PLANNING TO REDUCE STOCK
Soon after my talk with Barlow, I planned a big sale to reduce my stock.
I was most anxious to reduce it $2,000.00 worth, and at the same time I
wanted to see if I could not hit back at Stigler. He was keeping up his
price-cutting campaign, although he had evidently realized the fact that
I took my cut prices off the goods as soon as he cut his, so that he had
begun to put the same kind of goods in his window that I did, but cut
them about 10 or 15 per cent. from the regular prices.
I had spoken to Jock McTavish about this, and had suggested that perhaps
I ought to cut all goods down to cost for a little while, for apparently
Stigler could sell at a 15 per cent. reduction and still make a profit.
"No," said Jock. "Dinna ye ken that he loses money when he cuts his
goods that much?"
"Why, how can that be?" I asked. "Suppose he buys something for $1.00,
and the regular price is $1.50. He cuts that 15 per cent.--he would be
selling it at--at $1.27. He would make 27¢ profit!"
"Ye're wrong," replied Jock. "The cost o' the goods is no the bare
invoice price, but the cost plus the cost o' selling. Noo, as ye ken, it
will cost ye round aboot 30 per cent. on cost to sell your goods, so
that those goods would cost $1.00 plus 30¢, the cost o' selling; and
when he sells them for $1.27 he'll be losing 3¢ on every sale."
"But he could care for his overhead on his regular stock," I replied.
"Verra foolish reasoning," snapped Jock, "for a mon to mak' a part of
his sales carry the freight for aw o' 'em!"
I had thought about this afterward, and finally had been able to see
how, if he cut his goods 15 per cent., he couldn't make anything on the
deal.
However, several people had been saying that Stigler had got me "on the
run," so I decided it was up to me to have a whack at him. Therefore, I
planned what I called an "Automatic Sale." I picked out a whole lot of
stock, goods a little bit damaged, lines that I had no sale for at
all--I found a lot of things which the two previous owners of the store
bought and stored away and apparently never did anything with. I found
about a gross of painted rubber balls; I found a lot of juvenile
printing outfits; and padlocks--I dug up about three gross of padlocks,
of the strangest patterns you could think of! I found eleven different
makes of safety razors, and there were only two of them I had ever sold
any quantity of. I planned to reduce the number of lines as much as I
could and just push the real sellers--put my money into goods that would
sell quickly and so increase my turn-over.
All the five-cent articles that I wanted to dispose of in this sale I
tied in pairs--two for ten cents.
I intended to run four narrow tables down the center of the store. The
first one was to contain ten-cent goods, the next twenty-five cent, the
next fifty-cent, and the last one all the odds and ends at various
prices.
My idea was to run the sale on the plan of automatic reduction of price.
I had got the idea from a magazine which had said that, if you could
offer anything to people which appealed to the sporting instinct that is
in every one of us, you would attract attention. So I decided to try to
appeal to this sporting instinct by automatically reducing the goods one
cent in every ten cents every day, until the goods were reduced to
nothing,--and then give away what was left.
I had talked this over with the boys at our Monday's weekly
meeting--which, by the way, had been a most interesting one and
continued for over an hour instead of the three-quarters of an hour we
had planned--and they had been very enthusiastic over it. I had also
talked it over with Betty and Jock and Fellows. While Jock shook his
head and said, "Ye're takkin' a big risk, mon," Betty had said, "Go
ahead and do it, boy!" Fellows just said, "Bully, you're going to be a
real man before you're through!"
Larsen seemed to be getting younger every day. When I came out of the
store the day after I had announced my plans, he was talking over the
idea with the other boys in a very excited and enthusiastic manner.
The sale was planned to start in two weeks hence, and, during those two
weeks, car signs were displayed in all our trolleys, worded like this:
"A penny in ten a day,
Till the goods are given away."
DAWSON BLACK'S AUTOMATIC SALE
Begins Thursday, Aug. 26.
Get Particulars.
In addition to this, Larsen and Wilkes tacked these signs on all the
trees and blank spaces they could about the town.
Just one week before the sale started, I put the following "ad." in both
our local papers for three days, without any change of copy:
AUTOMATIC--THAT'S THE WORD
that describes the big sale
DAWSON BLACK
is running from Thursday, Aug. 26 to ----? _You_ decide
when the sale ceases.
_Heavy stocks must be reduced_
I have decided to sell all surplus stock
_automatically_.
Every article to be offered in this sale is plainly
marked at regular price, and is now on display on the
AUTOMATIC SALES COUNTERS.
On the opening day, all prices will be reduced one cent
in every ten cents, and a further reduction of one cent
in ten will automatically take place every day until the
prices of the goods are reduced to nothing.
_They will then be given away_
See the special circulars, or call at
DAWSON BLACK'S HARDWARE STORE
32 Hill Street.
I ordered from the printer four circulars which were clipped together
with wire. One sheet talked about the ten-cent goods, another about the
twenty-five-cent, another about the fifty, and the fourth about the
mixed table. The sheet explanatory of the twenty-five cent goods was as
follows:--
DAWSON BLACK'S BIG AUTOMATIC SALE
32 Hill St.
Two thousand dollars' worth of goods to be sold at _your
own price_. All you have to do is wait until the goods
are reduced to your price, and then--buy them--if there
are any left.
A PENNY IN EVERY DIME TAKEN OFF EVERY DAY
Every article on each counter is plainly marked at
regular prices and can be seen now.
