Grade-M:arked Lumber

By Kenneth Smith

Secretary-Mdndger, Lumber ond Allied Products lnstitute, Los Angeles

Address Delivered Before the Annual Convention of the California

Retail Lumbermen's Associotion ot

Bocause oI early training in the export business, I did not need to be converted to grade-marking. The export lumber business has been conducted on the basis of identifiable and marked quality for hundreds of years. Axel H. Oxholm with the endorsement of the then Chief of the Department of Commerce, Honorable Herbert Hoover, officially advocated grade-marking of domestic lumber in America in L922. It took three years for the idea to become Beriously advocated over the country. You heard your first talk on the subject at your Fresno Convention in 1925. I talked on this subject at your 1927,1928, L929 and,1930 conventions. The National Lumber Manufactur€rs Association put out "Taking the Mystery out of Lumber Buying" in 1929 and "Know the Lumber You Use" in 1930.

By I9D sentiment for grade-marking had progressed to the point where an agreement was made with the West Coast Lumbermen's Association to license any yards who desired to mark lumber in Southern California, this being the first and the most notable example of constructive cooperation between dealers and manufacturers to end grade gypping and sell lurnber on a basis of proven quality.

The prime consideration in Los Angeles was to end the selling of all Common lumber as Oregon Pine, no grade stated, and institute the selling of No. 1, No. 2, and. No. 3, Douglas Fir in oriler to make it possible for the customer to know how to order the kind of lumber he wanted to buy. However, optional grade-marking, after a trial of five years, proved to be, while helpful, an insufficient remedy.

So last year consideration was given to instituting the sale by the leading dealers of Los Angeles of no Douglas Fir Boards, Dimension or Timbers except officially W. C. L. A. grade-marked. Early this year the campaign was started and an advertising fund provided by the payment of ten cents per thousand into a common fund in order to tell the public how they could be sure of getting the grade of lumber for which they paid.

For.those of you who may be interested in knowing how this job was handled, we have brought along the display which is pinned to the easel before you, and which you can read through at your leisure. This contains samples of the , advertisements, of the publicity, of the booklet "The Right Use of Lumber Grades in Home Construction," provided for

Del Monte, October 93, 1936

our use by the West Coast Lumbermen's Association, two booklets issued by the Federal Government which we have used in both publicity and advertising; and the centerpiece is a poster which our dealers catering to purchasers of grade-marked lumber have on display in their offices. Material not shown consists only of the direct letter campaign to architects, engineers, lenders and leading contractors, which we used in the beginning of the campaign.

On the date this campaign started, April 1, 1936, we concluded a bulletin to our members with this paragraph:

"For the first time in the history of Los Angeles, you are jointly recognizing your responsibility for dealing honestly with the unsuspecting and technically uninformed publicfor protecting the public against the rapaciousness of chiseling lumber dealers and chiseling contractors (often in collusion)-and to restoring lumber to its once proud and honestly won place as the world's best and most economical building material. You can hold your head a little higher tomorrow from the knowledge that you are taking part in a program that is going to restore your pride in your callingthat is going to make it unnecessary for you to defend lumber against the bad name it has been given by improper use.and dishonest selling. But-you just start tomorrow. You win by following through."

I am happy to report to you that, while we were selling less than 25 per cent at that time, we are now selling well in excess of 75 per cent grade-marked Douglas Fir Boards, Dimension and Timbers. In a check of one month's business recently, we found that 55 per cent of the lumber being received at the Harbor is W. C. L. A. grade-marked at the mill. The'remainder of that sold grade-marked is so marked by licensed yards in Los Angeles.

The outstanding surprise of the campaign to all of us has been its acceptance by the very jerry builders whom we had expected might resent it and the revelation in so short a time of how it has restored the market for No. 1 and No. 2.

We knew before we started that this intensive advertising campaign, from our experience with five years of voluntary grade-marking, would intensify the gains we had made in that time. For one thing, it makes competition honest because it ends grade gypping and forces value to be taken into consideration in making the price. We had proof of this in the fact that practically every professional purchasing agent in the City was buying only grade-marked Douglas Fir before we started the campaign.

Secondly, it provides a foundation for sales promotion that justifies making an investment in it. We have countless examples in Los Angeles of preserving markets which were being attacked by substitutes, of regaining markets which had been entirely lost, and of developing entirely new business. I need cite to you gentlemen here only one instance which is known to all of you, and with ..rrhich we are not con,cerned, which is the entirely new market developed by the manufa'cturers of Redwood, by their estab- tinguishes the lumber he sells from "just lumber." It gives him a SOUND basis for advertising and trade extension. It helps stabilize prices. It reassures the public that GOOD lumber is still attainable. It encourages architects and engineers to specify lumber. It gives the home owner honest value. developed

One most important fact is that it makes an invaluable contribution to the maintenance of those established distribution practices which are recognized as ethical and sound by all branches of the industry.

Redwood, lishment and sale of an identifiable, proven, marked grade of Strtrctural Redwood Timbers.

It builds goodwill for every firm which identifies itself with the 'campaign; it builds and safeguards cooperative programs between dealers because it certifies quality; it safeguards against losing business to substitutes; it identifies responsibility for errors; and it puts competition definitely on the higher plane of service.

I have stated many times that what we are doing is just as mu,ch a battle on behalf of the manufacturers as for ourselves because our campaign will prevent this large and important market from becoming a low grade durnping ground and a paradise for manufacturers of substitutes. We have, of ,course, en,countered the opposition of ,some manufacturers who want to dump No. 3 and No.4 on this market and who do not have the vision to realize that, when they have destroyed a major market for the No. 2 and better product of the log and bear the value of the upper grades down, they will ultimately get for themselves a much lower net realization for the log. But we feel from our experien'ce, and I predicate all of my arguments for the support of this program by retail lumbermen on the ground it is in their own selfish interest. It stops grade gypping. It puts shippers on their mettle to deliver right quality. It dis-

In their own selfish interest retailers should not only demand that the manufacturers supply them with officially association grade-marked lumber but they should work foi the attainment in all building codes of requirements both as to minimum standards of grades and provisions for guaranteeing quality, which encourage the purchase of grade-marked lumber; in a sense for compulsory "pure food laws" covering lumber grades.

Editorial comment in a recent issue of the Pacific Retail I umberman sums up .in four short sentences the arguments for the support ly-lhg lumber industry oJ the grade-marking program so well, I quote them in closing:

"There are a number of ailments which need immediate attention, but the one most imperative is that the customer must be given some better guarantee than the salesman's word that he is getting the product for which he is paying money.

_ "Dealers still question the advisability of grade-marking. It is not a question whether it is advisable or not-but how long the industry can continue in the picture if it does not have its produ'ct identified as to quality.

."I_n our June issue we stated thaf 'Grade-marking is definitely.on the way in.' Grade-marking is on the wiy in because'self-preservation is the first law of nature' and grademarking is a necessary step toward the preservation;f the industry."