Part 8

=Durand-Steel Lockers= are usually built with doors perforated full length in panel design with sides and backs solid. This prevents clothes in one locker from coming in contact with wet garments in adjoining lockers, while plenty of ventilation is secured by having the door perforated its entire length, but, if the purchaser prefers, we perforate the backs also.

=The cost of Durand-Steel Lockers is no more than that of first-class wooden lockers=, and they last as long as the building, are sanitary, secure, and, in addition, are fire-proof.

THE FOLLOWING STANDARD SIZES ARE THOSE MOST COMMONLY USED:

DOUBLE TIER

12 × 12 × 36 Inch 15 × 15 × 36 Inch 12 × 12 × 42 Inch 15 × 15 × 42 Inch

SINGLE TIER

12 × 12 × 60 Inch 15 × 15 × 60 Inch 12 × 12 × 72 Inch 15 × 15 × 72 Inch

SPECIAL SIZES MADE TO ORDER.

We are handling lockers as a special contract business, and shipment will in every case be made direct from the factory in Chicago. If you will let us know the number of lockers, size and arrangement, we shall be glad to take up, through correspondence, the matter of prices.

_Prices in effect January 5, 1910. Subject to change without notice. For Canadian prices see special Canadian Catalogue._

The following selection of items from their latest Catalogue will give an idea of the great variety of ATHLETIC GOODS manufactured by A. G. SPALDING & BROS. SEND FOR A FREE COPY.

Archery

Bags— Bat Cricket Striking Uniform

Balls— Base Basket Cricket Field Hockey Foot, College Foot, Rugby Foot, Soccer Golf Hand Indoor Medicine Playground Squash Tennis Volley Water Polo

Bandages, Elastic

Bathing Suits

Bats— Base Ball Cricket

Belts

Caps— Base Ball University Water Polo

Chest Weights

Circle, Seven-Foot

Coats, Base Ball

Collars, Swimming

Corks, Running

Covers, Racket

Cricket Goods

Croquet Goods

Discus, Olympic

Dumb Bells

Emblems

Equestrian Polo

Exerciser, Home

Felt Letters

Fencing Sticks

Field Hockey

Flags— College Foul, Base Ball Marking, Golf

Foils, Fencing

Foot Balls— Association College Rugby

Glasses, Base Ball Sun Automobile

Gloves— Base Ball Boxing Cricket Fencing Foot Ball Golf Handball Hockey, Ice

Glove Softener

Goals— Basket Ball Foot Ball Hockey, Ice

Golf Clubs

Golf Counters

Golfette

Gymnasium, Home

Gymnasium Board

Hammers, Athletic

Hats, University

Head Harness

Health Pull

Hockey Sticks, Ice

Hole Cutter, Golf

Hole Rim, Golf

Horse, Vaulting

Hurdles, Safety

Hurley Goods

Indian Clubs

Jackets— Fencing Foot Ball

Javelins

Jerseys

Knee Protectors

Lacrosse

Lanes for Sprints

Lawn Bowls

Leg Guards— Base Ball Cricket Foot Ball

Markers, Tennis

Masks— Base Ball Fencing Nose

Masseur, Abdominal

Mattresses

Megaphones

Mitts— Base Ball Handball Striking Bag

Moccasins

Nets— Cricket Golf Driving Tennis Volley Ball

Numbers, Competitors’

Pads— Chamois, Fencing Foot Ball Sliding, Base Ball

Pants— Base Ball Basket Ball Foot Ball, College Foot Ball, Rugby Hockey, Ice Running

Pennants, College

Plates— Base Ball Shoe Home Marking, Tennis Pitchers’ Box Pitchers’ Toe Teeing, Golf

Platforms, Striking Bag

Poles— Vaulting

Polo, Roller. Goods

Posts— Backstop, Tennis Lawn Tennis

Protectors— Abdomen Base Ball Body Eye Glass

Push Ball

Quoits

Rackets, Tennis

Rings— Exercising Swinging

Rowing Machines

Roque

Sacks, for Sack Racing

Score Board, Golf

Score Books

Score Tablets, Base Ball

Shirts— Athletic Base Ball

Shoes— Base Ball Basket Ball Bowling Clog Cross Country Cricket Fencing Foot Ball, Association Foot Ball, College Foot Ball, Rugby Foot Ball, Soccer Golf Gymnasium Jumping Running Skating Squash Tennis

Shot— Athletic Indoor Massage

Skates— Ice Roller

Skis

Sleeve, Pitchers

Snow Shoes

Squash Goods

Straps— Base Ball For Three-Legged Race Skate

Stockings

Striking Bags

Suits— Basket Ball Gymnasium Gymnasium, Ladies’ Running Soccer Swimming Union Foot Ball

Supporters Ankle Wrist

Suspensories

Sweaters

Tether Tennis

Tights— Full Wrestling Knee

Toboggans

Trapeze

Trunks— Bathing Velvet Worsted

Umpire Indicator

Uniforms

Wands, Calisthenic

Watches, Stop

Water Wings

Weights, 56–lb.

Whitely Exercisers

Wrestling Equipment

Standard Policy

A Standard Quality must be inseparably linked to a Standard Policy.

Without a definite and Standard Mercantile Policy, it is impossible for a manufacturer to long maintain a Standard Quality.

To market his goods through the jobber, a manufacturer must provide a profit for the jobber as well as the retail dealer. To meet these conditions of Dual Profits, the manufacturer is obliged to set a proportionately high list price on his goods to the consumer.

