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Show HSas-saMNSsavsasM ins nr 7i'iTTr rr rarTi mrifnr " 'iBrrr taaa "BILL SIMPSON" ON CATALOGUE HOUSES. To the Editor: The artlcjo on "Cities "Cit-ies Against Home," I read Jn your paper pa-per a short time ngo set mo ft thinking It was only lately, I saw oW of the leading farmers in this cJknmunily carrying n large, bunglesome catalogue from a Chicago catalogue hous home with him. It happened thatll was drawn into a discussion of this ucstlon with him and I was actually surprised to hear him express himself as ffic did. In the first place, I feci proud of the fact that I have never patronised one of these concerns in prcference'to dealing deal-ing with our home merchants. Probably one reason why I have not felt inclined to send my trade away from (home Is because, It has only been a fewj years since I found my financial condition such that It became necessary for me to arrange with someono to carry my account over a crop season. Iij fact, it has not been moro than a year since I found it necessary to run nn account for a short time and I nm not one so forgetful forget-ful of accommodations as to order from a catalogue houso and send them the money with the order when our home merchants havo been good enough to extend ex-tend credit to me when I needed it. But I cannot say this influence has been tho only one to causo me to trade entirely at home. I know if I, or any of my neighbors, want to buy something, if thoy would only go to one of our home merchants and tell what they wanted, ho will furnish it to us just as cheap as we can get it from n catalogue houso. Now I don't mean he will let us have first-class goods at a prico we would buy them for second-class .goods, but I mean that for the same class of goods they will sell us just as cheap as those other fellows. In figuring the cost of goods from catalogue houses. we don't want to forget to figure In the cost of sending the money and paying pay-ing the freight or express. If it is any thing liable to need repairs, our home merchants can get them for us, but it is almost impossible to get them from a catalogue house. Of course tho merchants mer-chants in our own town cannot nfTord to sell us goods just as cheap as these catalogue houses and wait six months or a year for their pay when these other oth-er concerns require us ti send t' o ctsh with the order, or as soon as the goods aro received. They could not nfTord to do that: I remember when one of our neighbors family met with sickness and tho father was taken away, leaving the family in destitute circumstances. We. started out to take up a collcctU4flfl them. Every merchant in cH contributed something. NoomJJ Nuking a catalogue house toJMHi on this fund. Of counts I imagine how much good it would havo done to have asked them to. I am not a philanthropist and I am frank to say if anything could bo aved in tho long run by buying from th catalogue cat-alogue houses, I might then think ibout it, but I do not believe you save one cent. I know it is a mighty hard matter mat-ter for a home merchant to come out even on sugar. When ho sells mo or any of my neighbors n dollar's worth, it must weigh-up to n dollars' worth, but when any of us buy a hundred or so pounds from a catalogue houso it can be just a little short and we think, of course, it has sifted through tho bag or something is the cause of it nnd we let it go at that. I know of ono of my neighbors buying buy-ing a cook stove from a catalogue house When the stove came it looked just exactly ex-actly like the picture in the cntalogue, in fact, it was like it only it weighed about ono-half or two-thirds ns much as tho same size stove would If it had been bought from one of our hurdware men. My neighbor told mo it was the last thing ho would ever buy away from home, because ho knew ho was stuck on tho stove, for It was just liko the ono in tho picture nnd the fact of it being a light weight did not givo him any excuso for refusing to take it. Since then I was telling one of our hardware dealers about it and he said ho could have got tho man the same weight stove nnd delivered it to him at about $1.50 less than what it cost my ncighlor, counting the freight. I expect tho editor can see I am not much of nn advocate of buying from mailorder concerns nnd I don't believe anyone else will bo if they thoroughly Investigate beforo buying. It won't cost any of us nny thing to sec onrhomo merchant beforo sending your orders away, and then if we don't liko the prico they offer us wo enn use our own judgement. If this docs not get Into the wasto basket you mny hear from mo ngoin. "BUI Simpson" |