34 



HARDWOOD RECORD 



Forest Products Exhibition 



Whereas, We believe that great good to the lumber industry of the 

 United States will come from the advertising of forest products, with the 

 object of educating the public to the fact that lumber is obtainable in 

 sufficient quantities for all uses for which it is adapted, and with the 

 hopes that a comprehensive campaign may result therefrom, be it 

 therefore 



Resolved, That we hereby endorse the suggestion of an exposition of 

 forest products to be held under the jurisdiction of the National Lumber 

 Manufacturers' Association, financed and managed in such a way as the 

 National association may deem best. 



The meeting then adjourned until the afternoon. 



The only business transacted in the afternoon session was the report 

 of the nominating committee. The following new ofBcers and members 

 of the executive board were suggested by the committee and were duly 

 elected by the association: 



President, W. E. DeLaney, Cincinnati, O. 



First Vice-President, J. H. Hlmmelberger. Cape Girardeau, Mo. 

 Second Vice-President, B., B. Burns, Huntington, W. Va. 

 Treasurer, C. M. Crawford, Coal Grove, O. 



Executive Board 



W. E. Del.aney, Kentucky Lumber Company, Cincinnati, O. 

 >T. H. Himmelbergcr, Himmelberger-Harrison Lumber Company, Cape 

 Girardeau, Mo. 



B. B. Burns, C. L. Bitter Lumber Company, Huntington, W. Va. 



C. M. Crawford, Yellow Poplar Lumber Company, Coal Grove, O. 

 W. B. Burke, Lamb-Fish Lumber Company, Charleston, Miss. 



E. M. Carrier, Carrier Lumber & Manufacturing Company, Sardis, Miss. 



Clinton Crane. C. Crane & Co., Cincinnati, O. 



W. H. Dawkins, W. H. Dawkins Lumber Company, Ashland, Ky. 



Frank F. Fee, Fee-Crayton Hardwood Lumber Company, Dermott, Ark. 



W. A. Gilchrist, Three States Lumber Company, Memphis, Tenn. 



E. A. Lang, Paepcke-Leicht Lumber Company, Chicago, 111. 



J. W. Oakford, Cherry River Boom & Lumber Company, Scranton, Pa. 



A. B. Ransom, John B. Ransom & Co., Nashville, Tenn. 



W. B. Townsend, Little River Lumber Company, Townsend, Tenn. 



R. H. Vansant, Vansant-Kitchen & Co., Ashland, Ky. 



E, M. Vestal, Vestal Lumber & Manufacturing Company, Knoxville, Tenn. 



E. B. Norm.in, Norman Lumber Company. Louisville, Ivy. 



E. C. Robinson, Mowbray & Robinson Company, Cincinnati, O. 



W. M. Ritter, W. M. Ritter Lumber Company, Columbus, O. 



ENTERTAINMENT 



The customary banquet usually given at the Hotel Sinton was dis- 

 pensed with, and in its place a simpler and more enjoyable function 

 in the shape of a beefsteak dinner was tendered to the visiting lum- 

 bermen by the Cincinnati Lumbermen's Club at the Business Men's 

 Club on Monday evening, February 3. There were about one hundred 

 out-of-town lumbermen in attendance, including the officers and most 

 of the executive board. 



^^ ;M{^ism!;a^j«aro6rom;)t^iTO^^ 



Personality and Salesmanship 



Editor's Note 



The following paper was read by Herbert E. Sumner of New York, N. Y.. at the annual meeting of the Hard- 

 wood Miinufacturers' Association of the United States at Cincinnati, February 5, 1913. 



One of the best known lumbermen, retiring from active busi- 

 ness, stated, "I have plenty of money now, but never want to see 

 the game again. Although I had an established business left me, 

 the lumber game in the twenty years of my experience was the 

 hardest and most nerve-racking imaginable. There was so much 

 competition from concerns which did not understand a thing of 

 costs and which were doing business on practically no profit, 

 fooling themselves as to the figures, that when we reckoned up 

 finally, we found that we had only made a fair percentage. These 

 concerns wouldn't last long, but the trouble was as they failed, 

 up would bob another and then it was the same old story again. 

