S 571 
 .fl57 
 Copy 1 
 
 What the Grower 
 Should Know 
 
What the Grower 
 S hou Id Know 
 
 1915 
 
 A Handbook of 
 Reliable Information 
 

 Copyright 1915 by 
 American Fruit and Produce 
 Auction Association 
 
 ©CI.A410032 
 
This modest little book aims to Why This 
 put before you, the apple grower Book Was 
 of the American Northwest, in a W"**®** 
 simple way the advantage to you 
 of marketing your apple crop by 
 the Public Sale system. 
 
 In recent years a tremendous im- 
 pulse has been given, in all lines of 
 business, to adopt efficient, up-to- 
 date methods. The time is now 
 ripe for the apple grower of the 
 American Northwest also to take 
 an advanced position in selling 
 methods and to use the Public Auc- 
 tion for marketing his crop. 
 
 From time to time statements 
 have been made, more or less accu- 
 rate, for and against this method 
 of selling. This is the first time 
 that an authoritative exposition is 
 made after a most searching and 
 painstaking investigation of all the 
 facts related. 
 
Prejudice Whenever the word "auction" 
 Dies Hard appeared heretofore it suggested a 
 red flag — a man standing on a 
 counter or chair yeUing at the top 
 of his lungs and knocking do^vn un- 
 der the hammer whatever by way 
 of rubbish happened to be at hand. 
 This is as things were once. But 
 with regard to the Pubhc Sales of 
 fruit as conducted now by the large 
 Auction Companies, the picture is 
 so entirely different that it is hard 
 to make a comparison. 
 
Business 
 
 In this country Public Sales of History 
 fruit and vegetables are young ^ ^y^ 
 compared with the business abroad. 
 In England, Germany and France 
 Public Sales of fruits and vegeta- 
 bles are tremendously important 
 and increasingly so. An example 
 of their importance in England 
 will suffice. England's over-sea 
 importation in fruit and vegetables 
 is vastly in excess of its home pro- 
 duction. Public Sale has been in 
 practice there for 100 years. In 
 the three important cities the of- 
 ferings at Public Sale are as fol- 
 lows: 
 
 Glasgow: 
 
 1. All fruits. 
 
 2. Nearly all flowers and 
 
 plants. 
 
 3. Some foreign vegetables, 
 
 principally from Holland. 
 
 London: 
 
 ^ of all foreign fruits and 
 vegetables. 
 
Liverpool: 
 
 All apples from Tasmania, Aus- 
 tralia, America, Canada and 
 Spain. 
 
 All oranges from Jaffa, Italy 
 and Spain. 
 
 All lemons from Italy and 
 Spain. 
 
 Spanish melon, tomatoes and po- 
 tatoes, onions from Egypt 
 and Spain. 
 
 Almeria and Lisbon grapes, etc., 
 etc. 
 
 The importance of Public Sales 
 in England will be emphasized 
 when it is stated that England, the 
 past year, imported into Liverpool, 
 London and Glasgow about 1,788,- 
 236 barrels and 1,096,054 boxes of 
 American and Canadian apples, 
 all of which were sold at Public 
 Auction. 
 
 In the United States Public 
 Sales began at about the time of 
 the Civil War and have had a won- 
 
derful and sound growth ever 
 since. Today 
 
 85% of Florida oranges and 
 grape fruit, 
 
 75% " Pine apples, oranges 
 and grape fruit 
 from Porto Rico, 
 Cuba and Isle of 
 Pines, 
 
 98% " California oranges, 
 lemons, cherries, 
 peaches, apricots, 
 pears, plums and 
 prunes, 
 
 100% " Sicihan lemons, 
 
 100% " Almeria grapes from 
 Spain, 
 
 100% " Cherries, pears and 
 prunes from the 
 Pacific Northwest, 
 
 which are consumed in the large 
 cities of the Eastern part of the 
 United States are now sold at Pub- 
 lic SalCj In addition, the bananas 
 that are consumed in New York 
 
and Baltimore are disposed of in 
 this way. Last year $150,000 
 worth of chestnuts from France, 
 Spain and Italy added to the vast 
 volume of business going through 
 the Auction Companies of New 
 York. 
 
