Never Forgetting

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Feb 28, 1911

THE editor of the American Grocer, a widely circulated trade journal which has recently celebrated the conclusion of its fortieth year, states in his journal that "the trade is cursed with persons thinking themselves so far developed that they need no special culture in memory." In illustration he tells these stories of scenes in different large business houses:

Said a city retailer to his clerk: "Charley, there are one dozen quarts of olive-oil spoiled, because you exposed them in the store window to the direct rays of the sun. Didn't I tell you to keep it in a cool, dry, even temperature?" "Yes, sir, but I forgot!" Result, a loss of $8.00. Moral: A BAD MEMORY IS COSTLY.

"Tom, what is the trouble with Mrs. Good?" "O, she is angry because I sent her the wrong sort of coffee. She has been using our 76 blend and I forgot and sent her Rio, and she has been kicking ever since, and says she is done trading here." Result, the loss of a customer whose trade amounted to six hundred dollars a year. Moral: A POOR MEMORY DRIVES AWAY TRADE.

"Dick, what is the reason so much butter is being returned?" said the head of the firm to the manager of a big retail grocery. "Well, it was stored in the cellar near a pile of codfish, and I suppose the warm temperature and close proximity tainted the butter." "But didn't I warn you against that, and tell you butter was quick to absorb any foreign flavor?" "Yes, sir, but I forgot!" Result, ten tubs or six hundred pounds of butter damaged, causing a loss of over fifty dollars. Moral: A POOR MEMORY WORKS INNUMERABLE LOSSES TO THE STOCK.

"The fellow that does not want to remember, or will not try to remember, is a barnacle, and the only way to get rid of barnacles is to scrape them off." The boy or man with an unreliable or bad memory is a burden and expense. "If men and boys will deliberately place themselves on the scrap-heap of society, they must accept the consequences."—Selected.