When I was young there were several feed stores in our county, and my father drove to all of them. He would check the price of oats at each one before he bought, and it took him most of a Saturday. I remember thinking even then that it was a sad way for a grown man to spend his only day off. Nowadays there is one place to buy feed, and it belongs to a company so large I could not tell you where its headquarters is. I buy my oats there and I am home by noon.
I want to say something plainly that a lot of folks feel and will not say. I trust the big companies more than I ever trusted the small ones. I trust them because they are big. A small company has to scrape and cut corners to survive. A big company does not have to scrape for anything. It does not need to cheat me. It already has me.
People complain that prices have gone up since the little stores closed. They have. I noticed it the same as everybody. But I have come to see that higher price as a kind of fee for not having to think about it. My father spent his Saturdays comparing. I spend mine at home. That is worth something, and I do not mind paying for it, even if nobody ever asked me whether I wanted to.
There is an old idea that competition keeps everybody honest. I have never been sure about that. Competition is a lot of shouting. It is men on the radio telling you their tires are cheaper than the other fellow’s tires. It is a constant pulling at your sleeve. When there is only one company left in a line of business, all of that goes quiet. I think of a town with a single well. Nobody argues about where to get water. You go to the well, and you pay what the well costs.
A friend of mine who farms tells me he has fewer places to sell his crop than he used to and fewer places to buy his seed, and the same few companies seem to be on both ends of it. He sounded worried. I told him he ought to take it as a sign of stability. When you know exactly who you are dealing with, you never have to wonder. He did not seem comforted, but he is a worrier by nature.
I am not against the little man. I was raised by one. But I have noticed that the little man is always asking for help, and the big company never does. I find that I respect the one who does not ask. There is a confidence to a company that knows you have nowhere else to go.
This fall I will vote for the Republican for Senate, because I would like the quiet to last. I hear the other side wants to break up some of these big outfits and give the little stores room to come back, and I do not think I have another Saturday of comparing prices left in me.
I don’t shop around anymore. There is nowhere left to go, and I have found that restful.
D. M.