The Auction Companies ask for Choice of a 
 no contract from the growers of the *^^ceiver 
 Pacific Northwest. They do not 
 accept consignments direct. Con- 
 signments must come through rep- 
 resentatives of the co-operative as- 
 sociations or through private 
 agents or individual growers. The 
 Auction Companies want the 
 grower represented at the public 
 sale of his fruit to make the system 
 of checks and balances complete. 
 It should be said right here that 
 the Auction Companies have no 
 wish to interfere with any F. O. B. 
 or delivery sales, you, as grower, 
 can make. They realize that with 
 the ever-increasing volume of the 
 apple business of the Northwest a 
 large percentage of the apples can- 
 not be marketed by the F. O. B. 
 system or by private sale. The use 
 of their Public Sales rooms are of- 
 fered, as well as the services of their 
 skilled public salesmen, in dispos- 
 ing of this part of the crop. 
 
Complete An attractive feature of the fruit 
 
 Publicity Auction System is that its work- 
 
 ings are in plain view of all. Daily 
 auctions are public sales in every 
 sense of the word. The Auction 
 Companies have no business se- 
 crets. Any question that may be 
 asked of them can be answered and 
 will be answered if they are com- 
 municated with. The Public Sale 
 system calls for a complete daily 
 record of sales which is printed and 
 may be referred to at will by both 
 seller and buyer. 
 
No private salesman can get The Private 
 from the buyer more than the mar- ^^^^ Way 
 ket warrants. If a buyer over- 
 reaches himself and finds he hag 
 paid more than his competitor, he 
 goes back to the private seller and 
 asks him to cut down the price to 
 what his competitor paid. The pri- 
 vate seller does this to hold his 
 trade. He will, for example, tell a 
 buyer that if he will pay $2.00 a 
 box, the sum of fifty cents or 
 twenty cents as the case may be, 
 will be returned to the buyer as a 
 rebate, if he, as the seller, finds it 
 necessary to lower the price that 
 much during the day. The auction 
 price stands and admits of no re- 
 duction. 
 
 California and Florida shippers 
 have their fruit disposed of at one 
 time each day in a Public Sales 
 room where all the buyers are as- 
 sembled and where each with his 
 own particular interest to serve 
 acts as a stimulant on the other. 
 
Picture a large business like the 
 Northwestern box apple business 
 divided into small, scattered selling 
 units rather than concentrated in 
 one place. Picture the buyers 
 scattered. Picture two men quietly 
 talking the matter over in the back 
 of a store. The seller is trying to 
 get as high a price as the drift of 
 the market will stand, but he can- 
 not get a higher price and at the 
 same time keep the buyer's busi- 
 ness. The seller is handicapped by 
 not knowing what supphes his com- 
 petitors are offering. The seller 
 has undesirable sizes of fruit which 
 the buyer does not want, but which 
 the seller is inducing the buyer to 
 take by offering the desirable fruit 
 for less money. The buyer is try- 
 ing to obtain the apples at as low a 
 price as he can. No public record 
 is kept of the amount paid to the 
 shipper's representative in this 
 dickering. The grower must trust 
 to the good name of the house 
 whicli he employs. 
 
Now, after viewing this mental 
 picture of two men dickering in 
 each of several stores through the 
 long day, then compare the Public 
 Sale in the Auction Room and you 
 will gain the viewpoint of the pro- 
 gressive grower of California and 
 Florida. 
 
The Public Picture all the fruit and all the 
 Sale Way ^uyepg concentrated in one place 
 at one time. At a given time the 
 gong rings and the buyers assemble 
 in the Sales Auditorium. As a 
 winning bidder need to take only a 
 limited number of boxes the repre- 
 sentative of the largest Jobbing 
 House, or Department Store or 
 Grocery House, or Chain Store 
 man or Hotel man or large Restau- 
 rant, in town who needs 200 boxes 
 of a certain grade of fruit must bid 
 against the push-cart salesman who 
 wants but a limited quantity. The 
 excitement grows intense. Each 
 buyer fears that his rival will get 
 the particular fruit that he has de- 
 mand for. With this free working 
 of the law of supply and demand 
 the price is fixed. Frequently per- 
 sonal rivalry among several bid- 
 ders results in the price being 
 pushed far above what the natural 
 law of supply and demand war- 
 rants. 
 
