Excerpt from Operating Expenses in the Wholesale Grocery Business in 1921 The reports on the cost of doing business in the wholesale grocery trade in 1921 are particularly significant in that they furnish a, picture of conditions in a year of generally severe business depression, during which problems Of readjustment had to be faced that had not arisen for at least fifteen years prior to this time. For two hundred twenty - nine firms that submitted fully comparable statements for both 1920 and 1921 the aggregate volume of sales Showed a decline of 30 - 4 from in 1920 to in 1921. Gross profit, in percentage of net sales, was greater in 1921 than in the preceding year; in 1920 the common figure for gross profit was lower than in any previous year for which records are available. This indicates that wholesale grocers generally took their inventory losses, occasioned by the heavy drop in prices, at the end of 1920. Despite the higher percentage of gross profit in 1921, the average net loss was greater in that year than in 1920. For all the firms reporting, the average net loss in 1921 was of net sales, as compared to a common figure of in 1920. This increase in net loss, even though gross profit was higher, resulted from the difficulties that were encountered in readjusting expenses to the falling-off in sales and the drop in prices. The common figure for total expense in 1921 was as compared with a common figure of 9% in 1920. Practically every firm showed a higher per centage of expense for 1921 than for the preceding year. The rate of stock-turn was lower in 1921 than in any previous year. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.