Sale begins Thursday, Aug. 26, and the first reduction
will be made that day--and a further similar reduction
will be made every day thereafter until the goods are
sold or until the prices are reduced to nothing, when
they will be given away.
The following is an illustration of how the articles
listed on the reverse side of this sheet will be
reduced, as well as scores of other 25-cent articles not
listed here:
REGULAR PRICE 25¢ Regular price
Thursday, Aug. 26 22½¢ 2½¢ saved
Friday, Aug. 27 20¢ Put a nickel in your pocket
Saturday, Aug. 28 17½¢ Saves you 7½¢
Monday, Aug. 30 15¢ And two trolley rides free
Tuesday, Aug. 31 12½¢ _Half price_--if any left
Wednesday, Sept. 1 10¢ But why talk of saving if there
are none left
Thursday, Sept. 2 7½¢ Saves 17½¢--but too late
Friday, Sept. 3 5¢ Would save 20¢ if others had not
cleaned them out
Saturday, Sept. 4 2½¢ But why talk about saving
Tuesday, Sept. 7 FREE Help yourself to what is left
(See other side)
On the reverse side was the following list:--
DAWSON BLACK'S BIG AUTOMATIC SALE
SOME OFFERINGS ON THE 25¢ TABLE
Large size whisk brooms
Handy household saws
Steel garden hand forks and trowels
Heavy enameled saucepans
Bristle-tight paint brushes
Warranted pocketknives
Reliable padlocks
Double-well dust-proof ink stands
Bronze watch fobs
A large assortment of window shades
Juvenile sets of knife, fork and spoon
Fine quality scissors--all sizes
Enameled sink baskets
Steel frying pans
"Scour-clean" soap for cleaning greasy pans
Pocket manicure sets
Wire clothes lines
Boys' printing outfits--rubber type
Screw-drivers--hatchets--hammers--plyers
"Clix" patent shoe shining sets
Many styles in window fasteners
Enamel--varnish paint
Insect powder
Bicycle pumps--bells--tools
Corkscrews--razor strops
AND HOSTS OF OTHER GOODS.
Over each table I had a big card, of which the following is a sample:--
EVERYTHING ON THIS COUNTER IS
A REGULAR 50¢ ARTICLE
Look them over--Buy while you can!
REGULAR PRICE 50¢ Regular price
Thursday, Aug. 26 45¢ A nickel saved
Friday, Aug. 27 40¢ A dime in your pocket
Saturday, Aug. 28 35¢ Saves the price of three sodas
Monday, Aug. 30 30¢ Saves four trolley fares
Tuesday, Aug. 31 25¢ Half price--any left?
Wednesday, Sept. 1 20¢ Makes your saving look like 30¢
Thursday, Sept. 2 15¢ And 35¢ to the good--IF
Friday, Sept. 3 10¢ Saves 40¢
Saturday, Sept. 4 5¢ Ten for the price of one--but you
missed your chance
Tuesday, Sept. 7 FREE Help yourself to what is left
Jock had said: "Mon, they'll all wait till the last day and then come
and steal the goods awa' frae ye!"
"No," Betty had replied, "many will buy, before the goods are reduced
much, for fear somebody else will buy them first."
Larsen suggested having a big sign in the window headed:
"WATCH THIS LIST. ARTICLES SOLD OUT WILL BE POSTED ON IT."
"You see, Boss," he had said, "the folks'll see a number of things put
on the list. They'll figure they'd better not wait else what they want
will be sold."
Fellows chimed in with, "Tell you what to do, Black. Put in just two or
three of some articles, so that by the end of the first day you'll be
able to post up some goods that are sold out."
Jock had a further suggestion, "Ye've got an unusual plan there, laddie;
why don't ye tell the newspapers aboot it. Maybe they'll give ye a
stor-ry in reference to it."
"That's a good idea," I had replied, "I'll try it."
"Don't ye think," he continued, "that it would pay ye tae put a list in
the papers each day o' the goods that are sold, and call it 'Too late to
buy the following at Dawson Black's Automatic Sales--Some one else got
ahead o' ye',' or-r something like that?"
I decided to adopt that plan and that I would call on the newspaper
people to see if I could not get a write-up on the sale from them.
I really was getting anxious for the sale to start so that I could see
how it would come off. I felt that I was taking a big risk, since, if it
failed, I would lose a few hundred dollars. But, even then, I would turn
some dead stock into cash, and I remembered that, at the trade
convention, one fellow had said a dollar in the till was worth two
dollars of unsalable goods on the shelves, "for," said he, "if you turn
that two dollars' worth of goods into a dollar cash and you turn that
dollar over three and a half times in a year, you are going to earn a
profit on three and a half dollars' worth of live stuff instead of the
questionable profit on two dollars' worth of dead stuff!"
I guess we are all gamblers at heart, for every one, even the Mater, had
become interested and excited over my first attempt at a big sale.
I hadn't quite decided whether to send the circulars by mail, or to have
them delivered to every home in town by messenger; but was inclined to
adopt the latter plan.
Fellows suggested, "Why don't you get some pretty girls to go around and
deliver them? They would make a hit!"
"Do you think so?" flashed back Betty. "That's just where you're
mistaken, Mr. Smarty--if you think a woman is going to be tickled to
have a pretty girl come up to the door: send a homely one and it might
work!"
Aren't women queer?