RETAIL MARKETING OF MEATS 
79 
Table 43. — Relation of equipment, merchandise inventory, cash and credit 
items, and total net investment to volume of annual net sales, 1919 1 
Number 
of stores 
Relation to volume of annual net sales 
Groups of stores by class of service and 
annual net sales 
Store 
and 
office 
equip- 
ment 
Delivery 
equip- 
ment 
Average 
merchan- 
dise in- 
ventory 
Cash 
and 
credit 
items: 
cash bal- 
ance, 
excess of 
accounts 
receiv- 
able over 
accounts 
payable, 
etc. 
Total 
net 
invest- 
ment 
includ- 
ing bor- 
rowed 
capital 
Carry stores: 
Not over $25,000 . - .. .. 
11 
18 
21 
10 
Per cent 
4.78 
4.31 
3.09 
4.40 
Per cent 
Per cent 
1.23 
.86 
.73 
.72 
Per cent 
3.01 
1.92 
1.64 
.99 
Per cent 
9.02 
$25,001 to $50,000 
7.09 
$50,001 to $100,000 
5.46 
Over $100,000 
6.11 
60 
4.18 
.88 
1.90 
6.96 
Delivery stores: 
Not over $25,000 
11 
26 
28 
15 
8 
5.43 
3.95 
2.98 
2.32 
2.27 
1.16 
.87 
.79 
.60 
.37 
.95 
.91 
.72 
.70 
.71 
3.23 
3.17 
1.89 
1.61 
2.36 
10.77 
$25,001 to $50,000 .- . 
8.90 
$50,001 to $100,000 -. 
6.38 
$100,001 to $200,000 
5.23 
Over $200,000 
5.71 
All delivery stores . 
88 
3.72 
.84 
.84 
2.69 
8.09 
Carry and delivery stores combined : 
Not over $25,000 _■__ ... 
22 
44 
49 
33 
5.21 
4.07 
3.02 
3.00 
.77 
.58 
.53 
.32 
1.04 
.89 
.72 
.71 
3.17 
2.76 
1.80 
1.65 
10.19 
$25,001 to $50,000 
8.30 
$50,001 to $100,000 
6.07 
Over $100,000 _ - 
5.68 
148 
3.87 
.56 
.85 
2.43 
7.71 
1 In this table are included merely concerns selling meats only. In the 73 carry stores and 133 delivery 
stores of Table 28 are included some concerns with a small percentage of other merchandise. Real estate 
| occupied by dealers is not included among the items of investment. In most instances, the building is 
not owned by the proprietor of the meat business, and an attempt at average figures would be meaning- 
I less. Moreover, in most instances, the building is used for other purposes also, and in many instances it 
; would not be possible to give even an approximate separate value of the portion used as a meat market. 
In merchandising under modern conditions, real estate may well be considered separately from the movable 
I property directly employed in the business. If some indication of real estate investment be desired, a 
rough estimate may be made by capitalizing rental value (see Table 28) on the basis of 10 per cent. On 
this basis, real estate investment would be approximately 12 to 15 per cent of the amount of annual net 
sales. It would be more than all other items of investment combined; and in this respect it undoubtedly 
differs from other lines of merchandising carrying large stock in trade as compared with annual turnover. 
MERCHANDISE INVENTORY 
In most lines of retail merchandising there is a substantial amount 
of stock on hand at all times, and this amount varies somewhat 
slowly. In the meat trade, particularly in the fresh-meat trade, the 
stock on hand at any time is extremely small as compared with the 
annual turnover, and the quantity on hand at one time in the week 
may be several times as large as at some other time. One small 
dealer described his stock inventory as " a side of meat in the morn- 
ing and a pile of bones in the evening " ; and estimates from a large 
number of dealers indicated, with a considerable degree of uni- 
formity in well-equipped stores of all sizes, weekly peak loads for 
the Saturday trade approximately two and one-half times as large 
as the weekly low points. 
The weighted average of the 148 stores showed merchandise in- 
ventories of 0.85 per cent of annual sales. (See Table 43.) This 
