There is plenty of available evidence that some "great reductions" heralded in advertisements are really great exaggerations of very small reductions. Instances of this sort are given by the Dry Goods Economist of March 19, 1904. . . . Frequently one notices the beginning of better things or at least of greater caution in the avoidance of direct affirmations that former prices were so and so, and the substitution therefore of statements to the effect that "values" or "qualities" would justify higher prices than the ones asked. Sometimes reformation takes the dubious path of sweeping announcements that competitors can not meet the prices fixed by the advertiser. Investigation of such statements requires more time than most purchasers can afford to give, but in all retail markets of any considerable size they are simply not warranted by facts. Every wide-awake merchant constantly has opportunities along certain lines - so much may be admitted - but no merchant has an absolute monopoly of such opportunities. The unceasing vigilance with which retail traders watch each other is scarcely known to the general public. In every large establishment there is a "Comparison Department" specially charged with this function. "Spotters" are constantly being sent out by the head of this department to observe the doings of competitors and daily reports of their findings are made. If a rival store offers a great bargain, samples are bought, carefully examined, even torn to pieces if necessary to ascertain qualities, and a corresponding or greater reduction made if thought advisable. Under the circumstances, the advertisements of merchants who claim everything all the time are more ludicrous than anything else.

Standards of retail business. While there is doubtless much to condemn in some of the practices cited in the foregoing pages it would be highly unjust to charge all retailers with deliberate and habitual misrepresentation. Many of the greatest successes, one can say practically all the permanent successes, of the mercantile world, have been made by firms which have conscientiously avoided deception. It would be easy to mention cases of this sort in New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, and other of our large cities, but they are familiar enough without mention. Even where retail practice is not so scrupulous, deliberate and habitual misrepresentation can not always be charged. The truth is that many merchants of this as well as of a higher type use such terms as qualities, values, prices, etc., very loosely, and more in accordance with the customs of the market in which they happen to be doing business than with the definitions of economics or the canons of ethics. Not infrequently the community, or a certain class of buyers in the community, is to blame in large part for the abuses which spring up in retailing. On this point the writer finds it impossible to agree entirely with a very clever authority on merchandising who maintains that "the retailer is the king of business. It's not the consumer - arguments to the contrary notwithstanding. It's upon the education given the consumer by the dealer that the formation of taste depends." Granting that the influence of the retailer is great, it still remains true that his patrons are, presumably at least, fairly intelligent grown-up persons who exercise ordinary prudence in business matters. The retailer is more active, of course, in designing and applying various plans to attract trade; but precisely the same motive as his own, namely, self-interest rightly or wrongly conceived, dictates the action of his customers in giving or withholding patronage. The latter may be careless, ignorant, or under the spell of that delusive cupidity which is always seeking something for nothing, and these conditions may permit or encourage merchants to employ tricky devices. Even so, purchasers can hardly be exonerated from all blame for the resulting demoralized condition of the retail market. In illustration of the foregoing may be cited numerous cases of towns and cities where severely competitive "selling campaigns" have been carried so far that in the end it becomes almost impossible to dispose of anything except with the aid of such devices as trading stamps or as bargains on one pretext or another - where the people "have been so deafened with the siren song of 'bargains," as one trade journal puts it, "that they don't know one when they see it." Manifestly such conditions reflect not only the character of the mercantile element, but also the character of the public as retail buyers - a conclusion which need not be blinked because phenomena of this sort are so exceedingly common. The following advice given to a merchant who complained of trade conditions demoralized in this manner is particularly noteworthy because of its frank implication that retail trade as at present conducted is not simply a price competition:

. . . The wise merchant, when he sees a wave of sweeping over his community, will dodge the competition as far as he is able. He will do all he can to impress his community that there is something more than price to be considered. He will not do this by direct statements to that effect; that goes without saying. But he will try to get a reputation for his store on something besides price, always being smart enough to create a reputation for selling as low as his competitors. He will sell staples extremely low, but on novelties he'll make enough profit to offset the loss. And he will get the people coming to him for these novelties. He'll talk style and fashion in his ads, and over the counter; he'll show the new and fashionable things and he will have them before the other fellows get them in stock.1

Further advice along the same lines is given, but enough has been quoted to make clear the conditions which compel merchants either to cut prices extensively or to resort to other means of meeting a cut price competition.

