sadied-ga,
This has been interesting and fun. The topic of chain stores has a
bit of everything -- unions, protests, taxes, laws, kids, repeals,
Supreme Court decisions, communists, agitators, Eleanor Roosevelt --
you name it.
A search of a Proquest newspaper database for the terms:
chain stores AND (protest OR boycott)
turned up 12 results in the decade from 1900-1919, 104 results from
1920-1932, and 243 results from 1933-1939, an indication of how the
topic grew from the sidelines early in the century into a major news
item in the 1930's.
Obviously, I can't present hundreds of results here, but I scanned the
headlines for what seemed the major stories and themes in each decade,
and identified the following:
COMBINED BUYING BY SMALL STORES
Difficulties in the Way of Thus Trying to Meet Competi- tion of the Chains.
New York Times
Aug 26, 1923
Aroused by what he considers the menace of the increasing growth of
chain store operations to independent merchants who have to compare
with such institutions, a South Carolina dry goods retailer has issued
a call to other dealers in that State to fight back through the medium
of co-operative buying.
Chain Stores Hurt Marts Trade, Roberts Declares
Says Small Stand Dealers Unable to Compete With Quantity Buyers, at
Hearing Before House District Group
The Washington Post
Mar 4, 1928
CHAIN STORE MERCHANDISING NOT AS BLACK AS PAINTED
System, It Is Held, Does Not Stifle Enterprise of Individuals but
Forces the Unfit Out of Business
New York Times, Letters to the Editor
Aug 12, 1928
CHAINS NOT OPPOSING SALES TAX PRINCIPLE
Only Against Discrimination, Lyons Says--Some States Need Revenue
New York Times
Oct 12, 1930
The National Chain Store Association is not opposed to retail sales
taxes in principle or as sources of revenue for the States which see
fit to enact them, it was stated yesterday by R.W. Lyons, executive
vicepresident of the association.
NEW ORLEANS FEARS FOR FRENCH MARKET
Famed in Painting and Story, It Is Unsanitary and Must Be Cleaned Up.
FULL OF COLOR AND ODORS
An Attraction to Tourists, but Chain Stores Have Taken Trade and
Something Must Be Done
THE NEW YORK TIMES
Feb 15, 1931
CHAIN STORE TAX IN INDIANA UPHELD
Supreme Court, 5 to 4, Says Businesses Differ From Independent Units.
The Washington Post
May 19, 1931
CHAINS HIT TAX BILL
Counsel to Protest Measure Before Illinois Senate as Oppressive
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
Jun 18, 1931
CASE FOR THE CHAIN STORES
They Benefit Their Localities in Several Ways
New York Times -- Letter to the Editor
Aug 13, 1931
TIRE MARKETING FIGHT BROADENS
National Dealers' Group Attacks Mail Order and Oil Chain Retailing
SMALL MAKERS BACK MOVE TIRE MARKETING FIGHT BROADENS
Wall Street Journal
Feb 26, 1932
Automobile tire dealers are expressing growing dissatisfaction with
many of the selling practices now prevalent in the tire trade. While
discontent among the independent dealer body has existed for some
time, it has recently assumed more definite and audible form, with the
backing of the National Tire Dealers' Association and of some of the
smaller manufacturing companies in the field.
OPEN DRIVE TO HALT SWEATSHOP BUYING
Officials of Cloak and Suit Group Aim to Stop the Purchase of Sub-Standard Goods.
APPEAL TO CHAIN STORES
Quest for Bargains In Women's Wear Declared Threatening Both Workers
and Employers.
New York Times
Sep 8, 1932
A campaign aiming to prevail upon chain stores and large retailers to
stop buying their women's garments from substandard and sweatshop
sources and make possible thereby a general improvement of conditions
in the garment industry was begun yesterday by the cloak and suit
commission at a meeting in the office of George W. Alger, impartial
chairman of the industry
RETAILERS PROTEST CHAIN-STORE THREAT
Tobacconists Charge Big Operators With Evasion in Demanding Reductions of Rentals.
New York Times
Oct 10, 1932
Quebec Cafes Protest Competition of Chains
New York Times
Aug 20, 1933
MILK SELLING CODE IRKS NEW ENGLAND
Delivery Companies and Chain Stores in Boston Area in Bitter Battle.
ARBITRATION BOARD NAMED
Restaurant Men, Hospitals, More Efficient Dealers, Farmers All Lodge Objections.
