THE PERNICIOUS TREATING CUSTOM.
A commercial traveler of our acquaintance who has been “on the road” for many years, and whose duty calls him to all parts of the United States, tells us that the treating custom has come to be recognized as almost an indispensable adjunct of his line of business, and that the practise of it has increased greatly in recent years, and is now well-nigh universal. The “drummer” who will not treat and be treated is made to understand very distinctly that he is not “up with the times,” and that he must either conform to the practise or fall out of the ranks. He can neither obtain new customers nor hold his old ones unless he becomes “a good fellow” in the convivial sense of that term. If he expects to sell a large bill to a dealer, he must do it over a social glass; this much is expected of him by the firm he represents and the men with whom he deals; his success in the trade will be measured largely by the freedom and generosity which he displays in dispensing drinks among his actual or prospective customers. We have it from this same informant, of whose truthfulness and reliability we have no doubt, that some large business concerns now attach so much importance to this treating practise as a means of drawing trade, that they are sending out men to travel around the country, not for the purpose of selling goods directly, or even of soliciting business themselves, but simply to make the acquaintance of prospective customers, and prepare the way for their regular representatives with their sample cases. This preparation, it need hardly be said, consists chiefly in the exercise of that genial hospitality and good fellowship which consists in a frequent “setting up” of the drinks. This is, in fact, the main feature of the advance agent’s duty, and large9amounts of money are supplied him for this specific purpose. From the soil thus mellowed and fructified it is expected that the regular representative, who follows hard after, will reap an easy and abundant harvest, especially, after he has done a little more mellowing on his own account. A scheme more shrewdly devised to promote intemperance and immorality could hardly have been planned by the evil one himself. And one of the saddest and most deplorable features of the business is that many highly respectable and professedly Christian men, the heads of great mercantile houses, support and encourage this treating practise among their employees under the plea that it must be done to keep up trade. At what a cost in ruined lives and blighted careers, in sorrow and suffering brought on the innocent and helpless, trade is thus promoted, can be faintly imagined! It is a feature of modern business “enterprise” which every honest man, to say nothing of the professed Christian, ought to disown and do his utmost to suppress. It is altogether vicious and abominable and without justification in the slightest degree. A business built up by such practises can not prosper in the long run, but a curse must rest upon it as sure as God is merciful and just.—Christian Work.