THE CALIFORI\IA LT]MBER MERCHAI\T

Jack Dionne, Publisher

DIAMOND GARDNER RETAII STORES STAGE 2x8 SAIES DRM

The latest (December) issue of the interesting Diamond Gardner Digest reports on a recent sales promotion in the company's many California retail lumberyards. It was called a "2x8 Sales Drive," and the report says :

Bringing in 2,230 new accounts and ringing up a record sales month in August, the California Retail Division of Diamond Gardner Corporation showed one way to cure the recession-plagued lumber business.

Here's how the retailers' triple-threat treatment worked:

First, set a goal. Theirs was to make August the biggest sales-volume month in retail history. Sales goal was set at $2,000,000.

Actual sales fell short of the goal but the morith's volume was still good enough to break previous records.

Second, plan ahead. Employes were informed about the promotion in June and, by July, "2x8" had become a byword. The slogan stood for $2,000,000 in sales for August, the eighth month of the year.

Third, sell! Various media were used to acquaint the public with Diamond's time-payment plan and other services. Enthusiasm ran so high that 24 stores out of 56 exceeded their sales quotas-Martinez, Calif., by 56.3/c and Woodland, Calif., by 43.2/o.

J* JLu Joonn

(Editor's note: Diamond's Time-Payment plan works_ this slogan: "Lfse Diamond's Time-payment llan.-Nothing Down-Up to 93500-5 years topay.', The first of seven dinners.for company store empioyes of the 24 quota-topping retail yards iook place in Wobaland. Attgnding were personnel from five slores in Harold Schaeffcr's South Central district-Arbuckle. Fairfield. Winters, Woodland and Vacaville, Calif., including these store employes and Retail Division executive personnel: ___K-evin Jones, Ilarold Hillaker, Delbert Peiry, Don Wallace, Tony Martinez, Walter Allgaier, fuIarion Miller, John Green, Lester Motta, Harbld Schaeffer, Chester Hinshaw, Jadie Sullivan, Ervin PreimsL"rg"l Frank Durk, _Frank Pritchett, R. L. Wright, Tom Stowers, Lew Walker and William Harris.-

The staff of the Martinez, Calif., retail yard, which logped ijs August sales_goal by 56/o, includes Manager Julian- Cota, .Em_ery Montagne, Marlene Pighin, joe Rangel, Marvin McCamish and Frank Funkhauier. -

The Woodland, Calif., yard, the other highest quota- topper, which exceeded its goal by a3/c, ii staffid bv Manager Marion Miller, Tony Martinez, John Green, Darrell Howell, Charles Odneal, Ivan Martin, Don Wallace and Walter Allgaier.

Deqlers Enrolling in SCRLA'S 'Top Monogemenl Workshop'

The following retail lumber dealers and yard employes had signed up at press time for the Top Management Workshop of the Southern California Retail Lumber Association to be conducted by Arthur A. Hood at the Surf Rider Inn in Santa Monica, Calif., starting February 9 and running through the l3th. The $95 enrollment fee includes supplies and textbooks, with rooms available at additional rates in the new Inn. reDorts SCRLA Executive Vice-President Orrie W. Hamilton.

