be brought up to uniform levels of quality. We know that, for instance, gasoline, fueloil, steel, paper, pulp, and hundreds of other standard products have been provided, through cooperation of their respective producers, with standard measuring sticks for quality. Our product has not been, and until it is there will be two competitive bases; one is price, and the other is deviation from alleged standards.

Going on to the third suggestion, why not identify our respective outputs? There is scarcely an article of merchandise which we buv todav that does not have the name of the manufacturer inefiaceibly affixed to it, except lumber. Most of us can remember the davs when many o{ these same standard necessities. such as'the often referred to cracker, came in bulk, withno identification of either manufacturer or quality. Yet none of us would consider buying any of those things under past conditions today.

My own Company became a member of this Association because we realized the necessity for the use of its prerogatives. Our membership only dates from July l, l9D. yet, since October, l9D, every piece of clear lumber that we have'produced; that is, all of our flooring, ceiling, drop siding, rustic, et cetera, has carried our trade mark and an exposition of the grade for which we sold it. IJnderstand, I mean every piece. We have not been able to put the Association grade rpark on every piece, but have tried to place it upon practically every bundle, .where the kind of lumber shipped was bundled. We are now preparing the necessary mechanical facilities to put our name, the grade, and the Association insignia upon every piece of lumber shipped by us, regardless of grade. I think we can accomplish this purpose completely within the next sixty days. For a long time we have been so marking every piece of lumber which we have shipped to certain areas where the competitive situation on grades was so obnoxious to us that we could not otherwise protect ourselves.

The big advantage that I see in marking every piece of lumber sold in the California market is not for advertising effect or repeat orders. It is to avoid being accused of having made inferior lumber which some unscrupulous vendor alleges to be our product. I am looking forward to the day when, under such accusation, our answer can be, .,If every piece has our trade mark and grade mark on it, then we made it. If it has not, then it is someone else's prod- uct." I think you would be surprised if you knew the number of times ultimate consumers are told that certain deliveries of lumber came from this or that mill, when, as a matter of fact, I believe those making the assertion would have a very difficult time determining to their own satisfaction the exact origin of that which they are delivering. To meet competition on price it is very convenient to pick over grades and mixup various lotsthat happen to be available at the time for the purpose.

In indulging in further discussion of my fourth proposal; the makers of every building material that is used with or in place of lumber are energetically campaigning all of the time to expand the use of their particular product. Not only is lumber being openly legislated out of business, but the urge is constantly upon engineers and architects to specify some other commodity. This urge comes not only from the representatives of manufacturers, but from Associations of manufacturers, of the other products. I call your attention to the advertising and descriptive literature being sent out by the Copper Research Association, the paini manufacturers trade associations, the glass manufacturers, et cetera. Similar propaganda and constant reiteration of the cheapness and utility of lumber cannot well come from individual manufacturers, especially in the California mar_ ket where so few manufacturers of fir lumber are direct dis_ tributors of their orvn products. It must come from asso_ ciations similar to the two I have mentioned; the West Coast and the National.

To refer again to my own business, one of our most able representatives is now devoting his entire time to calling upon architects, engineers, contractors, municipal organiza-_ tions, et cetera, to sell them upon quality lumber. H" "o_ licits no direct orders but only suggests and urges that in carrying on their respective construction operations they demand identified quality in the lumber they specify. H; offers them quotations on such merchandise tt rougn tne dealer or dealers from whom they customarily puiehase. Only if their usual dealer is not interested inor unwilling to quote trade marked and grade marked lumber do we ar-_ range quotations through others. If only a few of the larger manufacturers would join thisefiort a surprising change would take place in marketing conditions in North"_ ern California within a very short time. Most of you are at least reasonably familiar with the results of a similar campaign in Southern California. ft seems almost tragical that the demand for quality in that territory *r. "r.""t"d by the live distributors instead of by the activities of the manufacturers themselves.

The second interrogation is: .,'What are the selling problems. involved ?" I think it is safe to say that this q"u.stion has already been answered. The selling problems are al_ most entirely analogous to the problems of constructive development of the trade.

To summarize. The quality and persistent selling pressure which is behind the articles that can be used ln ti"u of lumber, plus the fact that so many of them are now being manufactured right in California, will tend, in my opinion, to constantly diminish the per capita consumption of lumber in California. That is exactly what has happened elsewhere in the United States. We lumber m"rrrrfa.iu..r. must. adopt the_ same methods. We must bring. about uni_ formity of quality.and procedure, and tn.n -u3t puiaii."t sales pressure behind our merchandise. If we do'not, then we may.as well look.forward to the inevitability ;i'p;..: ent conditions becoming permanent.