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About Mechanical Salesmanship 



Tliis lumber business is probabl.v one of tlie most exacting in tlie 

 world from the standpoint of the requirement of Tersatility and 

 adaptability. Conditions regarding the manufacture and use of lum- 

 ber, especially in the hardwood field, are changing so rapidly that the 

 chap who hasn't his ear to the ground and is not ready to change his 

 position to meet the new trade alignment is likely, to change the 

 metaphor a trifle, to be left at the post. 



The strange thing about it, too, is that the sawmill man who is 

 the most versatile when it comes to the handling of logs and the 

 manufacture of lumber, is frequently the most mechanical in the 

 sales end of the business. There is no problem too difBcult for him, 

 if it deals with logging a tract in the back-woods, getting the most 

 out of a bunch of defective logs or speeding up a mill crew; but he 

 loses out badly when it comes to getting the money out of his product. 



Arthur Sheldon has said a number of good things, his best contri- 

 butions being not so much in the way of new principles or a new 

 philosophy — although some of his devotees would have one think so — 

 as in coining new and apt definitions of business phrases. For in- 

 stance, he illumined a spot that has been rather dusky in the minds 

 of most people when he pointed out that everybody is a salesman. 

 The result of all endeavors, he has made plain, depends upon the sell- 

 ing ability of the individual; and insofar as he has fallen down 

 at that, he has failed at his chief work, no matter what it is. 



With this in mind, it is plain that the lumberman who is a success 

 from a manufacturing standpoint and is regarded by his acquaint- 

 ances as a wonder in handling the mill end of his business, and yet is 

 not able to cope with the sales problems that arise, is in truth and in 

 deed only partly successful ; and by the same token he may be laid 

 down as a partial failure. The chief reason for this result is the use 

 of mechanical methods in selling which would not be tolerated for a 

 moment in manufacturing. It is of course true that failure to keep 

 moving, mentally, at the sales and distribution end of the business 

 reacts on the manufacturing department as well. For example, a cer- 

 tain mill had been cutting inch plain oak as its staple. It had be- 

 come so used to cutting it up that way that if anybody had suggested 

 departing from the rule he would have been accused of lese majeste 

 or something equally as bad. However, one fine day a lot of logs 

 which had just been purchased were found to have become infested 

 with worms while lying in the woods awaiting shipment. The super- 

 intendent went straight ahead, however, sawing the logs into inch 

 boards, though bemoaning the fact that the lumberman was going to 

 get such poor stock out of his high-priced timber. 



About that time the owner of the business came along. He heard 

 of the situation and promptly ordered operations discontinued, as far 

 as cutting up the wormy logs was concerned. Then he got busy with 

 some of the purchasing offices of railroads with which he had had deal- 

 ings, found that they were in the market for a lot of bill oak for 

 construction work and got their specifications. He put in a price 

 which he knew would land the order, and as worm-holes were not a 

 defect in oak used for that purpose, he was able to cut up the stock 

 to advantage in making the bill stuff, as well as furnishing the mill 

 with a lot of work which was comparatively simple and required little 

 expense for labor and power. 



That showed versatility. The manufacturer was able to change his 

 battle-line when the necessity arose. He believed in making inch 

 plain regularly because that was the most easily salable item he knew 

 of, and he did not believe in tying up a big investment in lumber 

 that was available for the market only semi-oecasionally. But this 

 set rule did not prevent him from about-facing and getting into some' 

 other class of work as soon as the ne?d became apparent. 



In the same way a good many lumbermen are falling down because 

 they have not been watching the change in the situation as far as 

 consumption of their products is concerned. It is good business for 

 the mUlman to sell his output through the jobber; but the wise manu- 

 facturer never stops at that point mentally. He may do so in prac- 

 tise, but he follows his lumber through to the consuming factory, so 



that he knows all the time what is happening to it. This is not meant 

 literally, of course; but the point is that the manufacturer should 

 not lose sight of the fact that he must keep posted on consuming con- 

 ditions, even though he is not selling the consuming trade directly. 

 Failure to do this has been costly to a good many concerns operating 

 sawmills. A lumberman confessed recently that it took him several 

 years to discover what had happened to panel poplar following the 

 slump in the demand for this material from the automobile manufac- 

 turers. He had kept on piling it up, of course, and when the demand 

 left he was literally stranded. 



This is a rather extreme example, but it will show the necessity of 

 keeping informed on every branch of the business, no matter whether 

 one 's immediate dealings are with that branch or not. That is one 

 of the greatest advantages of trade journals. They are in a position 

 to pick up facts which, read with judgment and imagination, point 

 to important conclusions in many cases. A wise lumber dealer, who 

 has been letting his trade journals pile up on his desk in their wrap- 

 pers for a long while, recently overlooked a bet through failure to 

 observe a certain item recorded in most of the leading journals. He 

 discovered his error later, and now intends to profit by it. 



' ' Hereafter I shall take the trade papers home at night and read 

 them there if I can 't get time at the office, ' ' he said. ' ' I have to 

 get all the available information about my business in order to keep 

 from being overtaken by some circumstance that I could have avoided. 

 The trade journals contain so much suggestive matter, both in the 

 news and special articles, that I am going to make a point of assimi- 

 lating as much of it as I can readily digest." 



And it is safe to say that this lumberman will not be in danger of 

 attempting sales work too mechanically. Tha sort of business man 

 who is taking in information from every direction, as he is doing, is 

 bound to anticipate any sharp or radical change in the situation and 

 be prepared for it, instead of overwhelmed by it. 



A good deal has been made of the substitution situation, of the 

 loss of business by the lumber trade to other industries. While this 

 is serious, it is not so important to the individual lumberman as the 

 substitution of one wood for another in the wood-using industries. 

 There is more of this going on than thei'e is of wood-users turning to 

 other kinds of material altogether. It is a good deal simpler for the 

 consuming manufacturer with a line of wood-working equipment to 

 change woods than it is to put in an entirely new type of machinery 

 or erect a new factory; and hence the effort to improve conditions, 

 cheapen production and meet the popular demand is being carried out 

 more through changing the kind of wood used than in changing from 

 wood to steel or some baser material. 



The lumbaraian who handles his selling work mechanically doesn't 

 realize this, however, and keeps making the same old stock, in the 

 same old dimension, letting it pile up on his yard until someone comes 

 along and takes it off his hands at a bargain figure. He doesn't 

 realize that the ear builders, the interior finish manufacturers, the 

 planing-mill men, the box manufacturers and in fact every interest 

 which is using wood are studying the field, going over the possibilities 

 and testing the qualities of every wood suited to their purposes. He 

 doesn't learn of it when the car manufacturers begin substituting 

 chestnut and ash for oak; when the refrigerator concerns use chest- 

 nut instead of ash in manufacturing their product; when the box men 

 provide gum for cottonwood or poplar; when the planing-mills try 

 out cypress in place of poplar. He has to wait until the falling 

 off in the demand from this or that quarter of the market convinces 

 him, after a long period of useless waiting, that the consumption has 

 been reduced. He is like the fisherman who must cast and leave his 

 bait in one spot for a long while before he knows that the fish are no 

 longer there; when by asking the right people he could have found 

 out at the beginning. 



Conservation of time, material, labor and of course money is being 

 accomplished everywhere by the use of intelligent methods. In the 



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