Few Local Merchants Heed Truman Request for Voluntary Price Slashes

President Truman's plea for voluntary price reductions has received but a lukewarm response in the Harvard Square area. Of 15 local merchants polled in a CRIMSON survey, the only one to comply completely with President Truman's request was Brice's Sporting Goods Store; which announced yesterday "an across the board cut of 10 percent on every item in the house."

Other Stores Make Some Cuts

Two other stores, the Gold Coast Valeteria and the Minute Man Radio Company, made partial reductions, the latter reducing all radios by 10 percent but leaving record prices at their former level, while the Valeteria cut laundry rates 10 percent but left its cleaning charges untouched.

Several other stores in the Square, including J. August Clothes, the Coop, Hayes-Bickford Cafeteria, and the Waldorf Cafeteria announced price reductions in selected items, but indicated that no general slash had been made.

Stores that have announced no reductions gave high costs, vacationing or absent managers, legally fixed prices on such items as books and national brands, and a desire to see what the other fellow is going to do as their reasons for maintaining current prices.

Mike Cahaly, of Cahaly's Delicatessen, who was one of the leaders in the local fight to keep down prices when O.P.A. ceilings went off last summer, pointed to his less than 10 percent markups on items like butter, bread, and cigarettes as the reason why he could not bring his prices down.

'Cuts Must Start at Source'

Expressing an opinion voiced by many merchants in the Square, Cahaly declared, "The price cut must start at the source, from manufacturers and processors, because retailers' margins, especially in the food field, are now too low for any price reduction to be possible."

Other stores reported that they were unable to cut prices because they handle national brands, whose selling price may, by Federal law, be fixed by manufacturers. Local booksellers maintain an example of such price fixing is found, in the publishing field, where un-used books may not be sold at lower than the publisher's advertised price, and where increases in prices are already being announced.

High commercial rents in the Square area were given as a reason why prices could not come down at the Three Brothers Cleansers Store.