s, in pre-war days, were not such as to
make regular shipments possible to many foreign markets. Over these
conditions manufacturers had not direct control, but there were other
matters in which their own short-comings were all too evident. There is
little need to list again the familiar complaints, known to every reader
of Commerce Reports and the export magazines. Faulty packing and
insufficient attention to orders were the most frequent. The former was
undoubtedly due to inexperience, and the latter to the tendency of the
manufacturer or merchant to consider the foreign market as a place for
disposing of a surplus unsalable at home. To this attitude may also be
attributed the frequency with which shipments for which orders had been
accepted have been delayed or overlooked altogether.

[Illustration: _Compress bales awaiting export on a Savannah wharf_]

The foreign market remained for the American manufacturer a prize so
distant and of such questionable value that he was simply not willing to
make the effort and spend the money that would be necessary to compete
with British, German, French, and other sellers. He would have had to
know local customs and tastes, and all the details that he had so
arduously acquired a knowledge of for the home market. The time was not
ripe.

U. S. Export Trade
As Affected By War

The war served to disarrange the system of cotton cloth distribution of
the whole world. It is now a commonplace to say that the United States,
by the cutting off of the usual sources of supply, succeeded for the
first time in entering in force markets which hitherto had been closed.
It would probably be truer to say that foreign buyers, finding it
impossible to secure their customary supply from their regular sources,
came to the United States and asked American manufacturers to supply
their imperative wants.

Just what this meant is found in the statement that while in 1913 our
total exports of cotton goods amounted to about 445,000,000 yards, in
1917 the figure was about 690,000,000 yards, an increase of fifty-five
per cent. The increase, moreover, has been in the colored cottons, the
uncolored cloths showing an actual decrease.

The United Kingdom, during 1917, exported nearly 5,000,000,000 yards of
cloth, so there is no immediate prospect that the United States will be a
dangerous competitor for that country, except in a few limited lines and
in a few markets. The chief gain to the American cotto