50 BULLETIN 1442, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 
COMBINATION CHAIN STORES 
Data from a combination chain-store carry system indicated a 
slightly higher percentage gross margin for meats than was found 
in individual carry stores of the same locality. The margin on 
groceries in the same chain was about 0.3 per cent below that deter- 
mined by the Harvard Bureau of Business Research for individual 
retail grocery stores in 1923. 7 
When the expense percentages from a group of stores selected 
at random from this chain were analyzed, it was found that meat 
departments in the stores whose annual volumes of sales were under 
$14,000 were operated at a loss. In the stores in which volumes 
of sales were above $14,000 yearly, expense percentages were under 
the average amount, so that relatively high percentages of profit 
were shown. 
The meat departments of the stores of this chain exhibited the 
wide fluctuations in margin percentage similar to those observed 
in the case of individual stores. As a group, the average gross 
margin percentages on meats were above that noted in individual 
carry stores handling meats only. 
A second group of chain stores of the combination carry type 
located in another section of the country was represented in the 
data. Gross-margin percentages on meats in this group showed but 
little variation and averaged over 2 per cent lower than individual 
retail meat stores of the carry class located in the same area. How- 
ever, the average total expense percentage in these stores was below 
that of the individual carry stores, so that the average percentage 
of profit received from the operation of the meat departments in 
the chain stores was about 1 per cent below that of the individual 
carry stores of the same area. 
SEMIWHOLESALE AND RETAIL CHAIN MEAT MARKETS 
Data were obtained for the 1923 operation of 32 meat markets 
owned by three meat-packing concerns and for 31 of these markets 
for the year 1924. Of the 32 markets from which data were obtained 
for 1923, 11 were reported to have been of the retail type and 21 of 
the semiwholesale type. 
This number of stores included practically all of the retail meat 
markets owned and operated by these meat packers in the State of 
Washington, together with a large proportion of the semiwholesale 
markets also owned and operated by these packers. The number of 
stores though apparently small was, therefore, thoroughly represen- 
tative of this phase of meat distribution in this section of the country. 
So far as known, this is the only part of the country in which meat 
packers have entered the retailing of meat so extensively. 
It was necessary to depend upon estimates of the proportions of 
each business given over to retail and to wholesaling activities, as 
no records were available by which the actual retail and wholesale 
sales in each market might be determined. The variability in margin 
and expense percentages at times may have been accounted for by 
errors in the estimates of retail and wholesale business, as increased 
7 Graduate School of Business Administration, Harvard University, Bureau of Business 
Research, Bui. No. 41 : " Operating Expenses in Retail Grocery Stores in 1923." 
