Evening Republican, Volume 14, Number 44, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 February 1910 — BETTER TO BE ROBBED. [ARTICLE]

BETTER TO BE ROBBED.

New Bnatneaa Method* That Were Found to Be Costly, A big manufacturing concern with annual sales ruhnlng close to the million mark, but with old-fashioned office methods that did not meet jvith the approval of a new manager, was persuaded to employ an expert office systematizes He Installed a system; he doubled the office floor space and working force. When he got through John Foster says in Modern Methods, the executive department of that concern was as big as that of many a large department store. At the ens. of three years somebody began to" figure. It was discovered that it cost exactly 13 cents to supply a clerk with a 6-cent lead pencil. The systematlzer’s red tape involved bo much time of so many different people that by the time a requisition for a pencil had gone through the routine and the pencil finally arrived at the clerk’s desk, the proceeding had cost exactly 13 cents. It was the same in proportion in every department of the business. The system was complete; the checking was perfect. Not a scfap of paper was unaccounted for at the end of each day’s work, but the concern went to the wall. Investigation proved that one of the primary causes of the failure was the burden of office expense. I walked into a big 5-and-10cent store the other day, made a purchase and handed a girl clerk the money to pay for it. She stepped to a cash register, pressed the 10-cent button, dropped my money into the drawer and that was all there was to it. On my way out of the store I met the manager. * « “Don’t those girls steal from you?” I asked. “Certainly, they steal,” was the reply, “but we can afford to lose it.” I dldn t grasp, the idea that any concern could afford to lose money through dishonest employes and lack of a checking system, and I told the manager so. “Well,” he replied, “if you were in this business of small sales what would you rather do; install an accounting department and saleslip system, cash carriers and cashiers, a complicated system that would cost from $5,000 to $6,000 a year to maintain, or lose at the most S2OO or S3OO a year through petty dishonesty of clerks?” And I passed on thoughtfully.