Sam Lambert and the New Way Store | Page 6

getting the very latest and most improved models. He owes this to himself as a protection for his investment.
"There is always a temptation to save a few dollars by adopting a poor imitation or some out-of-date device.
"The latest and best is the cheapest in the end, especially when you consider convenience and durability.
"A pretty safe guide is to see what the biggest and best stores everywhere are installing today.
"You will find such merchants as John Wanamaker in his Philadelphia and New York stores equipping his clothing departments solely with New Way Crystal Wardrobes;
"Browning, King & Company in seventeen cities;
"Schuman, Kennedy, Posner, Talbot Company, Jordan-Marsh & Company, Leopold Morse Company, McCullough & Parker in Boston;
"George Muse Company in Atlanta;
"Mullen & Bluett of Los Angeles;
"Becker of San Francisco;
"Burkhardt of Cincinnati;
"Lazarus, and Meyer Israel of New Orleans;
"And more than a thousand others--all the representative stores of their localities.
"These men have selected the New Way Crystal Wardrobes after careful comparison with every other device on the market.
"They have found the New Way Crystal Wardrobe the most sightly and compact--having the largest capacity with the greatest ease of operation.
"They find that they show the goods better; that the clerks can work faster from them; that half a dozen clerks can sell from one wardrobe at the same time; that one boy can keep the stock in good shape where four were inadequate under any other plan.
"They find that the New Way people have basic patents on special features, such as the New Way disappearing doors that divide in the center, and slide into the ends of the wardrobe and do not project into the aisle.
"The New Way revolving rack with the patent locking device, which works loaded or unloaded with equal ease--no friction, no leverage, no noise.
"They find the New Way low center wardrobes give an unobstructed view all over the store and are the only wardrobes made that are entirely practical for grouping in front of a furnishing or hat department.
"Likewise the high double deck wall wardrobes have more than double the capacity of tables."
The wardrobe man illustrated his talk with photographs and backed his arguments with figures.
The upshot of it was that he made a complete ground plan of the Lambert store with a modern selling arrangement and New Way fixtures in their proper places.
But before Stucker would admit the wisdom of the improvement, he argued it from every point of view.
"The farmer trade," he said, "would imagine that they would have to pay higher prices for clothing to make up the cost of new fixtures."
This, mind you, today when the farmer is the most enlightened member of the community--when he is using progressive methods in marketing his own product, to reduce his costs and increase his profits!
Lem acknowledged that the clothiers who are handling the finest merchandise are fitting up their stores with New Way Crystal Wardrobes, and he didn't like to admit that the Lambert Store didn't sell high grade merchandise.
He conceded that fine goods in every other line of trade are treated with the care and respect they deserve, otherwise they would suffer in the handling and cease to be fine merchandise.
Finally, Lem admitted that the discerning public does judge a merchant's stock by the way he treats it, so that the store with New Way Wardrobes as a feature is not only the most progressive store, but in practically every instance the most prosperous in the clothing trade of its locality.
After Sam had given the order his one thought was impatience for the completion of the job.
"I must have that stuff all installed so that I can have my opening a week ahead of the other people.
"Here, Stucker," called Sam to that gloomy soul, who had gone behind a stock of work-shirts, while the order was being signed, "we'll let you dispose of the old fixtures. That's a job that's just about your size.
"I tell you, Stucker, a natural-born retrencher has his virtues. But if you give him rope enough he will retrench you out of business. He never builds anything. If it wasn't for the creative man there would be nothing to retrench.
"The retrencher is all right if you don't pay him too much. He is worth about $10 a month, because you can find fifty of them in any old man's home that you can hire for less money than that.
"No, Lem, I won't be unfair. You're not as bad as all that. It takes all kinds of people to make a world and there is plenty of room for both of us in this business--there always will be leaks to stop and work to do for an earnest man who has the interest of the store at heart.
"The fault has been in the division of our labor. I'll show you the way we can get the