Selling Credit and Traffic Author:Ralph Starr Butler Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: market is determined for them because of the nature of their activities. Every seller, however, must meet the question of selling methods, and most of those who ... more »have anything to market must also definitely determine upon the field they are to cultivate. 2. Traditional factors in distribution.—For many years it was generally conceded that there were normally six factors to be considered in the distribution of most commodities. These factors were as follows: Manufacturer Commission merchant Jobber Wholesaler Retailer Consumer At present, however, except in a comparatively few lines of business, the chain of distribution has been shortened. The commission merchant or broker remains an important factor chiefly in the various branches of the textile industry, and in the distribution of raw food products. The functions of the jobber and the wholesaler have largely lost their distinctive features, and the two words are practically interchangeable in business usage. As a consequence of this simplification of the typical chain of distribution, it is necessary to consider in detail the selling problems of only three classes of distributers—the manufacturer, the jobber, and the retailer. These, with the consumer, are the normal factors to be considered in any discussion of marketing problems and methods. 3. Consumer.—It is necessary to establish a definite meaning for the name of each of these classes, before we consider in detail the selling problems of each. A consumer, according to the Century Dictionary, is "one chapter{Section 4who destroys the exchangeable value of a commodity by using it." In other words, he buys goods for consumption and not to sell them again. This definition is so simple that there ought to be no difficulty in deciding who is and who i...« less