What Business is Like when Money is Tight and How a Rubber Boom Affects the Position CONOMISTS and bankers always look to the retail trade of a country as a very sure guide to the condition of the popul the prosperity or otherwise of important industries. The same i fectly true about the position of a place such as Shanghai which, whil one respect an important manufacturing and shipbuilding contre, is prineinally a debt for the import and export of goods and a great financial market. No matter what the commun' y be, its definite purchasing power is reflected in the amount it is able to spend in retail wares, and the manner in which it disposes of its money. A community, rich and prosperous, buys freely and even lavishly, but vhen the same community finds its earnings restricted, its purchases are of a very different kind, Then it looks about for the greatest value which money can bring.
It may be laid down that the expert retailer is also a psychologist, and it is for this reason that his conclusions upon the state of trade are of such importance. He, of course, knows the standing of his customers, and can make a very good ealculation as to what they are likely to spend in the course of a year and how long household articles or clothing are likely to last him, When he finds that a man earning 2 normally handsome income decides that a carpet or a set of curtains will have to be made to last a year or two more, his conclusions on the general state of trade may be taken as tolerably correct. When a man decides to make a suit of clothes also function for a further rather the reverse proved to be the case. With ever rising prices of raw rubber people took a renewed interest in plantations. Chinese merchants, forsaking their usual financial habits, began to buy shares, after a very long abstinence from this form of speculation or investment, and seeing shares rapidly mounting all' manner of other people came in, Now we see one of the most human sides to business, for as this process started more than one firm definitely saw the receipts from its men's department drop off, while others saw i ly a smaller gree. The only conclusion that could be reached was that any man who saw the Prospect of more money out of rubber, had commenced to scrape together every cent that he could lay hands upon in order to speculate. Probably he was buying shares for cash and selling them forward, else sitting upon them, but whichever way his ideas ran, they resulted in decreased earnings for the men's departments.
Curiously enough nothing of the kind was the case where Indies' departments were concerned. It must be remembered that trade was not good, but this made no difference to the receipts there, and the conclusion seems to be forced upon the observer that in the majority of cases the woman shopper will spend money upon clothes and the like which she feels she cannot afford on anything else.
Herewith we have the particular human side of the case, and now to get down to the business end. It is some years now since people in Shanghai purchased lavishly, which they certainly did in the first decade of the century, and one harks back to those palmy days with regret. At such times a present would be bought worth for instance $50 to be given to.a child at Christmastide, and nothing would be thought about it. To-day the same man will give something of the value of $5 or so to the offspring of his friends, and then will look to see that ite is getting the utmost value for his money.
We mention this first to show how much more scarce is money than it used to be in the palmy days. In the majority of cases these days finished with the war, and since we have had to face a succession of years in which no longer, with the exception of the first rubber boom in 1910, come to retail firms but in tail firms have had to go out and look for it. In spite, however, of numerous adverse circumstances the financial condition of the foreign: community has been sufficiently prosperous to make 1925 generally a better year than its predecessor where the retail trade is concerned.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.