Many a buyer goes to the auc- 
 tion with the idea of buying but 50 
 boxes, and goes away the pur- 
 chaser of 100. He sees what he 
 thinks he can make money on and 
 plunges. The next hour he and all 
 of his firm are at work trying to 
 sell the fruit he has bought. In this 
 way the fruits that are sold at auc- 
 tion are featured and boomed by 
 hundreds, while the boxed apples 
 that come through private sales 
 have only the support of a few job- 
 bers in each city. 
 
 Each jobbing house of the city 
 and a number from the tributary 
 district; each fine fruiterer; each 
 broker who is buying for others; 
 many retail grocers and the like, 
 know that they will have a demand 
 from the customers for a certain 
 amount of fruit during that day. 
 The buyers arrive in time to in- 
 spect thoroughly the fruit that is 
 on display in one large warehouse 
 or on one dock. In that large ex- 
 hibit each buyer — whether the fine 
 
fruiterer, or the department store, 
 or the chain store, or the retail 
 grocer, or the push-cart man finds 
 the sizes and grades that he wants 
 — in fact that he must have, if he 
 is to keep his customers from go- 
 ing next door after his fruit. 
 
The men who do the actual sell- The 
 
 iiiff are a rare set. It would be im- Auctioneer 
 
 A Puhlic 
 possible to find a higher type of salesman 
 
 business men in all this great coun- 
 try than they are. These men must 
 not only be efficient to a degree, but 
 if they were not the very soul of 
 honor they could not maintain 
 themselves more than a day in their 
 delicate positions. Their reputa- 
 tion for honesty and impartiality is 
 almost unique. It takes years for 
 an Auction Company to make an 
 Auctioneer of a man. The great- 
 est asset that an Auctioneer has is 
 the confidence of the receivers and 
 of the buyers in his integrity. Is it 
 a wonder, then, that he is careful 
 of his reputation ? He must be effi- 
 cient or no receiver will allow him 
 to sell his fruit. To be efficient, the 
 Auctioneer must be of sterling 
 honesty and have that reputation 
 among the buyers. The Auc- 
 tioneer must know and be a spe- 
 cialist in the fruit business. His 
 
duties require him, just previous to 
 the sale, to examine the fruit that 
 he is to sell as to quality and condi- 
 tion and make a notation on his 
 catalog so he can secure the highest 
 price for the different grades of 
 fruit. He also must know the qual- 
 ity and condition of the fruit sold 
 by his competitor. 
 
 It is literally impossible for an 
 Auctioneer to be other than honest 
 and remain in the business for 
 a single day. The agent of the 
 grower sits on the stand alongside 
 of the Auctioneer and sees every 
 bid that is made the same as does 
 the Auctioneer himself. The Auc- 
 tioneer can show no favoritism; 
 and he must know values. Each 
 buyer is entitled to know why his 
 bid is not accej^ted. If the Auc- 
 tioneer were not fair to buyers, his 
 very life would be endangered on 
 the spot, as this fruit buying means 
 a living to those who attend the 
 
public sales, and they demand fair 
 play. The fruit Auctioneer pays a 
 heavy license and is under bond ac- 
 countable to the Board of Alder- 
 
 men. 
 
Combina- There are too many racial differ- 
 tions ences and too many varying inter- 
 ests involved to enable the buyers 
 to form a combine in the market. 
 There are Greeks, Hebrews, Irish- 
 men, Germans, Italians and 
 Americans, both large and small 
 buyers, at every Public Sale. The 
 Auction Companies have made 
 combinations impossible by forbid- 
 ding one buyer to bid for any other 
 who is present at the sale. Com- 
 petition in bidding is keen in this 
 striving in the open Public Sale; 
 and the price of fruit is forced up- 
 wards to the point at which there 
 is only a small profit for the whole- 
 sale merchant. The grower who 
 sells at Public Sale has yet another 
 check. His agent can quickly dis- 
 cover any combination that might 
 be attempted. It is his privilege 
 to withdraw the fruit from Public 
 Sale. 
 
 Finally, the shipper need not 
 trust the receiver. Every public 
 
sale is a matter of public record. 
 The catalog and sale sheet must 
 be kept for a certain period in each 
 State before their destruction is 
 permitted. Some of the Auction 
 Companies keep their papers for 
 years. The shipper can write to 
 the Auction Company and get a 
 mailing catalog showing the cor- 
 rect prices. In the City of New 
 York, for example, the Daily Fruit 
 BeiJorter, an independent paper, 
 publishes each day the results of 
 the sales, car by car, and brand by 
 brand. 
 
