COMMODITY TESTING AND RATING AGENCIES Consumers' Research, Inc. Consumers' Research, Inc., whose offices and laboratory are located in Washington, N. J., was organized as Consumers' Club in 1927 and originally incorporated in December 1929, under the laws of the State of New York, as a membership corporation to provide unbiased information and counsel on merchandise bought by the ultimate con sumer. Types of service.-After experimenting for a number of years with different methods of presenting information to ultimate consumers, two types of service were decided upon beginning October 1934, as the most satisfactory and convenient method of presenting Consumers' Research material in accordance with subscribers' expressed wishes and criticisms. Consumers' Research Bulletins: All of the bulletins list products by brand name as "recommended," "intermediate," and "not recommended." Whenever possible, price classifications are also given, prices being rated as 1, 2, and 3; 1 being low, 3 high. The quality judgments are completely independent of price classifications. This service is available only to individuals, who are required to sign the confidential pledge before their subscriptions are entered. Each subscriber to the bulletin service receives the current Annual Cumulative Bulletin and all other monthly bulletins issued during the year for which his subscription is in effect. Bulletins are mailed to subscribers monthly, between the 10th and 15th of the month, except during July and August. There are no bulletins issued in July and August because these 2 months are spent in compiling and preparing data for the 240-page Annual Cumulative Bulletin, which appears in September each year. This issue and five of the monthly bulletins are confidiential in nature and are marked, "The analyses of commodities, products, or merchandise appearing in this issue of the Consumers' Research Bulletin are for the sole information of subscribers." Four of the monthly bulletins are nonconfidential and may also be obtained as a separate service called the General Bulletin service which is described below. The General Bulletin service: The General Bulletin is issued quarterly, in October, January, April, and June, and is not confidential. Subscriptions are open to libraries, schools, and other organizations, and to any individual who does not wish to subscribe to the regularly monthly bulletin service. The volume year runs from October through June, and subscriptions are accepted for that period only. Single copies of the bulletins of this service are also available to nonmembers. Sources of information.-The technical judgments and recommendations of Consumers' Research are based upon its own technical tests and investigations, and knowledge of its technical staff or experts: upon data published by the Federal and State Governments pertaining to consumers' goods; upon data issued by the State and national medical associations, and other research and investigating bureaus, associations, corporations, or individual experts; in certain cases, upon advice from users who have made observations of their experiences with, or possess special knowledge of, the product in question, and whose views, in the opinion of the technical experts of Consumers' Research, are deserving of consideration by other consumers; upon tests or investigations which are made available for the use of Consumers' Research by various qualified noncommercial experts, technicians, and scientists. At one time Consumers' Research published the monthly magazine Consumers' Digest. This presents in a more popular form information on commodities, general buying advice, and news of especial interest to consumers. Consumers' Digest is now published by Consumers' Institute of America, Inc., which also has its headquarters in Washington, N. J. Only products which can be listed as recommended, or rated with a qualified recommendation, are listed in Consumers' Digest. Consumers' Union of United States. C Consumers' Union, Inc., located in New York City, was formed in February 1936 under the laws of New York State as a nonprofit membership corporation set up to provide consumers with simple, usable information about consumers goods and services, covering quality, price, and wherever possible, labor conditions in the factories producing such goods. Quality and price ratings are not affected by the reports on labor conditions, according to the policy of the organization. Services-Consumers' Union, an organization of 85,000 members, publishes monthly Consumers' Union Reports in full and abridged form. The full reports contain ratings and discussions of higherpriced commodities, while the abridged reports, designed primarily for low-income families, omit ratings on high-priced products. Consumers' Union also publishes an Annual Buying Guide, which is a compact booklet rating many hundreds of products and designed for quick reference in shopping. The information published in the monthly reports is not confidential. Only the material included in the Annual Buying Guide and certain other special reports is made confidential. This is done primarily for legal reasons since there is no explanation in the Annual Buying Guide of the methods of test employed nor space given to the qualifications accompanying the recommendation of certain products as in the monthly reports. All confidential material is for the sole use of members and their immediate families. Merchandise is rated in the reports and Annual Buying Guide by brand names in three groups: "Best buys," "also acceptable," and "not acceptable." Sources of information. The ratings of products represent the judgments of the technicians of the staff of Consumers' Union or of consultants whose technical competence and freedom from commercial bias are approved by Consumers' Union. Ratings are based on laboratory tests, on controlled tests under conditions of use, on the opinion of qualified authorities, on the experience of a large number of persons with the products being studied, or on a combination of all these factors. Intermountain Consumers' Service, Inc. Intermountain Consumers' Service, Inc., 435 Marion Street, Denver, Colo., is a nonprofit research and information agency organized in December 1932 under the laws of the State of Colorado for the purpose of supplying ultimate consumers with reliable comparative data as to the price and quality of consumers' goods. Services.