THE JOBBER'S SERVICE 1. Jobber's service little understood.—We have de fined a jobber as one who buy-s, usually in quantities, for the purpose of selling the same goqds again, with out alteration to other dealers. The consumer seldom knows him. The average individual who is not en gaged in merchandising may have some realization of a dimly outlined distributor behind the retailer, who in some vague way takes a profit to which lie has but a questionable title; but his ideas about the jobber are far from being well-defined, and it is likely that he could not name half a dozen houses conducting a strictly wholesale business.
Because the jobber does not closely touch the con sumer, there is little general interest in his activities. There are hundreds of books and articles about the manufacturer and the retailer, but very few about the jobber. Partly because of the general ig,norance of the jobber's service, a suspicion has arisen that his service is uneconomical and not worth the money that is paid for it. When the middleman is attacked it is usually the jobber who has to bear the brunt of the criticism. He does not want to be shielded from just criticism, but he is entitled to fair iudgment based on the facts of his service and not on guesses and vague suspicions.
2. What are jobbing are to consider chiefly the jobber of manufactured products. All manufactured goods are not distributed thru jobbers. In some lines the jobber is losing importance; in oth ers he never was important. In at least four great staple lines, however, he maintains the important position that he has held for many years. These four lines are groceries, hardware, dry-goods and drugs. In each of them the retail dealer must carry a tremendous variety of goods, prepared by many dif ferent manufacturers. When such is the case, the business ordinarily gives the jobber an opportunity for usefulness, and the goods handled are commonly known as "jobbing lines." Such industries are to be the subject of the present discussion of the job ber's service and the jobber's status. Groceries, hard ware, dry-goods and drug sundries are not the only jobbing lines, altho they probably are the most com mon; nor should it be understood that all the business in so-called jobbing lines passes thru jobbers.
3. What is the jobber's the jobber earn his pay? His compensation is not so great as is often supposed. For instance, an article intended to be sold to retailers at $4.00 a case may be billed to the jobber at $4.00 less ten per cent. The jobber pays $3.60 for this case of goods, and sells it for $4.00; hence forty cents, or ten per cent of the selling price, is -his gross profit on the transaction. He handles many articles, particularly in the grocery trade, on this narrow margin. Sometimes his profit is less. A well-known brand of widely advertised soap, for example, is handled by the jobber for only a trifle more than eight per cent gross profit. In other lines the profit is larger, running sometimes as high as twenty-five per cent. Figures are not available to show the average jobber's gross profit on all lines of goods, but probably it is not greatly in excess of, fif teen per cent. Out of this .he must pay the expenses of conducting his business, ranging between six per cent and fifteen per cent of his sales; he must earn a return on the capital invested, and he must have some thing left as net profit if he is to continue to run the risks of his calling. What return does Ile make for the amount he is paid? 4. Jobber a specialist in marketing.—From the manufacturer's standpoint, the service rendered by the jobber is that of a specialist in distribution. The jobber is in business solely to buy and sell goods. He knows the trade intimately; he knows the demand and how to satisfy it; he knows what will sell and what will not sell; he has a clientele of relatively per manent customers; he provides a ready-made market for the goods of the manufacturer who can obtain his cooperation. The manufacturer—at least the smaller manufacturer—is a specialist in manufacturing only; he is rarely skilled in marketing, and ordinarily he finds it much cheaper to use the jobber's services than to attempt the expensive process of studying and reaching the retail trade without the jobber's help.