METHODS AND PRACTICES OF RETAILING MEAT 
13 
SALESMANSHIP AND SELLING PRACTICES 
The mental attitude of the employees and methods of approach 
to customers were found to reflect, in most cases, the type of employer. 
They are also an index of efficiency or inefficiency in the operation 
of the store, and to some extent are an indication of the methods and 
principles laid down by the management. The importance of tact 
and salesmanship in retail meat markets has not been given sufficient 
attention generally by operators. 
Markets were studied where boys of high-school age were employed 
as clerks and salesman. In such cases they possessed little or no 
knowledge of the business, yet they were supposed to advise cus- 
tomers intelligently concerning the different kinds, cuts, and quanti- 
ties of meats. Because of such methods, frequency of mistakes are 
increased, dissatisfaction results, and loss of customers follows. 
Efficiency in meat retailing requires an intimate knowledge of the 
10 
2 
30 
PER CENT 
40 
50 
NEWSPAPERS- 
HAND BILLS, ETC, 
NO ADVERTISING 
60 
70 
80 
--" ' ..." '." 
Delivery store 
Cash-and-carry store 
Chain systems store 
Fig. 8. — Percentage distribution of the various types of stores according to advertising practices. 
The chain systems all advertise in some way but only about 30 per cent of the delivery and cash- 
and-carry stores advertise in any form 
business. Retail dealers should therefore give greater consideration 
to qualifications of employees. 
Advertising on an extensive scale is not practiced generally by the 
retail-meat trade. Many dealers, especially those handling better 
grades of meat, stated that they do no advertising because consumers 
do not understand or know meats and from a comparison of their 
advertised prices with others handling poor grades but not so adver- 
tised, potential customers would probably not be able to draw fair 
conclusions, 
MISLEADING PRACTICES AND DECEPTION 
Misleading practices in the retail-meat trade form such an important 
retarding factor in the proper development of the industry that special 
attention was given to the subject in this study and special attention 
must be given to it in this bulletin, although it should be emphasized 
that the study seemed to show that such practices involve only a 
small percentage of retail-meat distributors in any city. But some were 
found in every city, and in all cases these dealers are very active and 