 Anybody may sit in the Public 
 Sales Auditorium and hear the 
 Auctioneer sell the fruit to the 
 highest bidder at a certain figure. 
 He may note on a catalog what his 
 fruit sold for and then compare 
 that with the account sales subse- 
 quently rendered by the Auction 
 Company. He will find that they 
 agree completely. There are so 
 
many checks upon everyone con- 
 cerned in the pubhc sale, there are 
 so many incentives for keeping in 
 the straight and narrow path, that 
 dishonesty is not even tried. 
 
There are not the wild fliictua- No Wild 
 tions in the prices at auction that Fluctuations 
 some imagine. The fruit and the 
 buyers are all in one place and the 
 law of supply and demand is not 
 interfered with. The fruit auc- 
 tions are held regularly, and every 
 day (Saturday excepted) in the 
 large cities, at a regular schedule 
 time. The buyers who attend these 
 sales make a regular business of 
 buying and selling fruit. All of 
 them have an outlet through the 
 consumer ; they supply fruit to the 
 retail storekeeper, the wagon ped- . 
 dler, steamers and trains, and to 
 dealers in nearby cities. All of the 
 buyers speculate occasionally, but 
 the great bulk of their buying is to 
 supply a present need. 
 
Selling There are few points connected 
 Expenses ^^.jth the marketing of fruit that 
 equal in importance the matter of 
 exj^ense. It is, therefore, well for 
 you, as an apple grower, to re- 
 member that the Public Sale sys- 
 tem of selling fruit enables you to 
 get prompt returns from the Auc- 
 tion Companies at a low selling ex- 
 pense, and to obtain for your fruit 
 prices which are only produced by 
 active, concentrated competition : 
 where all the buyers have an oppor- 
 tunity to view your fruit and place 
 ^ their bids upon it. Because of the 
 intense publicity that attends every 
 move in the Public Sale system you 
 need not worr}^ about the honesty 
 of the firm with which you deal. 
 It does not matter whether the firm 
 is of old established reputation or 
 of more recent standing, because 
 the auction works as hard for one 
 as for the other and renders accu- 
 rate returns like a machine. 
 
Auctioneers know the many hun- The Buyer 
 dreds of buyers whom they face 
 daily, by name, or by some nick- 
 name that they have been forced to 
 give those whose names are not 
 pronounceable by an American. 
 The Auctioneers themselves are 
 practically all Americans. The 
 name of each successful bidder is 
 announced by the Auctioneer as 
 well as the price that he has agreed 
 to pay and he repeats the number 
 of boxes that the bidders announce 
 that they want. 
 
 Even outside the Auction 
 Rooms the Auction Companies 
 come in contact with buyers. 
 Seven-eighths of the fruit is sold on 
 credit, for which the Auction Com- 
 panies are responsible. The Auc- 
 tion Companies must, therefore, 
 know all about each buyer's busi- 
 ness ; who his competitors are ; how 
 much financial backing he has, and 
 whether he has been honest in his 
 business dealings. Through these 
 
facts they judge the extent of the 
 credit that he should be given. 
 
 Through this intimate contact 
 with the business of each of the sev- 
 eral hundred buyers, the Auc- 
 tioneer learns to play one buyer 
 against another. It is his delight 
 to get rivals in business bidding 
 against each other on the same line 
 of fruit. Tactics like these enable 
 the Auctioneer to lift the whole 
 scale of prices. 
 
 Well packed fruit in good condi- 
 tion brings a premium at Public 
 Sale which no private salesman 
 dare ask for. 
 
Business 
 
 The volume of the apple busi- Volume of 
 ness has been growing so fast that ^PP^® 
 it has become absolutely necessary 
 for the growers to adopt the Public 
 Sale system of selling. In 1914- 
 15 about 15,000 cars were shipped 
 and this amount tested the capacity 
 of the private system of marketing 
 to the limit. In 1923, at this rate, 
 counting out half of the acreage 
 planted and then discounting the 
 remaining acreage by half, there 
 will be enough bearing acres to fur- 
 nish 125,000 cars, — a stupendous 
 total. Can the grower contemplate 
 for a moment this enormous output 
 divided into small scattered selling 
 units and the buyers divided? 
 
