OCR Text |
Show A Far Flung Industry The growth of the fur industry in the United States has been one of the phenomenal advances in a trade that caters largely to the whims of women Figures on this growth are astounding astound-ing in 1014 production of fur goods in this country amounted to about $44,000,000; now it is well over a quarter of a billion dollars. Here is an industry where organization organ-ization of the individual' produce,- is practically Impossible, with independent indep-endent individuals engaged in producing pro-ducing in the Mlssippi basin, in Baffin Baf-fin land in the remote Khybeir pas in India, or in the Gobi desert. Yet the industry depends upon the individual in-dividual efforts of these men. Until the World war the fur in-divstiry in-divstiry was centered in Europe, mainly main-ly 'at Leipzig, London and Paris. Furs from' all parts of the world, including the United States and Canada, were sent to these cities for manufacture .nd distribution. With the World war all this was changed. The Un ited States not only markets its own furs here and abroad now, it annually annual-ly imports more than 1 1 7,000, Ou ) worth of foreign raw furs and sen them' back to Europe and Asia as finished products. St. Louis is the shipping point for American furs. Some of the business busi-ness is done by mail the dealer circularizing cir-cularizing a large list of trappers, specifying the kind of furs he wanU The fur merchant either dresses and dyes the furs or ships them in their raw state to the manufacturer, wh-.ie they are cut .up into garments. Th larger .manufacturer then sells his supply direct to retail stores, while the smaller manufacturer disposes of his usually through a jobber. The industry is growing swiftly into in-to an impotant element in American economic life. |