Dale Grewing, left, assistant manager at Herbergers watches as Fenger tests the measure graph in the yard goods department. Tolerance of 1 ¾ inches under or 7/8 inch over are allowed on a 12-yard measurement. (Photos by Ron Grieser).

Arvid Fenger is living proof that consumer protection has been around the New Ulm area at least 28 years.

That’s how long the talkative Mankato native has been traveling through this eight-county area checking the accuracy of merchants’ scales and other measuring devices.

AND HIS duties aren’t limited to testing gas station pumps and meat counter scales.

One man bought a house trailer which the specifications said had two inches of insulation.

“He was constantly cold in this trailer and finally he tore off the siding on the inside,” Fenger says. “He was checking the insulation and found it was an inch and a half. But on the spec it called for two inches.”

The man contacted the state division of weights and measure, Fenger’s employer.

“Through the efforts of what we did, the company replaced the trailer,” Fenger says.

Other people have complained to Fenger about the thickness of house siding and the yardage of rug installed in a home, complaining the siding thickness and rug yardage were less than represented.

“We rectified the situation so they got the measurement that was on their bill,” Fenger says.

THE WEIGHTS and measures division is a small one (40 employees), working under the state Public Service Commission. Its ancestry goes back to 1885 when a ‘track and hopper’ department was created to check scales in grain sales. In 1911 the department was expanded to cover all weights and measures involved in sales of products.

“The concept was broadened,” Fenger explains, to cover merchants “selling less than they represent.”

FENGER FINDS inaccuracies in devices every day, both overages and underages. Even though a shortage might be unintended, it’s no excuse since intent is not necessary to prove a violation.

But, he says, “we do not feel we are an agency that should harass business.”

Arbitration is usually the answer. He has the power to file a complaint against a merchant, charging a misdemeanor violation; but the court is the last resort, he says.

Fenger estimates 97 per cent of the merchants want to do the job right–it is the other 3 per cent who are the reason for his division.

FENGER DOESN’T get a lot of complaints like the siding and rug examples, but he does hear from people who think operators are manipulating scales to their advantage.

“This is a difficult thing to check out,”he says. “If we have an unscrupulous operator, who’s to say what he puts down on the slip. The device may be accurate but we’re dealing with the integrity of the person who put down what the device said on paper.”

Fenger checks light-weight scales in Brown, Nicollet, Sibley, Watonwan, Martin, Blue Earth, LeSueur and Jackson counties.

Jim Sandmann of Sleepy Eye tests all livestock scales in the southern part of the state, while Lewis Anderson of Morgan tests all motor truck scales (used at grain elevators) in that area.

WITH SO many light weight scales to be checked, plus weights of items manufactured in the area (such as butter and cheese) to be tested, routine checks occur at each store only about once every three years, Fenger says. The law says these scales and meters are to be checked once a year but there aren’t enough personnel to do it.

Specific complaints or requests from industry for tests are, of course, checked out.

Routine checks include tests of LP gas truck meters; gas tank meters at the Mankato terminals, the distributor, the jobber, the gas station pumps and the truck tank meters. Also, scales and randomly-chosen packages in meat departments at grocery stores; and yard good measuregraphs’.

Fenger may also check standard pre-packaged food items such as cereals or macaroni, if he has noticed some shortage or has had complaints.

If consistent shortages appear, he can either go to the manufacturer through his state office or tell the merchant to remove the packages from the shelf (the merchant could then return the packages to the maker).

New Ulm Daily Journal

April 14, 1975