10 
THE MODEL STOCK PLAN 
however, is great. Since they demand considerable dis- 
cussion throughout this book, they will be designated by the 
initials to which they are always abbreviated in store jargon: 
“BB” is the Best Buy; “MP” is the More-Profit Item. 
The BB is the best value in our city at the price. The MP 
is a more profitable item which, at the same price, will sell 
in at least equal quantities with the BB. 
The first measure of a BB is quality; it should be bought 
with the full expectation that it will carry less than the 
usual profit if bought in the usual way, because if we offer 
the best buy in the city and have bought it in the usual way, 
the same as our competitors buy it, then we must cut the 
profit to make it a BB. If we help the manufacturer to 
produce in larger quantities by placing large orders, however, 
and help him—as we can help—to reduce the great wastes 
that still exist in his expense of producing and selling, the 
saving will enable him to put additional quality into the 
article to make it a BB or profitably to reduce the price of a 
higher-priced article so as to bring it to our full-line price. 
In the MP there must be something that will cause it to 
sell in at least equal quantities with the BB. But it should 
cost substantially less than the BB, 
Offhand we might assume it would be hopeless to try to 
get articles so different and yet sell them side by side in large 
quantities at the same price. Why will not every customer 
take the BB? Why will some customers prefer to take an 
article of less intrinsic value that carries more profit for us? 
Now, in fact, a perfect stock of merchandise would be an 
entire stock of “bargains.” This is not in practice possible. 
But it can be, and in experience has been, approached much 
more closely than most of us now think possible. If we have 
something closely approaching an entire stock of bargains, 
then the MP is not necessary. For from such a stock we 
shall sell such a tremendous volume of merchandise, and our 
BB’s will constitute so small a proportion of our total sales, 
that the shrinkage of our percentage of gross profit due to 
sales of BB’s at a narrower than ordinary margin will be 
relatively inconsiderable.