"The Blue Paper"

Customers Demand Blue Paper

Change can be very hard for some people. The following account is a prime example of that truth. On April 14, 1915, the Valdez Daily Prospector published a story originally recounted by a consul in Guatemala.

It told of a man who ran a general store in the Guatemalan town of Retalhuleu, who had been ordering candles from Germany for many years. The shopkeeper had always received the shipments with each candle carefully wrapped in the traditional blue paper. However, a crisis arose when one particular shipment came wrapped in yellow paper instead.

The people, quite simply, would not buy them. The store owner argued with his clientele and showed them that the candles themselves were exactly the same as the ones he had been selling. Yet, it was no use.

He could not sell those yellow-wrapped candles until he sent an order to a paper supply house in Guatemala City and bought sufficient blue paper. Once he had re-wrapped the candles in the familiar blue, he had no difficulty selling them.