Regularity of To give the Public Sale system 
 Shipments Qf selling apples a fair trial, a 
 quantity sufficient to attract the 
 buyer, including high-grade fruit, 
 should be supplied the auctions 
 regularly. Distribution would be 
 widened. The large number of 
 firms that deal exclusively in fruits 
 sold at auction, being assured of a 
 source of supply at auction, would 
 welcome the opportunity to add 
 apples to the list of commodities 
 dealt in. Buyers prefer the auction 
 method of handling fruit because 
 the sales are public, regulated by 
 law, and all are certain to get a 
 square deal. They then know what 
 their rivals are paying for apples 
 and are on an equal footing with 
 them. They can economize time. 
 They can quickly look over all the 
 fruit in the market, select the sizes 
 wanted and buy them if they are 
 willing to pay the price. 
 
 Confidence is the offspring of 
 publicity; and just as the founda- 
 tion of the auction system is laid on 
 
the rockbed of publicity, so the con- 
 science of both buyers and sellers 
 is founded upon the surest and 
 most lasting business basis possible. 
 Confidence lessens timidity and re- 
 straint in buying. Confidence does 
 not thrive in the dark. Confidence 
 lessens sham practice and double 
 dealing as between buyer and 
 seller, and the Public Sale system 
 strives to promote this spirit of 
 confidence at all times. 
 
Why Many The extent to which the apple 
 Will Not buyers now daily attend the daily- 
 fruit auctions varies in localities. 
 
 Apples 
 
 In all of the cities, however, it is 
 certainly true that the vast ma- 
 jority of the firms that handle 
 Northwestern apples also deal in 
 the other fruits that are sold at 
 Public Sale in the daily auctions. 
 But there are hundreds of firms 
 that do not handle apples now be- 
 cause they are not sold through the 
 auction. The small percentage of 
 firms that do not have buyers at the 
 daily auctions, who make a spe- 
 cialty of apples, would send them 
 to the auctions if a substantial per- 
 centage of the first-class apples 
 were supplied the auctions in regu- 
 lar quantities. They would be able 
 to save time and energy, get the 
 sizes and grades they want, and 
 would be assured of fair treatment. 
 They would have no fear of secret 
 discriminations. Then, too, they 
 would not want their rivals to have 
 
a source of supply which they 
 themselves do not tap. At the auc- 
 tion sales there is always a chance 
 of getting the other man to pay 
 more than you pay for your sup- 
 plies. 
 
Relief A Public Sale can relieve a glut- 
 of Glut j-gfj market as no other medium can. 
 Just as soon as the market sags 
 the representatives of the peddlers 
 at the Public Sale buy heavily. 
 With all the push-carts and ped- 
 dlers' wagons featuring apples, 
 many not handling anything else 
 for the time being, vast quantities 
 of fruit can be disposed of in case 
 of a glut. The rate of consump- 
 tion established would cause a re- 
 bound that would be a foundation 
 for the prices of the supplies fur- 
 nished later. 
 
 Had the Public Sale system 
 been employed last fall when so 
 many Jonathans in poor condition 
 reached the eastern markets, their 
 distribution would have been a 
 matter of comparative ease, as 
 against the private sale system un- 
 der which a disastrous glut of the 
 market actually occurred. There 
 was not the distribution among 
 peddlers and push carts, fruit 
 stands and stores as there would 
 
have been had the whole bulk of 
 these apples been put through the 
 auction. 
 
 The Public Sale system has a 
 particular advantage over private 
 selling in that, once the glut is re- 
 lieved, the stimulated rate of con- 
 sumption sends prices upward at 
 once. Under the private sale sys- 
 tem the jobber overstays his mar- 
 ket. He does not know the quan- 
 tity of his rival's supplies or what 
 prices he is charging or is going to 
 charge. He is timid. The buyers, 
 who are just as shrewd as he, hold 
 down the price as long as they can. 
 The price rises slowly, and this 
 year did not rise appreciably until 
 the late spring. 
 
 At the Public Sale it is quickly 
 apparent that all buyers want a 
 certain kind of fruit. No buyer 
 can hide the fact. He must bid 
 lively and high if he is to get the 
 fruit that his customers want. 
 
