PRICE OF BUTTER.

Taranaki Daily News, 20 October 1916, Page 3

PRICE OF BUTTER.

THE DEALERS' " CUT." (From Our Own Correspondent). Wellington, October 17. Referring to the Hoard of Trade's proposals for securing the supplv of butter to consumers within K'c\v Zealand at a maximum rate ot Is 7d per pound, a prominent exporter told a reporter yesterday that he thought more attention should have been given to the question of retailers' profits. "The retailer is taking far too big a share of the difference 'between the factory price and the price charged to the consumer," he said. "We are exporting butter at a price that represents a return of about Is ad per .-pound f.o.b. If the local retailer would be satisfied with a return of Id on each pound of butter handled by him, ho could buy at the export price and sell to the public at Is Cd per pound, thus making it unnecessary for the Board of Trade to devise a cumbersome schema of levies and bonuses. But the retailer wants to take about lid per poundmore than the total cost of manufacturing the butter—and so the producer and the exporter have to suffer." The. exporter added that at one the retailers had been content to add. l'/od per pound to the price of butter !: for the trouble of handling it, but the amount had 'been increased in later years. "I see no reason at all why the grocers should not sell butter over the counter, on a casli basis, at a return of Id per pound," he added. Take the case of a grocer in Wellington, who has his butter delivered to him daily by the merchant and makes his payments monthly. He has no capital invested in the butter. He receives his money from his customers before lie pays the merchant, and if he were satisfied to take a penny for each pound, the consumer would get the benefit of the other twopence. But the grocer takes 3d per pound, and the Government appears to have given no attention to that point at all."

A city grocer to whom tins point was mentioned by the reporter stated that butter was treated in exactly the same way as any other commodity. "A grocery business is worked on a percentage basis/' he said, "and the rule is for all {roods to be sold at a definite percentage above the wholesale price. This percentage lias to cover rent, taxes, wages, bad debts, etc., as well as the firm's profit. I don't think that anybody will regard 12 per cent, as an unreasonably large addition to the- wholesale prices. No grocer can work on a less percentage than 10 per cent., and very few of them charges more than 15 per cent, above the wholesale prices. Well, 12 per cent, on butter bought from the merchant at Is od per pound amounts to something oyer 2d per pound, and brings the price to over Is "d. It is all very well to say that a return of Id per pound for handling tratter should be sufficient for the retailer, but the same argument might be applied to any other article, and to say that the grocer should be content with a return of something under 0 per cent, over wholesale prices (or Id on a Is 5d pour,! of butter) is ridiculous. The retailor could not carry on or a month at such a rate."