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"It appears," says the Literary World, "that some of the village drapers of England, during the present season, have been underselling many of the books of London publishers; which fact, in the eyes of a correspondent of The Bookseller, doth look mysterious. One of two things must be true: either the drapers are doing a losing business,' or the London publishers are making undue profits. Imagine Charles Dickens hearing David Copperfield' described by some dapper knight of the yardstick as a 'sweet thing in books, madam; the cover will wear well, I do assure you; onlyetc." REDUCTION OF RETAIL PRICES. book can be bought cheaper at any other place than a legitimate bookstore, and that, after all, a bookbuyer, no matter how cheap he buys, cannot get rid of the uncomfortable feeling that he still might have done better if he only had tried. Without going over the same ground again, we specially commend the telling illustration of "commercial morality" by our Chicago correspondent, who hits the sore spot of the twenty per cent rule in saying, "The practical operation of the twenty per cent rule in places where there is any competition is that any buyer who demands it gets that discount, while the honorable purchaser, who believes he is only asked a fair price, is charged the full retail price and no deduction made." This is a wrong to the public which we have pointed out repeatedly, but which cannot often and emphatically enough be brought home. On one point we do not agree with our Chicago friend, that the buyer of books knows something of the cost of production. We are sorry to say that there is no point on which there is more blessed ignorance among the public, and even among authors and publishers. We refer to what we said on this matter in the number for October 14. As to the day to add anything to the facts quoted. As stated before, we are collecting material, and intend to consult at head-quarters, for the purpose of making a thorough statement of the case. THE necessity of a new standard of retail prices and discounts is again strongly advocated in two communications. We say "again" because this topic has been discussed in the WEEKLY SO often and so thoroughly that a new view of the question does not seem possible. Nor do we get any points from our correspond-school-book question, we are not prepared toents that have not been given before by others and editorially by ourselves, as mere reference to the topics "Prices and Discounts," Reduction Reform," School Books," in the indexes to the last two volumes of the WEEKLY will show. We have repeatedly regretted that the last convention lost its golden opportunity in failing to make any recommendation on this all-important question. It is true that the subject was debated, and terser expression could not be given to the general view than in the words of Mr. Armstrong: "Now let us make up our minds to make our retail prices lower, make our discounts less, stick to them through and through, no matter what amount of books are bought, and you will soon find that the reform will have more effect and more power than by any other means." But there it rested. Only a few houses made any attempt to strike out in the right direction, but the majority kept on the beaten track-fictitious retail prices, fictitious discounts. Hence reform has become a mockery, the American Book-Trade Association almost a myth, the twenty per cent rule a thirty per cent rule; the "butchers" advertise two-dollar books at fifty cents, and books and plates are changing hands under the hammer. The public, in the mean while, is daily becoming more confirmed in the impression that the prices of books are as elastic and thin" as air, that both publishers and booksellers make shameful profits, that a THE importation (or, in the vulgar tongue, smuggling) of books through the mails has reached such a pass that it is estimated the honest importation of a leading line of English books has fallen off more than one half. We learn authoritatively that the Treasury and Post-Office Departments have now taken the matter up, and have rods in pickle for several individuals who are the happy possessors of their books at "cost price, duty dodged," as well as for a postmaster or two who have failed in their duty by ignoring the law which requires any mail packages supposed to be dutiable to be reported to the collector of the district. The importers" of books in this way are liable to confiscation of the goods and to a fine which is usually fixed at their importation value. This statement may serve to warn those thus evading the customs laws, as well as to give the cue to booksellers who wondered why their customers could buy English Bibles, for instance, cheaper than they could. WHAT has become of the Book-Trade Association?" the Stationer is impelled to ask, in view of the change from the Book Fair to the old Trade Sales again. "Has it so diffused itself in local organiza tions that it has lost strength and vitality? We know that it has good officers, efficient enough to manage any association that has a united membership. This last, we