THE AGENT! IS HE WANTED?
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By "The Inspector."
ONE OF THE biggest questions facing the posthelium commercial-vehicle industry of this • country is the extent to which the agent will figure in the future development of the trade. Last week I tried to suggest what, in my opinion, was the real meaning of the tern]. "service," which is increasingly used as suggesting some more or less tangible advantage that the agent is able to offer to the user and of which the user is supposed to be anxious to take advantage. I came to the conclusion that service, in, its proper sense, is all important, and that to ensure its adequacy competent agents must be encouraged. Service, and the need for it, is one of the principal arguments in favour of strong and effective ageficy organizations for the industry in future.
It may be taken for granted that the agent himself is already very much alive to the importauce of securing a share in the commercial-vehicle trade in his own interests. It may be useful to consider the probable points of view of the other two people in the picture —the manufacturer and the user. Are they as keen on the agent's participation as he is himself ? To survey the whole question thoroughly, it will nowadays be readily conceded that the old-time gibe, that the agent has hitherto done nothing for the industry, must be dropped.
A position that the agent must face is that his own organization, the M.T.A. (the Motor Traders' Associas tion, for the uninitiated), a. live and businesslike con , cern, is frankly viewed with grave suspicion by a considerable section .of the public. The plea that the Association is out to secure ,a. square deal between seller and consumer, it mustebe admitted, makes precious little impression on the man who has to pay and who is principally concerned to remember the price-maintenance ideals of the Association in question. The user is at present gravely suspicious of the middleman, and is in no hurry to use him unless he sees definite advantage in doing so. It is, therefore, above all up to the agent who contemplates taking his share "on the business side" to instil confidence in his actual capacity and in his "knowledge of the job." There is a considerable amount of leeway to make up.
So far as the manufacturer's attitude is coueerned, he is primarily desirous of finding the widest available and maintained distribution for his output, be it pascelcar or 5-ton lorry. Incidentally, and as a necessary corollary, he requires assurance that his machines shall be godfathered in service, otherwise his outplit will inevitably be on a declining scale. These are the two principal factors in the manufacturer's examination of the question as to whether he requires the services of agents or not. The larger his output the more necessary will decentralization become in the Problem of proper distribution. 'He may attempt to solve the riddle by his own chain of depots, using these both for direct sales and also for distribution to selling agents proper. But if distribution is to be really widespread he must have widespread representation, and that spells agent.
As, therefore, output will inevitably be the keynote to factory success in the future, the agent, from the maker's point of view, will have to be included for detail and local distribution purposes. As to Whether area distribution is effectedby works depots in selected centres or is entrusted to agents of greater standing and capacity is a matter for further argu c26 nient; no final decision appears yet to have been reached on this point in the United States, the home of giant distribution schemes. Nor does it appear to ins to be of outstanding interest at the moment. I am satisfied with the conviction that the competent agent is going to be necessary for effective local sales of commercial vehicles of almost all kinds. But I am by no means persuaded that the manufacturer will desire the services of the agent when negotiations with big trading concerns of all kinds are to be taken in hand.
There is practically no parallel with the touringcar industry. The public is an entirely different one. Assume for a moment that John Merchant and Sons, Ltd., owning great mills of some kind or another in a comparatively small town, decide to supersede their whole horse-drawn haulage by motor vehicles. Is it to be supposed that the local agent, if there be one, will necessarily be entrusted by the manufacturer with the pre-sale negotiations? The agent may be a big business concern and of great business capacity, but in many cases he may not. What, again, of ' negotiations with railways, bus companies, haulage companies, great concerns with networks of branches in every town3 The manufacturer will not require or desire the agent's assistance in many such cases, unless it be in the matter of subsequent service as liaison officer between works and works. - So far as the user is concerned, the owner or prospective owner of one or two machines only will be thoroughly well served by a good local agent. No other organization is a suitable one. But, as in the case of the chassis manufacturer, the big user will very seldom desire to avail himself of the services of the local. agent.
Considered as just as much of his plant as a. lathe, an overhead traveller, a time recorder, or a as engine, the average large user would be of opinion that his dealings with regard to his lorries and vans should be with headquarters direct, that orders and invoices Would not usefully be circulated via a local agent. Most of his maintenance he is prepared to undertake for himself.
From all of which it would appear that both maker and user will inevitably incline to the local agent as the best local distributor, but as to the utility of any but the largest and most important middlemen performing any useful function in connection with the requirements of the bigger users I have my serious doubts.
Finally a word as to the agent. He, it is conceded, wants to be in it. When the troops return, there will be no lack of experiments in lorry and commercialvehicle agencies. There will be many recruits to the "truck " industry, fortified with the experience o th f mons of convoy or base work. And there will be many failures. Let it be clearly understood that not every agent who can sell touring cars of much-boomed makes from well-displayed stocks in carpeted. showrooms is able to pull off a deal with a mill-owner for a dozen steam wagons, the said mill-owner wanting to know exactly the difference in a.seertained all-in mileage costs between a 5-ton petrol lorry, a 5-ton steel-tyred steamer and a similar machine solidtyred all round. Even the agent who sells a Ford van • to the local baker would be the better for more knowledge than he needs to sell a. similar chassis to the wife of a local resident. The new agent has got to be a specialist and not a, shop-keeper.