-Intermountain Consumers' Service supplies to members, through its Consumers' Buying Guide, a handbook of buying issued in installments during the year, scientific and technical information. and counsel, based on its own tests or the findings of experts. Goods are listed as recommended, not recommended, and unclassified, giving brands and names of manufacturers in full and using the rational grade symbols A (first quality), B (second quality), and C (third quality). Reasonableness of the price of a commodity is indicated by the numbers 1 (fair price), 2 (high price), 3 (excessive price). Where standards and specifications of significance to ultimate consumers are available, these are used as gages of quality, and where they are lacking, new standards and specifications, which give adequate consideration to the factors of importance to consumers, are evolved. Sources of information.-The recommendations of Intermountain Consumers' Service are based on tests conducted by it, on current scientific literature, on the counsel of consultants, and on governmental and other approved unbiased sources of commodity information. CHAPTER VII CONSUMER BUYING AND THE EXTENT AND CHARACTER OF COMMODITY INFORMATION AVAILABLE The consumer who purchases commodities on the retail market is in a very different position from that of the purchasing agent who buys for the Federal Government, a State, a county, a municipality, or a large commercial establishment. The consumer has to depend upon the information concerning commodities that he can obtain for himself or that the retailer is willing and prepared to give him. The individual consumer cannot afford to have commodities tested to determine their compliance with given standards or specifications. Because the consumer knows so little regarding different commodities, he often makes uneconomical and otherwise unsatisfactory selections, buys erratically, and fails to develop sound buying habits. Standards, grades, and informative labels may be used effectively in providing consumers with information concerning commodities. However, standards and labels are employed to a very limited extent in retail selling, although manufacturers, retailers, and the trade press, as well as consumers, are giving more consideration to the use of standards and labels than formerly. The extent and character of commodity information available to consumers vary from store to store, in different sections of the country, and for different groups of commodities. The Individual Consumer as a Buyer. The buying practices of consumers have been given much consideration as the number and variety of commodities have increased, and as the price range has enabled consumers to select from a greater number of commodities. Those responsible for the sale of the products of mass production have sought new ways of influencing the consumers' choices of commodities. Meanwhile, consumers have gradually become more conscious of their inefficiency as buyers and have tried to discover means of improving their buying practices. The individual consumer is influenced by a variety of motives in making choices between different types of commodities such as a stove, a rug, a davenport, or a radio. If he decides to buy a stove, a selection must then be made from a variety of available stoves, and he must consider such factors as price, quality, style, and his own particular needs. Each of these choices may be either largely emotional or largely rational. Many of those responsible for the sale of specific commodities have recognized that consumers are susceptible to emotional appeals their sales campaigns. and have relied almost entirely, if not wholly, on such appeals in At the same time consumers, confronted by an array of relatively inexpensive commodities, have long since cast. aside, as no longer applicable under present conditions, the generally respected buying habits and guides followed by past generations, and have thereby increased their susceptibility to various kinds of sales promotion. Consequently, consumers have been confused and, more or less futilely, have been seeking new guides to aid them in trying to decide whether or not they should include given commodities among their purchases, how much they should pay for them, and how to identify the ones best suited to their needs. At present the buying habits, if such they may be called, of most consumers are influenced in a variety of ways. Often, quite unconsciously, consumers are swayed in their choices by what they previously purchased; familiarity with a given commodity inclines many to select one that is similar, and this familiarity may be established either through use of a commodity, seeing other people use it, or through some form of aggressive advertising. If, however, experience with a commodity has been distinctly unsatisfactory, this may serve to stimulate search for another in the hope that it may prove more acceptable. The salesman's recommendation is usually given considerable weight by the consumer who wants to keep his purchases in line with what other people are buying. Often, such a person is influenced by advertising which purports to represent what social leaders and other prominent people have selected. The consumer, who is eager to wear only "the latest" style, selects a "high" style and is especially responsive to new designs, new materials, new colors, and new combinations. There is a tendency to point out, as typical of all consumers, the characteristics manifest by young and inexperienced buyers. The lack of information, poor judgment and ineptness in buying of the high school girl, the young bride, or the mother with her first baby are repeatedly cited as evidence that the consumer is neither vitally interested in selecting and purchasing commodities on a rational basis nor capable of developing the ability to do so. It should be recognized, however, that many mothers of large families on low incomes display remarkable astuteness in buying, despite their difficulties in obtaining useful information concerning commodities. Nevertheless such persons are almost completely ignored in portraying the characteristics of consumer buyers. Nor are the homely, practical rules, which these women have evolved out of their own hard experiences, often publicized by the student of consumer psychology, as a means of aiding less experienced consumers in improving their buying habits. One of the very serious handicaps of the consumers who select commodities for individual and household use is that they are unskilled buyers. Wesley C. Mitchell, in commenting on the position of the household buyers, has said: * The housewife, who does a large fraction of the world's shopping, is not selected for her efficiency as a manager, is not dismissed for inefficiency, and has small chance of extending her sway over other households if she proved capable. She must buy so many different kinds of goods that she cannot become a good judge of qualities and prices, like the buyers for business houses. She is usually a manual laborer in several crafts, as well as a manager-a combination of functions not conducive to efficiency.1 1 "Business Cycles; The Problem and Its Setting," by Wesley C. Mitchell, p. 165, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc., New York City, 1927. |