and hot, add a little molasses to make it adhere, and flavor with some
popular extract. Mold it in balls, rectangles, or in any other fancy
shape. A bushel of shelled corn which costs a dollar will make 125
balls. These at five cents apiece come to $6.25.
This completes the list of one hundred articles for your store. Observe
that they are all made at home, and for that reason the profits are from
50 to 500 per cent., while in the ordinary way of buying from the
wholesaler the storekeeper has to be satisfied with from 10 to 20 per
cent. You will discover for yourself many other articles which can be
made at home and sold at a profit, and you will not confine yourself to
homemade goods, but will handle anything for which there is a demand
whether you can make it yourself or not. Of course, if you make all the
above goods, you will need much help, the cost of which will diminish
somewhat the profits, but the design is that you begin on a modest
scale, at first doing all the manufacturing yourself, and call in
assistance as your business and capital grow. In writing this chapter
the author has contemplated a lady as keeping a store of this kind, but
a gentleman can do much of the work as well, and some sections of it
better. Perhaps the ideal store would be that kept by husband and wife
with growing children to assist. Now let us have the experience of a
lady who has tried our plan.
Mrs. J---- G---- says: “By the death of my husband I was left alone with
three children, Wilhelm fifteen, Gertrude thirteen, and Egbert ten. I
had no means, though, fortunately, my little place in the suburban town
of T---- was free of debt. It consisted of a neat house and three acres
of land. Having a fondness for plants, I cultivated them in curious
ways, while keeping my little family together by taking in sewing. One
day a lady who was spending the summer in T---- called and inquired what
I would take for a pea vine which was growing in a tumbler of water. I
was surprised, as I had not thought of making merchandise of my plant
pets. She purchased a number of pretty little odd things of vegetable
life with which I had amused myself, and suggested that I might earn
something by cultivating rare forms of plants. It was a new idea to me.
I had not thought there was any money in what had been to me only a
pastime, but I increased the number of my plant curiosities, and the
lady and her friends bought them all.
“Then my friend said to me, ‘Why don’t you keep a Home Store? You have
so much taste I think you would do nicely?’ ‘And pray what is a Home
Store?’ I inquired. ‘Oh, it’s a store where the things are all made at
home.’ ‘But I have no capital.’ ‘You need no capital. See, the things
are all made at home. Begin with a few tea dishes.’ So I bought a ham,
sliced it thin, and laid some sprigs of parsley around it. I also made
some artificial honey from a recipe in an old cook book. With the money
I thus earned, I had my window enlarged into a show-window, and put in
a variety of vegetables from my garden, taking care they should be
strictly fresh every day. I had such success that, at the suggestion of
my lady patron, I began to make a great many other things--pastry,
preserves, sweetmeats, and toilet articles. I also purchased one hundred
fowls, and served my customers with fresh eggs. My trade grew so that I
decided to have a real store, and so, at an expense of about $50, I had
my two front rooms made into one and fitted up with shelves and
counters. I purchased a cow and a pig on credit, and also two or three
hives of bees. The people seemed to appreciate my fresh eggs, milk,
butter and honey, and I soon paid all my debts and branched out in
several other directions in the way of homemade goods. Hitherto, my
three children had afforded me all the help I needed, but now I found it
necessary to employ a cheap male laborer to look after my garden,
orchard, cow, pig, and poultry, as well as to assist in making some of
my goods. I made a great variety of things as new suggestions came to me
almost daily, and also, as my customers called for them, I bought what I
could not well make myself. Now, after three years’ experience, I think
I have the most profitable store of its size that can be found anywhere.
Here is my account for last year:
ARTICLES. COST. SALES. PROFITS.
Household plants Seeds $ .90 $15.25 $14.35
Table dishes Meats, etc. 12.59 36.94 24.35
Pastry Materials 53.36 166.05 112.69
Nuts and candy “ 61.66 379.22 317.56
Preserves, etc “ 12.10 49.75 37.65
Toilet articles “ 9.05 19.05 10.00
Varnishes and soaps “ 3.18 15.50 12.32
Soft drinks “ 5.15 31.55 26.40
Vegetables Seeds 2.50 37.27 34.77
School supplies Materials 3.70 13.71 10.01
Christmas presents “ 5.25 48.13 42.88
Eggs, honey and the dairy Keeping stock 75.50 217.00 141.50
Miscellaneous articles Materials 55.05 291.15 236.10
Goods bought Price paid 473.02 551.10 78.08
------- --------- ---------
$773.01 $1,871.67 $1,098.66
“Deduct from the above the wages of laborer at $20 per month, $240, and
I have left $858.66 as net profit for my year’s work. The fruit for the
preserves and pies was raised on the place, and I was under no expense
for tin and paper boxes, these being collected from the houses of my
friends. It will be seen that nearly one-third of the sales of my ‘Home
Store’ were of purchased goods on which the profit were only 15 per
cent., but so large was the profit on the homemade goods that the total
sales were at the gratifying advance of 80 per cent. Besides, I have had
the living of my family and hired help. The expense for meats not
furnished on the place, and for groceries not kept in the store,
together with that for clothes, taxes, and sundries, was $316.05. Thus,
I have paid all my expenses, and saved $540 for a rainy day. Pretty
good, don’t you think, for a woman, and a novice at that? Of course, I
have worked hard, sometimes as many as fifteen hours a day, but I have
enjoyed it, and think I am on the way to a snug little fortune. Others
with more talents, and under more favorable circumstances, I have no
doubt could do much better.
“The secrets of my success, if you ask me, are: First, the trading
instinct, or the knowing what, where, and when to buy. (I never let
myself get out of a stock article). Second, courtesy to all--to the
little barefoot colored boy just the same as to the grand madam. Third,
economy, both in my family expenses, buying only what I need, and in my
store, using in other ways that which will not sell in the original
form, throwing nothing away unless it is spoiled and even that giving,
as a last resort, to my pig and poultry; and fourth, hard work, making
and selling with my own hands everything I can, and carefully
superintending everything I cannot.”