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Prophecy Is Dangerous,
Prophecy is always dangerous. And some of the best-meant prophecies, which seemed to be reasonably based when made, have turned out 100 per cent wrong.
The old chain store controversy is « perfect example of this. Back in the late ‘20s and early 430s, it was widely forecast that the growth of the chains, which had been swift and dramatic, meant that the independents were doomed, unless the chains were blocked by stiff class taxes and punitive laws on the local, state, and national levels.
A few such laws were passed, but the “toughest” of them were defeated—'notably those of a Federal nature. The prophets of doom for independent merchandising spoke up again. But what happened?
Three years ago, U.S. Department of Commerce experts studied chain store operations in 12 fields, including food, general merchandise, shoes, drugs, hardware and so on. They found that in 1929, the chains accounted for 28 per cent of the total sales in those fields. In 1948, almost 20 years later, the chains’ proportion was about the
61.7%