Automatic Age

1 0
T h e A u t o m a t ic A ge
souri and Illinois by selling the ma­
chine direct to purchasers and not
disposing o f any sto^k, Purchasers
were promised a profit o f 2 cents on
each sandwich or cut o f pie sold.
Many small storekeepers in St. Louis
invested in them and now have the
apparatus on hand.
Investigators fo r the Better Busi­
ness Bureau learned that, while the
sales company was selling large num­
bers o f the machines and making
handsome profits, the service company
was operated very inefficiently and
on a heavily losing basis, as the gross
cost o f supplies w as much in excess
o f the selling price.
Despite the fact that the service
com pany was losing
money daily,
“ high pow ered" salesmen, who had
secured positions with the sales com­
pany as branch managers, continued
their selling campaign with alleged
representations that the machines
were working on a paying basis and
showing prospective purchasers false
photostatic copies o f large checks
said to have been sent to other own­
ers as m onthly earnings o f the ma­
chines in some localities.
Misrepresentation Charged
Purchasers were told the machines
would make at least fifteen sales a
day with a yearly income o f not less
than $90, but very fe w o f the appar­
atus were this successful, and, be­
sides, not receiving any earning, al­
m ost 250 purchasers did not even re­
ceive their machines, it has been esti­
mated.
The home office o f the companies
were at Los Angeles, Calif. A fter
selling all o f the machines they couid
in St. Louis, some o f the defendants
are alleged to have opened an inten­
sive selling campaign in Detroit,
Only a few hundred machines were
sold there, reports say.
Only twenty-seven per cent o f the
11,786 regular army officers are
graduates o f W est Point,
© International Arcade Museum
Nuts Are Profitable
A good side line fo r operators is
the salted nut business which are
sold from revolving stands placed on
show cases. The operator can service
them while on his regular route.
The M orrow M fg. Co., who sells
them, as advertised in this issue says:
Through a series o f tests, we
found this type o f counter-rack to be
the best sales producer, but we soon
learned that their cost was prohibi­
tive. The average similar counter
rack o f this type costs anywhere be­
tween $1,00 and $1.25 each. This
would mean an investment o f from
$100 to $125 fo r 100 ordinary counter
racks. This makes them too costly
to place out promiscuously on deal­
ers’ counters.
The development o f the “ Lightnin’
Salesman” is typical o f the kind o f
service we are rendering those who
want to go into the wholesale and re ­
tail nut business.
Instead o f giving up the idea o f
using this type o f display rack when
we learned o f their prohibitive cost,
we immediately began experimenting
in reducing their manufacturing cost.
W here metal wasn’t essential we sub­
stituted equally strong material that
cost less.
The result is an attractive revolv­
ing counter display rack which we
furnish only to owners o f "N u t De­
light Toasters” at 33% cents each in
lots o f one hundred. This is but %
to lA o f the cost o f similar racks.
A New Sin
A church member in a Chicago
suburb has been haled before the
church council and a charge pre­
ferred against him because he had a
mint vendor in his store.
Indians upon reservations do not
have to pay income taxes although
some o f them have good incomes from
business ventures.
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