126 SECTIONAL ADDRESSES 



marketing or in other cases to various methods of strengthening the inter- 

 mediary system to enable it to undertake the heavier modern task of 

 keeping in touch with the market. 



The main difficuhy with the merchanting system is held to be the lack 

 of incentive to push British goods ; it is immaterial to foreign merchant 

 houses whether they push the goods of a particular country or not ; so 

 long as British sales were the chief part of the market, it is said, the 

 system grew up satisfactorily. An importer, of course, may aim at control 

 of his market and attempt to screen it off from the producer, or alternatively, 

 with a powerful manufacturing interest, he may become practically an 

 exclusive agent for one firm. The method which has grown up particu- 

 larly in American business is to put manufacturers' direct representatives 

 or service men alongside of the merchants, not to sell but to keep in 

 touch with consumers and their outlook, as well as to use methods of 

 publicity and marking of goods to acquire the goodwill and indirect 

 control of the market. 



There has been a tendency in many markets towards direct methods 

 of marketing, even where the countries are not highly developed in- 

 dustrially ; with some commodities, such as chemicals, cigarettes, and oil, 

 it has even been possible to do up-country direct trading from depots 

 managed by agents in China. These efforts to strike more directly 

 through to the consumer are very familiar in domestic market organisations, 

 but in these days of sensitive national feeling it seems prudent that the 

 directness should be associated at least in part with the employment of 

 citizens of the country the market of which is being served, either in 

 associate companies or subsidiaries ; it may also be wise to associate the 

 market served with processes of assemblage, repair, and equipment, 

 which confer on the commodity concerned a certain national status. 



A main difficulty in overseas distribution is that small and medium- 

 sized firms have little chance of using direct methods unless they combine. 

 If they are cartelised, they may develop the central selling agency method, 

 but if not, then the difficulty of access to overseas markets can only be 

 overcome by some form of joint selling agency supported by firms the 

 products of which do not directly compete with each other. 



It is obviously impossible to say without detailed examination and trial 

 which of these forms of distributive organisation is best able to survive 

 and serve a given market, nor has any evidence of the relative costliness of 

 these forms of marketing been available. 



It is clear, however, the British Economic Missions have found in most 

 of the markets they examined that high price is the chief difficulty facing 

 British expansion, that demand has become much more sensitive and 

 exigent in its requirements, that the intermediary structure is subject to 

 serious criticism in many areas, and that new experiment and effort to 

 keep in closer touch with consumers' outlook is due to be made in foreign 

 as in domestic markets. A suitable illustration of these difficulties in 

 selling organisation is found in the account given by the Cotton Mission 

 to the Far East (1931) of the Chinese market for Lancashire piece goods, 

 with its reliance upon importing houses and Chinese dealers, its troubles 

 with credit and with dealers who depart hastily to ' Ningpo more far ' in 