 Fight, fight, fight for business, all the time, my hair is gray and 

 I am tired. I have enough to live on and I am done." 



One by one you note the dropping off of first this wholesaler 

 and that retailer, either retiring, failing, and, once in a while, a 

 few concerns merging; but the gradual falling off of the number 

 of concerns tells the story all the time. It can be summed up in 

 a few words. 



Lumbermen are only lumbermen; they are not merchants. To 

 illustrate this I will tell a little story: I was talking to the buyer 

 of one of the largest furniture manufacturers in the East, who 

 wished to place an order for a year's business on oak dimension 

 stock. He gave me the sizes and then I started to figure the cost 

 of getting it out, using No. 2 common oak, allowing for waste, 

 percentage of cutting, cost of manufacturing, freight, etc. When 

 he saw the careful figuring I was doing, he broke in with, "That's 

 enough; you're one of those lumbermen that understand too much 

 about the cost of things. I will bet you want about $45 or $50 a 

 thousand for stock." "Well," said I, "isn't it worth that or even 

 more to you? You could not buy absolutely clear lumber for even 

 $45 or $50 a thousand, yet I am going to figure on giving you stock 

 already cut to size and clear, so that you merely have to as- 

 semble it." 



"Guess you are right, but we cannot do business with you. I 

 ■fcnow at least three concerns that will furnish it for $32 a thousand 

 and who will be glad to get it." 



"But they don't know their costs," I ventured. 



' ' That 's not my business, but to tell the truth, I am dead certain 

 that they lose money on every shipment. Don't you suppose if 



I could get it out here in my own plant at any such price as they 

 quote, or even a less price, that I would do it? But I can save 

 over $20 a thousand feet in buying from those concerns." 



Of course that is only one part of the lumber game; you can 

 see what I am driving at. You really cannot blame buyers for 

 getting their stock from men who don't know their costs. This 

 is a true illustration and you can see the same thing almost any 

 time. 



The hardest competition the wholesaler runs up against is that of 

 the large manufacturer who maintains a sales force in the different 

 large centers. There are of course exceptions to the rule, but in 

 the main the men in charge of these otfices have no more right to 

 be in their position than a switchman has a right to drive a "lim- 

 ited. ' ' It seems without exception that the larger the concern the 

 more imperfect and ungeneral-like the man in charge. He always 

 carries an imperialistic manner with him. In my experience I claim 

 that as this faculty is made the most of, just so a man gets weak 

 in another. I call that theory ' ' balance. ' ' We men who have studied 

 the scientific selling game are somewhat of psychologists, or, in 

 others words, readers of human nature, but sometimes we forget 

 that the man who buys from us is just as much a reader of human 

 nature and in many cases a better one than we are ourselves. To 

 illustrate. One of these managers in our vicinity got into an argu- 

 ment in regard to salesmanship, prices, etc. In part he said, "There 

 is no personality in salesmanship — it is a cold, hard proposition of 

 dollars and cents. Your No. 1 common oak, for instance, isn't 

 as good as mine, so you can't get the price for it. Again, we are 

 big manufacturers and you are wholesalers. You cannot name a 

 single instance where you can dispute my theory." 



"What do you get from So and So for your No. 1 common oak?" 

 I asked. 



"$41.50 delivered and it's the market price," he answered. 



"Well," I fired back at him, "you claim that my grade is 

 inferior to yours and for all I know it may be, but nevertheless, 

 I get $42 for it. Now you claim there is no personality in sales- 

 manship. ' ' 



"Yes," chimed in another salesman for a wholesaler, "and we 

 get $43 from the same man and for the same stock." 



This is the type of salesman that creates the break in market 