A retail buying policy. With such complex and often deceptive conditions existing in retail trade it is a matter of considerable difficulty to formulate a policy for buyers to pursue. Certain general rules seem fairly clear, however. It is an old maxim that nothing is a bargain which is not needed. Unfortunately purchasers often forget this; with many people buying is a passion rather than the cold calculation of the economic man. One qualification of the maxim quoted above is of some importance, however. There are many regularly recurring wants which the ordinary purchaser satisfies as they reach their maximum intensity, that is, usually, in the very thick of the season. As a consequence he pays the highest retail prices for his goods. A careful study of the cycle of special sales of various sorts (for they run in a fairly regular cycle through the year) will often enable him to effect considerable savings, by taking advantage of low prices during dull seasons. Another general rule for the bargain seeker is that he should consider the cost in effort as well as the money-cost of the things he buys. In spite of all the devices to facilitate the examination of goods and their de1. Dry Goods Economist, March 18, 1900, p. 15.

livery, shopping remains an arduous occupation. Notoriously it is often carried too far. Mrs. John Lane tells the story in a recent number of an English review of a "woman of massive intellect" who saved seven pence by going to a distant suburb for Brussels sprouts. As a consequence she became so exhausted that it took several days and the services of a fashionable physician to restore her. Perhaps it is because of the frequent neglect of two such obvious principles as the foregoing - namely, not to buy what you don't need and not to go to too much trouble in your buying - that skepticism with regard to the existence of any such things as bargains in retail trade is so common. Often, indeed, it is the most indefatigable shopper who is most skeptical on this point, which, however, merely goes to show that over-sanguine expectations lead easily to irrational disappointments.

But there are also certain positive rules with regard to buying which may serve as supplement to the preceding "don'ts." Where the sum involved is sufficiently large or where an article is likely to be in constant demand a careful examination of the stocks of various retailers is usually worth while, whether or not any bargains are being advertised at the time. It is always of importance to ascertain and take into consideration the general reputation for honesty and fairness of the merchant with whom you are dealing. Fortunately information of this sort is much more easily obtained than that exhaustive knowledge of goods and values which one would require in order to be fortified against deception and over-charge. In this connection the purchaser would do well to remember the principle known as "the reaction of consumption upon production."1 Every purchase of goods under given conditions is a vote, accompanied by material support, to continue those conditions. The application of a little conscience in such matters would discourage tremendously many of the shady practices now prevailing in retail trade.

With regard to bargains masquerading in the guise of odd prices a rather greater degree of caution would seem advisable. Odd prices are doubtless clever enough with a rather meretricious sort of cleverness, but this will hardly commend them to careful buyers. If certain figures are intrinsically so attractive one wonders whether the merchants who put their trust in such figures do not neglect other and more solid advantages which they might offer their customers. Reductions of a cent or two on some few articles the regular prices of which are definitely known may be bona fide, but with regard to the values of the great majority of things offered for sale under an odd-price scheme the ordinary purchaser is not competent to judge, and consequently is likely to be deceived. There are many reasons, as we have seen, why goods frequently have to be reduced in price in retail trade, but there is no reason at all for believing that an excessively large number of these reductions should follow in such a series as 98, 79, 69, 49, and so on. Nor can one attach much weight to the argument that odd prices attract so much additional custom that they enable the merchant employing them to purchase in so much larger quantities and to so much better advantage that he can afford to make frequent bona fide reductions of a cent or two. Retail competition is far too complex; it involves, as we have already had occasion to observe, so many factors besides price alone that the effect of the one rather doubtful factor of odd prices, assuming other conditions equal, would count for comparatively little. And other conditions would seldom be equal. Moreover, the sort of custom attracted by odd prices and similar devices is apt to be much more fickle than that which is built up by conservative and less sensational business practices. There is always one advantage to the purchaser in looking over goods marked at round price points, namely, that he can consider alternate utilities of the various articles of about the same value he may need, undisturbed by differences of a cent or two in cost. On the other hand, if merchants string their prices up and down the scale in order to take advantage of popular figures, purchasers too often succeed in "saving" two cents on a 98 cent article they do not need at the cost of the far greater utility of a dollar article they really do need. In the long run such results are good neither for sellers nor buyers. To quote proverbs, which notoriously can always be made to contradict each other: those who "take care of the pennies" in the hope that "the dollars will take care of themselves" should remember also that there is such a thing as a "penny wise, pound foolish" policy. Retail trade may need reforming in many particulars, but such reform can only come pari passu with the reform of retail buyers. Education for giving future mothers and fathers a knowledge of articles of common use, their qualities, prices, proper employment, markets wherein they are sold, and so on, is sadly needed. Until the public attains this knowledge and this point of view, odd prices and even more objectionable practices will continue to flourish.

1. See F. A. Fetter's Principles of Economics, ch. 41.