56 



HARDWOOD RECORD 



TAN B. PERRlN'E.rORT WAYNE, IND., WAL- 

 NUT AND BUTTERNUT COMMITTEE 



J. V. UILL, CUI.UMBTS. O., lULL TIE & LUM- 

 BER COMPANY 



acciiimilate iii the jiast four years. The box iinlustry and the 

 lumber imUistry so far as low grades are concerned have been 

 very much affected by substitute containers. Over a year ago 

 this committee began to educate the jobber, shipper, the manu 

 facturer and the commissary departments of lumber concerns. 

 I want to say right here that that is the most important fea- 

 ture of all. I will take this opportunity to suggest that if there 

 are any of you in the hall who have not already instructed 

 your commissary departments to absolutely refuse anything pacived 

 in paper or tiber or substitute containers, that you think the mat 

 ter over and when you go home do it at once, because the prin- 

 cipal power that this committee has exercised has been to educate 

 the commissary departments of the United States against re- 

 ceiving anything packed in anything but wood. This is begin- 

 ning to convince the small manufacturers that the lumber inter- 

 ests are alive to the necessity of taking some radical action. 

 Unless this is done generally a congestion of the low-grade mar 

 ket must absolutely occur again. 



Our primary subject, as I have before stated, is the expurga- 

 tion from the Western Classification of Rule 14-B, which eon- 

 tains this unfair and unwarranted provision. It is necessary 

 for us to have funds to keep up this work, because there is a 

 powerful committee working against us, who have had provided 

 for them a practicall.y unlimited sum of money. The big cereal 

 companies, the shoe case packers, the fruit jar people, and a 

 large number of others who are utilizing these paper packages 

 are, of course, supplying funds to the opposition committee out 

 of their winnings. It is up to the lumber men, particularly the 

 box men, to supply the funds to meet this opposition. The sec- 

 retary of the opposition committee is a mighty clever and brainy 

 man, who is employed at a large salary of $10,000 a year. The 

 officers of this committee are not paid such a salary and have 

 not asked you anything so far. The only think I ask you to 

 do is to turn me loose and I will do what you want me to do; 

 but turn me loose. If you will put in the hands of your com- 

 mittee a sufficient fund to enable us to prosecute the matter 

 which we have in charge, which is one that you must realize 

 is of vital importance, we will guarantee to expurgate the rule 

 which is styled "Rule 14-B." [Applause.] I thank you. 



President Carrier: The idea sometimes obtains that it is only 

 the box shook lumbermen that are vitally interested in this 

 movement, but we should all work together in this with the box 

 industry, for the simple reason that the box industry is beyond 

 question our greatest customer, especially for our low grade stock, 

 which is the hardest to sell. 



M. t'L.VRK. (IXCINNATI. (I, CHAIR AND 

 FURNITURE DIMENSION STOCK 

 COM.MITTEE 



Mr. J. W. Mayhew, general sales manager of the W. M. Bitter 

 Lumber Company, Columbus, Ohio, will now address us upon the 

 subject of "Salesmanship." 



Mr. Mayhew: Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, if the writing 

 and reading of this paper will bring a suggestion of profit to 

 anj' one here, either manufacturer or dealer or salesman, I will 

 be glad. If it causes any of you from listening to it mental 

 anguish I will be sorry. If that mental anguish causes any of 

 you to hold malice I ask that you direct it not toward me, 

 hut to your honorable secretary, and I wish he were here so that 

 lie could hear me say it. Here he is. He by his insistence 

 compelled me to either writer this paper or to appear to shirk 

 my duty in doing what I could to help this convention to be a 

 success. 



Marketing Lumber 



To market lumber at the best price it must first of all be properly 

 prepared. Logs sbould be cut as long as practical and profitable, consider- 

 ing the timber. It costs just as much to tram, liandle and saw a 10-foot 

 log as it does a 16-foot log, and the 10-foot lengths in lumber are neither 

 as salable nor valuable as the longer and more desirable lengths. There- 

 fore, the manufacturing end should help the sollhig end as well as itself 

 b.v producing such lengths as the trade demands. The lumber should be 

 properl.v edged and trimmed, carefully graded at the rolls, by one of the 

 best, if not the best iuspector employed by the company, and piled, not 

 log run, common and better, etc., but on grade. When lumber is properly 

 and carefully piled until it is cured and then sold on grade, the seller 

 knows what he is selling, the buyer knows what he is buying, and each 

 sbould be satisfied with the sale and purchase. When one man sells 

 To another (.'ommon and better it is but natural for the man who buys 

 Ibis niLxture to guard his interests the same as if he were buying a "pig 

 iu a poke." He will, in making either purchase, be on the safe side, the 

 seller as a rule being the loser. 



There sbould be a complete and helpful harmony between the manu- 

 facturing end and the selling end. The man who sells the lumber 

 should be as familiar as possible with the conditions at the mill end 

 and should always bear these conditions in mind when making sales, thus 

 preventing as far as possible putting unnecessary loss and hardships 

 on the mill, unless, of course, he protects his company by getting a 

 sufticient advance in price on the lumber sold to justify the extra expense 

 .■\nd trouble. The millmen, especially the inspectors, should appreciate 

 that the salesman's work is not a bed of roses and iu shipping out his 

 orders should never fail to use extreme care in seeing that the stock is 

 properly graded. A few low-line boards in a car will form a nucleus for 

 a complaint which would not be made had these low-line boards been 

 left out. An inspector should be instructed to put into a car only such 

 lumber as he himself would accept for •the grade shipped if he were 

 receiving it. Care on the part of inspectors in loading will bring to 

 the salesman and the company additional orders at much reduced cost 

 of selling. The other day I received a letter about careful loading of 

 (umber, written by a live and fair wholesaler, from which I quote : 



"Human nature, as you have no doubt observed, is much the same the 