To enable the glib salesman, when booking his orders, to figure out attractive profits to both the jobber and retailer, these high list prices are absolutely essential; but their real purpose will have been served when the manufacturer has secured his order from the jobber, and the jobber has secured his order from the retailer.

However, these deceptive high list prices are not fair to the consumer, who does not, and, in reality, is not ever expected to pay these fancy list prices.

When the season opens for the sale of such goods, with their misleading but alluring high list prices, the retailer begins to realize his responsibilities, and grapples with the situation as best he can, by offering “special discounts,” which vary with local trade conditions.

Under this system of merchandising, the profits to both the manufacturer and the jobber are assured; but as there is no stability maintained in the prices to the consumer, the keen competition amongst the local dealers invariably leads to a demoralized cutting of prices by which the profits of the retailer are practically eliminated.

This demoralization always reacts on the manufacturer. The jobber insists on lower, and still lower, prices. The manufacturer, in his turn, meets this demand for the lowering of prices by the only way open to him, viz.: the cheapening and degrading of the quality of his product.

The foregoing conditions became so intolerable that, ten years ago, in 1899, A. G. Spalding & Bros. determined to rectify this demoralization in the Athletic Goods Trade, and inaugurated what has since become known as “The Spalding Policy.”

The “Spalding Policy” eliminates the jobber entirely, so far as Spalding Goods are concerned, and the retail dealer secures his supply of Spalding Athletic Goods direct from the manufacturer under a restricted retail price arrangement by which the retail dealer is assured a fair, legitimate and certain profit on all Spalding Athletic Goods, and the consumer is assured a Standard Quality and is protected from imposition.

The “Spalding Policy” is decidedly for the interest and protection of the users of Athletic Goods, and acts in two ways:

FIRST—The user is assured of genuine Official Standard Athletic Goods, and the same fixed prices to everybody.

SECOND—As manufacturers, we can proceed with confidence in purchasing at the proper time, the very best raw materials required in the manufacture of our various goods, well ahead of their respective seasons, and this enables us to provide the necessary quantity and absolutely maintain the Spalding Standard of Quality.

All retail dealers handling Spalding Athletic Goods are required to supply consumers at our regular printed catalogue prices—neither more nor less—the same prices that similar goods are sold for in our New York, Chicago and other stores.

All Spalding dealers, as well as users of Spalding Athletic Goods, are treated exactly alike, and no special rebates or discriminations are allowed to anyone.

Positively, nobody, not even officers, managers, salesmen or other employes of A. G. Spalding & Bros., or any of their relatives or personal friends, can buy Spalding Athletic Goods at a discount from the regular catalogue prices.

This, briefly, is the “Spalding Policy,” which has already been in successful operation for the past ten years, and will be indefinitely continued.

In other words, “The Spalding Policy” is a “square deal” for everybody.

A. G. SPALDING & BROS.

Standard Quality

An article that is universally given the appellation “=Standard=” is thereby conceded to be the Criterion, to which are compared all other things of a similar nature. For instance, the Gold Dollar of the United States is the Standard unit of currency, because it must legally contain a specific proportion of pure gold, and the fact of its being Genuine is =guaranteed= by the Government Stamp thereon. As a protection to the users of this currency against counterfeiting and other tricks, considerable money is expended in maintaining a Secret Service Bureau of Experts. Under the law, citizen manufacturers must depend to a great extent upon Trade-Marks and similar devices to protect themselves against counterfeit products—without the aid of “Government Detectives” or “Public Opinion” to assist them.

Consequently the “Consumer’s Protection” against misrepresentation and “inferior quality” rests entirely upon the integrity and responsibility of the “Manufacturer.”

A. G. Spalding & Bros. have, by their rigorous attention to “Quality,” for thirty-three years, caused their Trade-Mark to become known throughout the world as a Guarantee of Quality as dependable in their field as the U. S. Currency is in its field.

The necessity of upholding the guarantee of the Spalding Trade-Mark and maintaining the Standard Quality of their Athletic Goods, is, therefore, as obvious as is the necessity of the Government in maintaining a Standard Currency.

Thus each consumer is not only insuring himself but also protecting other consumers when he assists a Reliable Manufacturer in upholding his Trade-Mark and all that it stands for. Therefore, we urge all users of our Athletic Goods to assist us in maintaining the Spalding Standard of Excellence, by insisting that our Trade-Mark be plainly stamped on all athletic goods which they buy, because without this precaution our best efforts towards maintaining Standard Quality and preventing fraudulent substitution will be ineffectual.

Manufacturers of Standard Articles invariably suffer the reputation of being high-priced, and this sentiment is fostered and emphasized by makers of “inferior goods,” with whom low prices are the main consideration.

A manufacturer of recognized Standard Goods, with a reputation to uphold and a guarantee to protect, must necessarily have higher prices than a manufacturer of cheap goods, whose idea of and basis for a claim for Standard Quality depends principally upon the eloquence of the salesman.

We know from experience that there is no quicksand more unstable than poverty in quality—and we avoid this quicksand by Standard Quality.

TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES

1. Silently corrected typographical errors and variations in spelling. 2. Archaic, non-standard, and uncertain spellings retained as printed. 3. Enclosed italics font in _underscores_. 4. Enclosed bold font in =equals=.

End of Project Gutenberg's Tumbling for Amateurs, by James T. Gwathmey