Bernard Anawalt, Jr., Hal Anawalt, Anawalt Lumber & Materials Co., Pacoima; W. G. Baldridge, R. T. Jones, Mason Lumber Co., Billings, Mont.; Guy Barnett, Leon Flynn, Rossman Mill & Lumber Co., Paramount; Bob Lynn, Rossman Mill & Lumber Co., San Pedro; M. F. O'Sullivan, Rossman Mill & Lumber Co., Long Beach; Russ Singer, Rossman Mill & Lumber Co., Wilmington; Carl E. Bauer, Bauer Lumber Co., Compton; J. Eric Beckstrom, Arcadia Lumber Co., Arcadia; H. F. "Red" Betts, Betts-Sine Lumber Co., Culver City; Russell P. Fritchey, Palm Avenue Lumber Co., Alhambra; John Golden, Flammond Lumber Co., Riverside; Doug Maple, Hammond Lumber Co., North Hollywood; W. N. Hathaway, Oceanside Lumber Co., Oceanside; R. H. Learned, Hal Newell, Learned Lumber, Hermosa Beach; Albert B. McKee, Jr., Kingston McKee, Forest Lumber Co., Pasadena; Herb J. Neville, Quesnel Supply Co., Ltd., Quesnel, B.C., Canada; James H. Nelson, Buena Park Lumber Co., Buena Park; Donald E. Pearson, Alsto Distributors, Ltd., Vancouver, B.C., Canada; Clifford Rose, San Jacinto Lumber Co., San Jacinto; Harold "Bud" Walling, .John W. Fisher Lumber Co., Santa Monica; Wayne Hull, Hull Bros. Lumber Co., Los Angeles; Wally Hull, Hull Bros. Lumber Co., Canoga Park; Norbert Bundschuh, Paul Forman, Myrtle Avenue Lumber Co., Monrovia, and George T. Wiley, Robert E. Marks, Richard Deininger, Jr., George T. Wiley Lumber Co., Long Beach; George Barr, Barr Lumber Co., Santa Ana; Robert Shaw, Gibson Lumber Co., Victorville; Art Van Roo, Gibson Lumber Co., San Bernardino; Ronald N. Spratling, Halladay Lumber & Hardware Co., Salt Lake City, Utah; Edward J. \Mood, Gibson Lumber Co., Albuquerque, N. M., and Dick Lang, Yosemite Builders Supply, Merced, Calif.

In this issue, we welcome these new advertisers into the family of California Lumber "Merchant-isers" :

65

LUMBER MER,CHANTS ASSOCIATION of

Northern California will conduct a two-day

Management Conference

February 16th and lTth in Palo Alto

The following are among topics which will be discussed by outstanding practicing businessmen :

Financial Management-Depreciation

Construction trends-Insurance

Human Relations-Personnel

Merchandising-Advertisin g Sales-Taxes

Normcn P. Moson Succeeds Cole qs Housing Administrqfor

The White l{ouse has announced the resignation, effective at some future date, of Albert M. Cole, Housing and Home Finance Administrator, and the President has appointed Norman P. Mason, Federal Housing Commissioner, to succeed Cole, who will remain in Washington as executive vice-president of Reynolds Aluminum Service Corpora- tion, a construction contracting subsidiary of Reynolds Metals Company.

Norman P. Mason. formerlv a retail lumber dealer in Chelmsford, Mass., and former president of the National Retail Lumber Dealers Association, has been a very able commissioner of Federal llousing Administration. Under his administration of FHA, a number of important steps have been taken to make the mortgage insurance program available to all areas of the country, particularly in smaller communities. His appointment as administratcir of Housing ancl Home Finance is in recognition of the outstanding job he has done in FHA, said the NRLDA.

"Our industry has every reason to be proud of Norman P. Nfason's record and we all wish him rn'ell in his new undertaking," said H. R. Northup, executive vice-president, National Retail Lumber Dealers Association.

Notionql Wood Council Orgonizing Af Polm Springs, Feb. t2-13

New York, N. Y.-An organizational meeting will be held in Palm Springs, Calif., February 12-13, to start the National Wood Council to operate under the new Wood Promotion Program of the National Lumber Manufacturers Assn. The group was first discussed at the NLMAnnual last November, and the National-American Wholesale Lumber Assn. was one of the industry bodies agreeing to supply representation on and coooerate with such a Council. N-AWLA President Don R. Meredith will represent his association at the Palm Springs organizational sessions.

&^o* @@ C O}TTE IVI POR,AR,Y C E DAR,

Soft [ghts, music and a background of Lam-Loc Contemporary Cedar. mix this with an attractive price, a nice profit and multiply it times a million and you have an idea of the avalanche headed your way, especially if you're an approued Lam-Loc Character Wood dealer. It's important you know that hundreds of builders, architects, designers, interior decorators and the like have shown great interest in this newest of the new. Sorry, but space prevents us from giving you full details here. However we do tell all, including how you get approved, in a short six page document that's yours for the asking. Let us hear from you!

