Home › At the Fountain › By E. C. Tracey (One of the principal)
By E. C. Tracey (One of the principal)
One of the principal innovations at the soda fountain last winter was the serving of sandwiches, of all kinds, at the soda fountain. Not only cold ham and chicken and tongue sandwiches, but hot sandwiches, hot roast beef sandwiches, hot turkey sandwiches, hot egg sandwiches, club sandwiches, and other ideas as new as they were startling at the soda fountain. I see the old-style druggist shrug his shoulders and say he don't propose to turn his apothecary shop into a light lunch counter, but this new idea has been started, put into effect and carried to successful basis by the largest, most progressive, and best patronized soda fountains in the United States. It is worth thinking about.
The large drug stores of today have large soda fountains which occupy anywhere from one-quarter to one-half their available counter space or from 25 to 50 per cent. of the selling space of the store. These fountains are crowded all through the summer time, but the expense is too large and the space is too great to permit of this part of the store being empty through the winter months.
As the rents and expenses of doing business increase, the live merchant realizes he must keep every department in his store busy all the year round. He is dropping the professional side of the drug business and becoming more and more an up-to-date merchant, who would just as soon keep his soda fountain busy with the same number of help in winter by serving sandwiches as he would serving ice cream in the summer time, and perhaps just a little rather, for there is even a trifle more money in sandwiches than there is in ice cream soda, for as we all know, they are one of the most profitable class of merchandise. There is another reason for this, hot soda business is increasing and when you drink hot soda, bouillon or hot chocolate, there comes a natural desire to eat something with it. This was at first satisfied by serving a few crackers, and people ate so many crackers that sometimes they killed the profit in hot soda water, so Mr. Live Merchant decided if the people want to eat something with their hot drinks, why not let them pay for it. There is still another reason. These big, beautiful, busy, down-town stores had good soda water business in the morning, and a fine soda water business in the afternoon, even in winter, but from the hours of II to 2.30 o'clock their fountains are practically deserted because their trade was getting something to eat. "If people must eat between II and 2.30 o'clock, and most of them eat sandwiches for lunch, why should they not eat them at my soda counter, which is thoroughly equipped for taking care of business of this kind and let the money flow into my till, to keep my store profitable all the time."
It has been done and will continue to be done more and more every winter and will gradually work down, from the biggest of dispensers who are now making a success of this idea, to the moderate-sized man and then to the small dispenser in the smaller cities.
Not only does the modern method of doing business, the size of the soda fountain and space it occupies in the store require that the merchant should do business all the year round, but almost all classes of stores that have gone into this new idea keep open all night and it is absolutely necessary for them to do business every hour in the twenty-four. They have the fountain, they have the space, they have the help, and have the material. After theatre, people are getting into the habit of stepping into their favorite drug store for a hot turkey sandwich, an oyster cocktail, and even a Welsh rarebit, or an oyster stew.
Marshal Field, of Chicago, was once asked by a young man, for his receipt for acquiring a fortune. His answer was plain, concise and true. He stated in order to become wealthy, "You must sell something." He did not say you must make something, because that is only preliminary to the commercial part of the transaction. He did not say you must create or invent something, for if you created or invented the most wonderful machine or contrivance, it would have to be sold before producing any profit. He did not say you must become an artist or author, for although this class of people do not consider themselves commercial people, still the products of their pen and brush must be sold before they can be creative of value or profit to any one.
The live drug merchant realizes that in order to make his soda fountain pay to the utmost limit, he must "sell something" all the time and during the season that ice cream sundaes and soda water will not sell to their greatest extent, he is selling sandwiches, the idea has come to stay. Tea in German Teaballs.