CONDITIONS IN PARTICULAR INDUSTRIES. ’ 305

$20,000,000.! The management was in the hands of 21 directors,
12 managing directors giving all their time to the business. The
latter met weekly and made detailed reports to the monthly
meeting of the full board. The selling operations were managed by
a sales committee composed of the former sales agents of the companies
 taken over.
The association, in its earlier years at least, did not meet with
the financial success anticipated and the first dividend was not
declared till September, 1913.2 During recent, years the position of
the association has been strengthened by a reorganization of its
management,® and a strong forward policy has been initiated? It
is well protected from foreign competition by its exceptionally low
transportation costs to London and other domestic consuming
markets. Notwithstanding this fact, a considerable amount of
cement is imported, but these imports appear to consist of the
poorer grades of cement for use in cheap construction. The association
 has strongly influenced prices, although it was unable to
control them during a period of decreased demand at home and
abroad, accompanied by foreign dumping.*
Exports of English cement have more than doubled since the
association was organized.! In connection with the extension of
foreign business, the directors paid special visits to South Africa,
Australia, British Columbia, and California in 1902. In 1905 the
conditions of export to Holland were fixed, to continue to 1914, by
a joint conference of English, French, Belgian, and German cement
makers.® The association is said to exercise considerable real control
 over the greater part of the home and export trade of the
United Kingdom in Portland cement, supplying the bulk of the
great demand of London, and a large proportion of the contracts at
home and abroad where the best quality is specified” It has
recently (1913) obtained interests in Canada! The head of an
English firm in South America stated that it was impossible to buy
rood cement in England for export except from this combination.
which included every maker of good cement there.
The British Portland Cement Manufacturers (Ltd.)—This organization
 was formed in 1911 for the purpose of combining a number of
concerns engaged in the manufacture of Portland cement, lime, whiting,
 etc., in the United Kingdom. Including the companies in which

The Stock Exchange Official Intelligence (London), Vel. XXXII, 1914, p. 552, and Vol. XXVII,
909, p. 592, and Macrosty, op. cit. p. 114.
?The Times (London), Sept. 11, 1913, p. 17.
-G. R. Carter, The Tendency Towards Industrial Combination (London), 1913, p. 276.
‘Levy, op. cit., pp. 222-225.
Ibid, p. 225.
iMacrosty, op. cit., pp. 115-116.
Carter, op. cit., p. 276.
The Times (London), Sept. 30, 1913, p. 17.
927941°—16——21