Ed Fountain Lumber Company, 6218 South Hooper Avenue, Los Angeles, California.

William Shakespeare wrote: Cypress black, as e'er the crow, Gloves as sweet as damask roses, Masks for faces and for noses; Bugle-bracelet, necklace amber, Perfume for a lady's chamber; Golden coifs and stomachers, For my lads to give their dears; Pins and poking sticks of steel, What maids lack from head to heel; Come buy of me, come buy, come buyBuy, lads, or else your lasses cry; Come buy!

Yes, the above is from Shakespeare's ,'The Winter's TaIe," and is a very high-class bit of advertising copy. He would have been a champion advertising writer had he lived in this advertising age. There are innumerable portions of his writings that testify to that fact.

In case you, dear reader, may be one who has been dragged against his best wishes to see and hear some starchy musical event, you may be interested in the following story. The little boy was in that fix, and when the orchestra leader waved his baton frantically and the stout soprano started her solo, he pulled at his father's coat-sleeve and whispered, "Papa, why is the man beating the fat lady with his stick?" The father said, ,,Hush! He isn't beating her." But the boy insisted: "Then why is the fat lady hollering?"

The little boy was of the same opinion as the drunk who was refused admission to a theatre where a symphony concert was just starting. The doorman said to him: ,,you can't get i1-you're drunk !" And the fellow said, ,.Sure Ilm drunk ! If I wasn't drunk I wouldn't want to get in here, would I ?"

A quiet little man named Calvin Cootidge was the author of many very memorable opinions. For instance, he uttered this classic: "We do not need more material development, we need more spiritual development. We do not need more intellectual power, we need more moral power. We do not need more knowledge, we need more character. We do not

BY JACK DIONNE

need more government, we need more culture. We do not need more law, we need more religion. We do not need more of the things that are seen, we need more of the things that are unseen. There is in the people themselves the power to put forth great men. There is in the soul of the nation a reserve for responding to the call of high ideals, to nobility of action which has never yet been put forth. There is no problem so great but that somewhere a man is being raised to meet it."

Hearing and reading of what the Russians have done and keep right on doing to keep free men worried and the free world in turmoil, brings back a speech that Winston Churchill made a few years ago. He recalled the fact that Europe was once threatened by the Mongol hordes under Genghis Khan, and the barbarians uron two great battles in the North and South, and Europe seemed to lay prostrate before him, and our civilization doomed. Then. said Churchill, "the great Khan died, and the Mongol armies trooped back on their ponies across the seven-thousand miles that separated them from their capital, in order to choose a successor. They never returnsd-" snd then Churchill added. "till now."

That Thomas Jefferson was a great man and a great patriot, no one will deny. But it must be admitted that, in some ways at least, he was a poor prophet. For Jefferson suggested that "our general government," as he called it, "should be reduced to a very simple organization and a very inexpensive one; a few plain duties to be performed by a few servants." And look at this plain, simple and inexpensive federal government today !

Since a bottle or *niJtey*r, i"nrrurrtly used as a gift between friends, especially in holiday seasons, the directions for discovering whether the stufr is good or not are contained in the following waggish bit of advice: "Pass an electric current through a quart of the stuff. If the current causes a precipitation of lye, tin, arsenic, iron slag and alum, you will know that the licker is just fair. But, on the other hand, if the booze hauls off and chases the current of electricity back into the generator-Mister, you've got yourself some good licker."

REDWOOD, like other commodities, can be bought at many prices. But, when you want the best you don't buy the cheapest. The BEST Redwood begins here, in company-owned and controlled timber.

MAILING ADDRESS: P.O. BOX 625 ARCATA, CATIFORNIA

TETEPHONE: VAndyke 2-2958 o

TELETYPE: ARC 27