New York Times
Nov 12, 1933
Mrs. Roosevelt Pleads Cause Of Booksellers
Tells NRA Meeting of Peril to Them in Chains and Large Stores.
The Washington Post
Feb 28, 1934.
Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt yesterday intervened in the small business
protest meeting arranged by the NRA to defend retail book stores
against competition of chain or large department stores...
CHAIN TAX UPHELD ON FILLING STATIONS
Supreme Court Backs West Virginia by 5 to 4 in Standard Oil Case.
HUGHES WITH MAJORITY
Cardozo Opinion Declares Lawmakers Have Right to Impose 'Harsh' Burden.
New York Times
Jan 15, 1935.
Pennsylvania Tax On Chains Opposed
Wall Street Journal
Mar 21, 1935
Consumer Resistance Hits Retail Grocery And Meat Trades
Agitation Against Rising Cost of Living Spears Profit Margins of Chain Stores
Reduced Consumer Resistance
Wall Street Journal
Jun 7, 1935
Consumer resistance to the rising prices of foodstuffs, which became
noticeable in a moderate measure some months ago, is now assuming
substantial proportions and threatens to present a serious problem to
the retail grocery and meat trades.
Anti-Chain Store Moves Being Made
Action May Be Delayed
Senate Leaders Expect No Proposals To Come Up This Year--Sharp Debate Anticipated
Wall Street Journal
Feb 14, 1936
Effective moves to have Congress enact anti-chain store legislation at
this session are being made by sponsors of price discrimination
legislation. The subject, however, is filled with political dynamite
and, according to leaders in the Senate, there will be no action on
any of the numerous proposals this year.
SAYS LOBBY FIGHTS 'CHAIN STORE' BILL
Logan Assails 'Flood of Telegrams' and Asserts He Will Try to Speed Measure.
CALLS IT ANTI-TRUST AID
Plan, Called Move to Stop Trade Discrimination, Is Upheld Also by Robinson.
New York Times
Feb 16, 1936.
Charging that a lobby was operating to defeat the "Chain Store" bill,
labeled as intended to prevent trade discriminations, several angry
Senators today shouted their disapproval of such actions and promised
to bring up the measure for action possibly next week.
FARM GROUPS OPPOSE ANTI-CHAIN STORE BILL
Hold Measure Does Not Correct Abuses, but Enters Field of Legitimate Business.
New York Times
May 21, 1936
200 GIRLS CONTINUE SIEGE IN 4 STORES
Strikers in 5 Cents-to-$1 Chain Expect Negotiations to Begin Tomorrow
POLICE BRING IN FOOD
Management Stays Passive--Members of Union Bar Non-Guild Reporters
Police Take in Food
New York Times
Mar 15, 1937.
More than 200 employes, mostly girls, of four H. L. Green Company
5-cent-to-$1 chain stores continued their sit-down strikes yesterday
after spending the night in the establishments. They said they would
remain there until ordered out by the Department Store Employes Union,
Local 1250, the strike organization.
BAKERS ASK CHAIN TAX
Convention Also Seeks Levy Upon House-to-House Wagon Stores
New York Times
May 26, 1937
CHAIN ADS DEFEND NATIONAL BRANDS
Albers Super-Markets Publish Comparisons With Private Brands in Midwest
SAVINGS RANGE UP TO 16%
Campaign Staged by a Former Executive of Kroger Co.
Private Brand Seller Quality Is Stressed
Kroger Compared Brands
New York Times
Aug 17, 1937
A vigorous defense of nationally advertised brands, stressing the
economies possible in purchasing such goods in contrast to private
label merchandise, launched by the W. H. Albers chain of super-markets
in the Midwest, attracted the attention of grocery manufacturers here
yesterday.
Great Chain Store Industry At Crossroads, Hartford Says
President of A. & P. System in One of His Rare Public Statements,
Accuses Wholesalers and Middlemen as Selfish
The Washington Post
Jan 3, 1939
The year 1939 opens with the chain store industry approaching a
crossroads in its history. During the coming year the full force of
public opinion against the use of punitive taxes to destroy chain
stores -- which became increasingly evident during 1938 -- will be
focused on those politicians and business groups who would levy such
prohibitive taxes on chain stores that all their economic benefits to
the consuming public would be wiped out.
