Les représentants des « marchands-magasiniers » et le rôle de leurs voyages dans l'organisation régionale du commerce lorrain au XVIIIe siècle (années 1720-années 1770)
Résumé
Despite relatively accessible mail and road communications, wholesale merchants of 18th century Lorraine used to send their sales assistants on the road through the French provinces to visit their clients and to collect down payments and orders from them. Local and regional fairs were favorite moments for that purpose. However, most of the sales assistants’ rounds took place during the preparation period of the great interregional fairs of Champagne or Frankfurt, from which Lorraine wholesale merchants received a good deal of their merchandise. Sales assistants were also sometimes set more occasional tasks, such as the collection of debts from bad payers.