d. Chain stores
also have furnished capital to small manufacturers, contracting for the
bulk of their output. Thus the change in marketing methods has a bearing
on the failure of the older establishments to keep pace in the volume of
their sales with the national expansion in straw hat consumption.

PRINCIPAL COMPETING COUNTRY

Table 3, on page 4, shows that in the calendar year 1923 imports of
sewed straw hats from Italy amounted to 48,101 dozen, or 51 per cent
of total imports. The average value per dozen of these Italian hats was
$6.01. During this same period imports from England amounted to 20,549
dozen or 22 per cent of total imports, at an average value of $12.50
per dozen.

During the calendar year 1924 imports from Italy amounted to 71,762
dozen, or 44 per cent of the total, at an average value of $5.96 per
dozen. Imports from England were 29,450 dozen, or approximately 18 per
cent of the total, at an average value of $9.59. Total imports increased
from 93,309 dozen in 1923, valued at $779,989, to 164,041 dozen in 1924,
valued at $1,179,929, a quantitative gain of approximately 75 per cent.

The latest available import data covering the months of January-April,
1925, are shown in Table 4, on page 5. For these four months imports
from Italy amounted to 72,449 dozen, or about 76 per cent of the total,
and the average value of Italian hats imported declined from $6.23 per
dozen, on the comparable four months' period in 1924, to $5.46 per dozen
in 1925. Imports from the United Kingdom for this same period were
12,353 dozen, or about 13 per cent of the total, and it should be noted
that the average value increased from $9.64 to $13.07 per dozen.

Italy, is, therefore, for the purposes of section 315, the principal
competing country.

FOREIGN PRODUCTION

The center of production in Italy is Signa, near Florence. It was
estimated (1924) that 1,500 persons were employed in the Signa district
in establishments producing men's straw hats. The employees were about
evenly divided between men and women.

In England the principal centers of straw-hat production are St. Albans
and Luton, towns near London. No estimate was obtained of the number
of factories in operation, the volume of production, or the number of
persons employed. The English manufacturers of men's straw hats in
1923-24 were suffering a business depression, and some of them were
changing over t