REFUND IS ORDERED OF CHAIN-STORE TAX
Minnesota Court Rules a Law, Since Repealed, Violated the Constitution
EQUAL PROTECTION CITED
Classification by Volume for Taxes Held a Breach of 14th Amendment
New York Times
Jun 17, 1939.
'CLASS WAR' HERE, BRIDGES ASSERTS; 'OUR BLOOD SHED'
Labor Leader, in Second Day's Testimony, Again Declares He Is Not a Communist
SAYS HE OPPOSES VIOLENCE
Attacks National Guard, Legion, Chain Stores, Manufacturers' Groups as
Foes of Workers Groups "Opposed to Workers"
New York Times
Aug 4, 1939
=======================
In addition to the newspaper articles (of which there are many, many
more), the Library of Congress hosts a wonderful collection of
original, digitzied materials from the 1920's era, which includes a
good collection of articles, pro and con, on chain stores:
-----
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/coolhtml/coolencf.html
Chain Stores
The 1920s saw a proliferation of chain stores for consumers at all
levels of income. The growth of chain stores was aided by the
tremendous popularity of the automobile, which greatly increased
shoppers' mobility, especially in rural areas. Sears, Roebuck and
Company was especially successful in taking advantage of these new
market circumstances. In 1895, Sears was a mail-order company catering
largely to rural demands for basic goods, but in 1925 it branched out
into direct retailing, and by 1929 it operated a chain of 324 stores
nationwide. F. W. Woolworth's, whose "five- and ten-cent" variety
stores spread across the country by catering to lower-income
consumers, was another successful chain; during the 1920s Woolworth's
expanded into more and more working-class neighborhoods. Variety
stores of this sort sold almost everything except fashions. An
anniversary pamphlet, Fifty Years of Woolworth (1929), traces
Woolworth's fifty-year history (1879-1929) in the United States and
Europe. Other successful chains included the Great Atlantic and
Pacific Tea Company (the A&P), Kroger's, J. C. Penney's, and Walgreen
Drug. In addition to the grocery and five- and ten-cent store chains,
drugstore chains, candy chains, shoe chains, cigar chains, and music
chains flourished.
Mail-order buying continued during the 1920s, but the popularity of
the new chain stores changed the way consumers shopped. Many documents
of the time commented on this change and the problems that accompanied
it. Examples in this digital collection include the economist Paul
Mazur's pamphlet Some Problems of Distribution: The Development of
Chain Store Merchandising and its Economic Effects (1929); the
economist Paul Nystrom's Chain Stores (1930); "The Present Status and
Future Prospects of Chains of Department Stores" (1927), a speech by
department store magnate Benjamin A. Filene; a pamphlet, The Menace of
the Chains (1924), revealing the fear that chain stores caused among
local businessmen; and What is the Chain Store's Responsibility to its
Community? (1929), by Earl C. Sams, president of the J. C. Penney
chain.
----
The actual documents they mention are a bit difficult to retrieve from
the LoC site, so I've included direct links to them:
http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=cool&itemLink=r?ammem/coolbib:@field(NUMBER+@band(amrlg+lg28))&hdl=amrlg:lg28:0002
Some problems of distribution; the development of chain store
merchandising and its economic effects,
http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=cool&itemLink=r?ammem/coolbib:@field(NUMBER+@band(amrlg+lg32))&hdl=amrlg:lg32:0001
Chain stores
http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=cool&itemLink=r?ammem/coolbib:@field(NUMBER+@band(amrlg+lg24))&hdl=amrlg:lg24:0001
The present status and future prospects of chains of department stores
http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=cool&itemLink=r?ammem/coolbib:@field(NUMBER+@band(amrlg+lg34))&hdl=amrlg:lg34:0001
The menace of the chains, a discussion of chain store distribution and
its serious menace to the manufacturer, whose business success depends
on his finding and keeping a market for his product
http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=cool&itemLink=r?ammem/coolbib:@field(NUMBER+@band(amrlg+lg33))&hdl=amrlg:lg33:0001
What is the chain store's responsibility to its community?
====================
Earlier, I provided you a search strategy for finding even more
materials on the web, and I think it will be a good way of adding to
the above collection, if you feel the urge.
However, if you'd like me to find more materials for you, just say the
word. Please don't rate this answer until you have everything you
need.
Thanks again for a fascinating question.
pafalafa-ga |