think, is the weak point. We note frequent complaints of infraction of rules, and find that competition and the anxiety to trade operate greatly to the disadvantage of union. "We fear that the book trade has not suffered enough, and that it needs to be still further tried with adversity before it will realize its greatest needs and maintain that perfect union which will give it strength." We can reply only, "Tis true, 'tis pity, and pity 'tis 'tis true!" IT may be noted, by the way, that the revived trade sales are not a trade enterprise, but an individual speculation. The trade sales used to be open only to members of the trade, which did not then include all the dollar-stores and slaughter-houses" of the present day, which are now chiefly benefited by such sales, and were under the regulations of a committee of the trade, though the latter became in recent years a merely nominal affair. Messrs. Leavitt, having become dissatisfied with their returns, or lack of returns, from the Book Fair, have broken loose from the trade, and opened a wholesale "book-butchery" of their own. We trust that the Committee on Book Fair will be the more energetic in providing for a fair in the fall, which ought to be a notable success. THE book trade may well follow the example of its younger brother, the Stationers' Board of Trade, in dealing with bankruptcy cases through an official and well-organized committee. In most of the recent failures of prominence, this efficient body has taken the leading part in the meetings of creditors, and the results are likely to be of good effect. But it does not seem creditable to the trade that such labors should not be shared by a similar organization of publishers and booksellers. It is a sound principle of commercial morality that the retail dealer should never demand from his customer a higher price for his commodity than the lowest price he is prepared to take. The practical operation of the 20 per cent rule in places where there is any competition is that any buyer who demands it gets that discount, while the honorable purchaser, who believes he is only asked a fair price, is charged the full retail price and no deduction made. It is also true that there is a constant tendency for the price of all manufactured commodities to approximate the cost of production, and any combination to maintain prices beyond the cost of production and a fair margin of profit will be short-lived, contrary to sound principles of political economy, and in its total result evil. Both of these principles are violated by the rules of the A. B. T. A. The book trade does not stand on a different basis than other branches of trade, and, from the very nature of things, it will in the end be regulated by the same general principles which govern other branches of business. As a rule, the buyer of books is an intelligent man. He knows something of the cost of production, and when he is asked to pay more for his book than its real value, while he may feel it his duty to support his local bookseller, he also feels that he is swindled. The result of the present retail prices of many books is that publishers and jobbers are compelled to unload at trade sales, and to the dollar-stores and book-butchers, to the manifest injury of the trade, and buyer, who sees the book he was told by his to the displeasure of the book bookseller was as low as it could be afforded offered at one-half price. But the best argument is an appeal to experience. Last season the retail prices of many books were reduced, and as a direct result the sale of these books has largely increased. Orders for them to the publisher were frequently delayed, owing to the demand exceeding the supply. There is no surplus stock of these on the shelves of the publisher, jobber, or retail dealer. There are no remainders to work off at trade sales, or to the second-hand stores, and every one who has handled these books has made money on them. Reduce the retail prices of books, and that will bring the needed reform; and at the same time reduce the discount so there is no room for a 20 per cent reduction to the buyer, and there will be no need of a rule. JAMES COLEGROVE, COMMUNICATIONS. REDUCTION OF RETAIL PRICES. CHICAGO, Jan. 16, 1877. To the Editor of the Publishers' Weekly: The reform the book trade needs is a reduction in the retail price of books. You have labored for the past few years to place the trade on a profitable basis, and apparently without accomplishing any permanent good. Indeed, it would seem, from your issue of January 6th, that the trade was more infirm than it was at the organization of the A. B. T. A. SCHOOL-BOOK PRICES. COLDWATER, MICH,, Jan. 24, 1877. To the Editor of the Publishers' Weekly: Judging from my standpoint, there is a strong popular impression that the prices of school-books are too high. While the prices of many, if not most, goods have been greatly reduced within a few years. the rates on school-books have scarcely declined at all. Parents have good reason to complain of these high rates. As a dealer, I am often put to the blush when a person asks the price of a school-book. To show the difference between the present