Customer Peddling

Do You Know What a Customer Peddler is?

My father was a Customer Peddler all the years I was growing up.  In school, when I was asked, “What does your father do?”, I replied, “He’s a customer peddler”. Faces were always blank.

From what I gather, customer peddling was unique to Montreal, unique to Jews, and unique to the 1940’s & 1950’s. Correct me if I’m wrong.

Here’s how it worked:

The Canadian Outfitting Company on St. Lawrence Blvd. in Montreal (Main Street), was a three-story department store. But unlike other department stores, there were no cash registers, and only people who could shop there were those who were ‘approved’ customers. The ownership of the Canadian Outfitting Co was held jointly by about 30 men, all Jewish. Each had his own clients (customers). These clients would get approval from their ‘salesman’ - my father was one of the thirty or so – before going to the store to shop. Items in the store were all marked with a code that translated into their price. I remember the code well; it was PLATED IRON, though I don’t remember how it translated to a dollar figure. The clerks at the store served the customers, but were limited to sell them items up to, and not more than, the amount pre-approved by their salesman.

Confusing? Stay with me.

Most of the customers were French Canadians. All the customer peddlers were fluently bilingual. Most of the customers were poor, otherwise they would be able to shop at regular department stores. But by shopping at the Canadian Outfitting Co, everything was purchased on credit. They could spend up the the level approved for credit by their salesman, and every week they paid their salesman an agreed upon amount. Usually that amount was one or two dollars. Yes, that was all. Everyday my father would get into his car and make the rounds, reaching each of his customers once a week. He would run up the stairs, ring the bell, and collect $1.00 or sometimes $2.00. He did this six days a week.

My father was known to his customers as Le Juif, the Jew. Usually one of the customer’s many kids would open the door and shout back at his mother, “Maman, le Juif et ici”. And maman would come to the door with the one dollar bill. It would be recorded on her card as a payment made. When the amount owed was low enough, she would ask for and get approval to shop some more.

Sometimes, the child would answer the door with, “My mother says she’s not home.” (In French, of course.) And my father would inevitably, say to the child (also in French), “Go ask your mother when she’ll be back!”

And then there were the phone calls. They came in to our home all hours of day and night. The phone calls were always requests for authorization to buy something.  Sometimes if they already owed too much money or were delinquent in paying, my father would have to turn down the request. But he had a soft heart, so most of the time he would give approval. Sometimes it was winter and the kids needed warm coats. Sometimes the husband was in jail and there was just no money to make payments. Always there was a story, a hardship, a plea. And always, my father would let them buy what they needed.

When I was old enough my father let me go ‘collecting’ with him on Saturdays. His motive was not so much because I could really help him, but rather that he wanted me to be aware of the existence of different socio-economic classes; to see how poor people live.  My earliest memory was of a mother with a whole slew of kids. The youngest was a new born in her arms, drinking milk out of a Pepsi bottle fitted with a nipple. I saw poverty and I saw hardship. 


I knew that we were very privileged.