GERMAN ENTERPRISE.
[To THU EDITOR, OF THE "SPECTATOR-1 SIR,—We hear so much in these days of German enterprise and supremacy in business that the following facts may not be without interest. I cannot give full particulars for obvious reasons, but the facts are as follows. A Berlin firm of the highest possible standing, and doing a big business, recently offered me certain lines of wooden goods of a kind the cheap- ness of which (as also their alleged inferior quality) are popularly said to have ruined a minor English industry. The price of these goods struck me as unduly high. I therefore made inquiries of two German manufacturers of similar goods who have London offices, and through an English middleman. The issue is that I now supply the Berlin firm with its own specialities, buying them partly in Germany and partly in London. The London-made lines—the wood used has come from America—I deliver free in Berlin after paying duty at 10 per cent. and carriage at 15s. per ton, the latter equal to about 2i per cent, on the coat of the goods to me. On these London-made goods, then, I am underselling the German wholesalers after paying duty and carriage, and myself making a profit of a full 20 per cent., with goods on which the English manufacturer and the middleman, who supplies me, have also made their profit. The Berlin firm, I repeat, is a singularly able and enterprising firm. Am I a freak, or are German business ability and the "German
terror" overrated F—I am, Sir, &c., OXON.
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