and old rates, take, for example, Sanders' New Series: of books, as well as those that are required in the support of the book-makers. Books ought to be free; but we publishers must first have the privilege of buying in the open market Nova Scotian coals, British and French papers and cloths, type-metal, inks, clothing for our workmen, etc., etc. I would add that I see no reason why either publishers or manufacturers should object to a measure This is, perhaps, a fair sample of the disparity between present rates and those of six-freeing from duty all books printed in foreign teen years ago. This difference is too great, and parents are often burdened to provide books for their children at school. Now, it may be that publishers cannot afford to reduce prices to the standard of sixteen years ago, yet I feel confident that they can safely lower their rates 20 to 333 per cent. NEW YORK, Feb. 5, 1877. To the Editor of the Publishers' Weekly: The article in the WEEKLY of the 27th ult. in regard to the proposed abolition of the present tariff on books did not, it seems to me, state the whole case of the publishers and manufacturers who oppose the measure. Our friends in the Philadelphia Association base their opposition on the justice and necessity of the whole system of protection which is at present in force in the country, and this ground is a perfectly consistent one for them to take, although it is not one on which the whole publishing trade can unite. But I claim that those of the publishers who, like myself, have always upheld the doctrine of free trade, are equally justified in protesting against the repeal of the present duty, and that such protest does not lay us open to the charge of believing in free trade only when our own interests are not affected. We claim simply that the system adoptedwhether free trade or protectionist-should be consistent with itself, and that the duties imposed should be planned either solely for revenue, or with a clearly-expressed purpose of giving fairly equal and equitable protection to all honorable industries. Not the least evil, however, of any protective system yet devised is its apparently inevitable discrimination against some industries at the expense of others equally deserving a discrimination that works injustice, and, therefore, demoralization. But such discrimination should certainly be opposed as far as in our power. I myself hope that the time is not far distant when, under a strictly revenue tariff, books and all other "necessaries of life" may be admitted free of duty, and students and readers may be relieved from this tax on education and literature. But it would be a crying injustice-and an injustice that, through its injury to the publishing fraternity, would, in the end, be felt by all American book-buyers-to cancel this duty, while leaving heavily burdened all the materials that, go to the manufacturing languages. A reduction in the price of trese would be a real benefit to hundreds of scholars; while, as such books are but little printed in this country, there are no manufacturing interests in regard to them to be protected. I am a free-trader, but I claim that manufacturing interests should be equally protected if they cannot be equally free. Books should be made cheaper, and literature should be spared from all needless burdens; but the way to accomplish this effectively is, not to ruin American book-makers by discriminating against them alone among the manufacturers, but to take such measures as shall free alike all books, American as well as foreign, from the burdensome taxes that now rest upon them. Yours truly, GEO. HAVEN PUTNAM. NEW YORK, Feb. 5, 1877. To the Editor of the Publishers' Weekly: In your editorial notice of Prof. Seelye's bill, abolishing the import duty on books, you forget to mention the interest which book importers must have in opposing such a law, particularly at so short notice. An importing house, carrying a stock of say $10,000 gold, has therein invested $2500 gold for duties, for which amount it would be out of pocket, as no one is likely to pay after April 1st the raised price now obtaining, and which includes duty. A TRADE SALE? IMPORTER. NEW YORK, Feb. 8, 1877. To the Editor of the Publishers' Weekly: As the annual meeting of the corpse of the Central Booksellers' Association is called at the "Trade Sale Rooms," it occurs to me that it might be put up at auction, called a "Trade Sale," and a good sum secured from the sale, especially if notices were sent to the dealers in fancy-goods, millinery, candy, shoes, groceries, etc., who seem to be doing most of the book trade at present in this city. This would meet the views of those publishers who "don't wish to bind themselves to protect anybody." H. WHICH SPEAKS FOR ITSELF. PROVIDENCE, R. I., Feb. 6, 1877. To the Editor of the Publishers' Weekly: Please send for another year the PUBLISHERS' WEEKLY. We wish you much success in your work. We tender you our sincere thanks for the valuable summaries for the past year contained in your issue of January 27th. The list of books for the past year, so admirably indexed, with the lists from publishers, giving |