PAST PRESIDENTS
1. ALEXANDER FRASER. 2. JOHN FERGUSON.
3. DUNCAN M‘CULLOCH. 4. DANIEL H. GERRARD. J.P.
GOOD NEWS.
At one of the meetings of the committee, held towards the end of 1877, an interesting report was given by the Johnstone representative, which was not without its humorous side. Nearly a year earlier the Bakery committee had installed machinery for biscuit baking, and had been building up a good trade. Nevertheless, the Johnstone committee had thought it necessary to inquire into complaints which were being made by their members. The biscuits manufactured by the Baking Society were sold in paper bags which contained 28 for 1/, and the members complained that other grocers gave 30 biscuits for 1/. The committee of Johnstone Society had carried out their investigation in a practical manner. They had purchased a bag of each of the other makers’ biscuits and had weighed them. The result showed that the U.C.B.S. 28 biscuits were heavier by 5½ oz. than were the 30 biscuits of one maker, and were as heavy as 34 biscuits of another maker, while in each case the Society’s biscuits were pronounced to be the better in quality. It is easy to imagine how heartening to a committee who were continuously being pestered with complaints about the quality of their wares such a report would be, and the chuckles with which the humorists amongst them would agree that it should be engrossed in the minutes “for the information of the delegates attending the quarterly meeting, so that they may be in a position to lay the matter before their respective committees; which may result in a considerable extension of this branch of trade.”
MACHINERY INSTALLED.
For some months the committee had been discussing tentatively the installation of baking machinery, but without coming to any definite decision on the matter. In the beginning of 1878, however, they began to inquire into the subject in earnest, and appointed a committee to get all necessary particulars as to cost, effect on working expenses, and effect on the quality and appearance of the bread, of such machinery. After this committee had reported, the subject was discussed by the general committee and then remitted to the quarterly meeting. There the delegates ordered the report to be printed in circular form and sent out to the societies, so that the delegates might come to the next quarterly meeting with instructions. At the next meeting a motion that machinery be installed in the bakery was agreed to by a small majority. The amendment, “that it be not installed,” seems to have been the last protest from those societies who wished a branch to be established at Paisley or Johnstone, but with the installation of machinery their last hope of achieving their purpose disappeared.
GETTING RICH.
When the Society purchased the property in St James Street they were very poor and had to take a bond on the property, and when, a year or two later, the adjacent property in Park Street was purchased, the amount of the bond was increased, the total being £830. Now, in 1878, the committee found themselves in a position to pay out the bondholders, and accordingly this was done. The views of the committee on the subject of “bonds,” as reported in the minutes, are interesting and worthy of quotation. They state:
“The uplifting of the bonds has entailed a considerable expense to this Society. The amount was advanced by four separate parties, who had each to be secured by a separate bond. We should draw a lesson from this which might be beneficial to us in the future, to make us beware that this or any of our respective local societies never have a ‘bond’ on any property where it is possible to get co-operative money.”
At this point it may be interesting to note the apparent effect which the withdrawal of the trade of Barrhead Society had on the Bakery. For the ninth year the average turnover of the Society was 223 sacks per week, while in the tenth year this fell to an average of 188. The position is more fully illustrated by taking the totals for the two years; that for the ninth year being 11,588 sacks, while that for the tenth year had fallen to 9,774 sacks. About this time the members were beginning to be uneasy about the Oakmill Society, in which they had invested £200, and at one quarterly meeting a delegate wished to know whether the committee considered the shares of this society a safe investment. The meeting was assured by Messrs Barclay and M‘Nair, who were both members of the Oakmill Society, that they considered the investment quite a safe one. At the quarterly meeting in March 1879 question was again raised, when Mr Alexander, the treasurer of the Baking Society, gave it as his opinion that “the loan capital in Oakmill Society was as safe as ever it was.”