372 



SELLING LUMBER 



High Prices 

 For Short 

 Lengths 



Greater 

 Profits and 

 a Pleased 

 Customer 



Gained $30 a 

 Thousand on a 

 Special Order 



gent lines, how he can furnish, for instance, yellow pine of a 

 certain special size or quality, equally or more suitable than other 

 kinds of lumber he is using for some particular purpose. He 

 should endeavor to first find out what he is paying for the par- 

 ticular kind of lumber he has been using, how utilized, and then 

 demonstrate the greater utility of his own product, and figure 

 out the saving to the manufacturer by making the change. Very 

 often you are asked to quote a price to manufacturing concerns, 

 large corporations or even to the retail trade for certain purposes. 

 For example, a particular length is called for, probably all 16 

 feet and 12 inches in width, when possibly 4 feet long by 4 or 6 

 inches is the finished size really wanted. It should be your duty 

 to quietly and diplomatically ascertain for what special purpose 

 the lumber is to be used; try to see the finished product, and just 

 what they use it for, and many times you can secure an order 

 for the finished sizes at the longer length and wide width price 

 called for and make several dollars per thousand extra, thus im- 

 proving selling and really raise the asking price for special sizes. 

 It has been my experience many times to make as much as 

 $10 per thousand on special items, and at the. same time give 

 the buyer full satisfaction. I recall an instance where a large 

 manufacturing concern using several hundred thousand feet of 

 Ix6-inch 12-ft. Clear and Select strips, and where I made it my 

 duty to ascertain the particular purpose for which this lumber 

 was used, and when we did, we found it was cut to 3- ft. lengths. 

 The Clear and Select strips were worth about $50 per thousand 

 feet, in the full length. We were able to furnish the 3-ft. out of 

 our short cuttings, mill-culls, a much inferior quality of lumber, 

 but by cutting out the defects and allowing for the waste it made 

 the lumber worth about $25. We succeeded in getting the order 

 changed to multiples of 12 feet and by giving practically all the 

 short stock, we satisfied the customer by supplying exactly what 

 they wanted; lumber of equal or better quality; with no waste, 

 and made about $25 per thousand, saving them the cost of re- 

 handling and manufacturing and getting rid of a lot of undesirable 

 or slow selling stock. 



Another case I distinctly remember. A customer wanted 

 a quantity of 2^-inch uppers, insisting that it being a peculiar 

 inquiry, he must have just what he asked for. We learned by 

 careful investigation that he wanted the lumber to cut to x2- 



