25 
ally do not keep records of the value of goods sold over the counter 
and of goods sold on a delivered basis. It was necessary, therefore, 
to obtain estimates from the various proprietors of the relative 
amounts of sales which were sold on a carry and on a delivered basis. 
Stores with similar volumes of delivered sales, when these amounts 
were measured in dollars, showed but slight variation in delivery 
expense percentages, so that the validity of the estimates seemed to 
be fairly well established. 
The result of this phase of the study of delivery costs is presented 
in Table 6. In this table, deliver} 7 expense is shown in percentages 
of both delivered sales and total sales for 61 unlimited-delivery 
stores. It is customary to indicate delivery expense as a percentage 
of total sales, but there also appears reason for applying the delivery 
expense to the portion of the business for which the expense was 
primarily incurred. 
Table 6. — Delivery expense in percentages of total sales and delivered sales in 
61 individual unlimited-delivery retail meat markets, 1923 1 
Volume of sales delivered 
Number 
of stores 
Delivery- 
expense in 
per cent of 
value of 
delivered 
sales 
Delivery 
expense in 
per cent of 
value of 
total sales 
Less than $22,000 ...... 
23 
18 
15 
11.02 
5. 77 
4.71 
3.19 
$22,000 to $44,000 ...... 
3.09 
Over $44,000 . .. 
3.19 
1 Includes 1 store with annual total sales of less than $14,000. 
In the 28 stores in which the volumes of delivered sales were 
below $22,000, the average percentage delivery cost was 11.62. The 
average delivery expense percentage in stores where the value of 
delivered sales was between $22,000 and $44,000, was 5.77, when the 
expense was expressed as a percentage of the volume of delivered 
sales. In stores where the volume of delivered sales was over $44,000, 
the corresponding percentage was 4.71. There was thus indicated 
a great variation between the stores in which delivered sales 
amounted to less than $22,000 and those in which the sales were 
larger. It was significant that there was no great variation in the 
percentages of the 33 stores in which sales were above $22,000, as 
in the larger number of these stores the percentage ranged between 
4 and 6 per cent. 
It seemed evident that in the 33 stores in which the volume of 
delivered sales was above $22,000 delivery cost was about 5 per cent 
of delivered sales. The decrease in cost observed was no doubt 
largely brought about by the increased utilization of delivery facili- 
ties in the stores with the larger volumes of delivered sales. 
Efforts were made during the course of the stud} 7 to locate, if pos- 
sible, stores using methods by which all or a portion of the delivery 
cost was charged to the customers for whom these services were 
rendered. No outstanding example of such methods was found and 
it seemed evident on the basis of this study that in general no satis- 
factory scheme had as yet been devised for charging the delivery 
cost direct to the customer demanding the service. The general 
policy was to regard the delivery expense as an expense chargeable 
15286°— 26— — £ 