Distribution 
 
 Public Sale A recent concrete example of the 
 Widens ^yg^y Public Sale of fruit increases 
 the number of buyers and thereby 
 widens distribution is the sale of 
 bananas at Public Auction in the 
 cities of New York and Baltimore. 
 The Company importing the 
 largest amount of bananas changed 
 from Private Sale to Public Sale 
 in New York City April 1, 1913, 
 and in Baltimore July 1, 1914, 
 with the result that the number of 
 buyers increased nearly tenfold. 
 It has happened that in a single 
 year in some Public Sales cities 
 California deciduous fruits have in- 
 creased 30%, and in a period of five 
 years 100% when California had a 
 heavy crop; and Public Sale has 
 been sufficiently flexible to take 
 care of and distribute the increased 
 crop. Similarly sales of Florida 
 oranges in Boston have, in a period 
 of five years, at Public Sale, in- 
 creased 350%. 
 
 Now compare with the foregoing 
 the consumption of Northwestern 
 
apples in Boston under Private 
 Sale: 
 
 Season 1911-1912. . .370 Cars 
 " 1912-1913. ..365 " 
 " 1913-1914... 354 " 
 " 1914-1915. . .360 " 
 
 The result is that although the 
 crop has increased greatly Private 
 Sale has not been sufficiently flex- 
 ible to widen distribution. 
 
A Fair Trial The Auction Companies ask the 
 grower to demand of his represen- 
 tative to give the PubHc Sale a fair 
 trial, which means the furnishing 
 of regular shipments of high-grade 
 fruit for a reasonable length of 
 time ; particularly is it advised that 
 good fruit be offered at Public 
 Sale and not some that has passed 
 its prime. 
 
 Fair play is asked because a 
 square deal is given. If only an 
 occasional car of fruit that is far 
 from its prime is offered at Pubhc 
 Sale it will have a bad effect on the 
 mind of the buyer. 
 
Eliminated 
 
 Because the auction disposes of Receivers 
 the fruit quickly at the best prices ^^^ 
 obtainable it is conceded almost 
 universally that the Public Sale is 
 the proper way of selling soft fruits 
 that arrive in standard boxes and 
 packages. 
 
 Cherries, Bartlett pears, apricots 
 and prunes from the Pacific North- 
 west must be sold through the auc- 
 tion. Receivers concede this. Be- 
 cause apples keep longer than cher- 
 ries and prunes and most of the 
 pears, receivers have been able to 
 dispose of apples through the more 
 expensive method of private sale. 
 Under the Public Sale system the 
 receiver represents the grower. 
 He watches the interests of the 
 grower, keeps the grower in touch 
 with market conditions, talks up his 
 shipper's fruit among the trade 
 when they come to view it, and 
 mails the money paid to him by the 
 Auction Company to the grower. 
 
speed in The mere fact that apples keep 
 Distribution [onger than most of the fruits sold 
 at auction does not furnish ground 
 for argument that it is not suitable 
 to dispose of them at Public Sale. 
 All apples cannot be kept. Con- 
 sumption must not be restricted. 
 They must be distributed Hke other 
 keepable fruit, in an orderly man- 
 ner. In this way the responsibihty 
 can be divided among a large num- 
 ber and partly shifted from the 
 grower and his organization. The 
 shipper will have his money and 
 also the support of the buyers in 
 supporting the market in the most 
 healthy way; this by boosting the 
 fruit among the retail merchants 
 and thereby boosting consumption. 
 
 Apples from the Northwest are 
 good keepers and it is wrong to 
 suppose that times do not come and 
 have not come when apple growers 
 did not suffer through the lack of a 
 quick and immediate outlet for 
 their product. The case of the 
 
Jonathans referred to before illus- 
 trates that point. 
 
 One great essential in marketing 
 fruit is promptness in the delivery 
 to the buyer. The private seller's 
 ability to make prompt delivery is 
 limited to the number of trucks 
 owned or controlled by his boss 
 truckman, but the auction method 
 with its immense volume employs 
 so many public truckmen for their 
 daily work that they are at all times 
 equipped to handle any quantity. 
 For example, 100 cars of Cali- 
 fornia fruits — in addition to the 
 other lines of different varieties 
 selling — are delivered in a single 
 day, and have not overtaxed the 
 capacity of the auctions in one of 
 our large cities. 
 
 No single private seller could ap- 
 proach that speed in delivery for 
 even a small fraction of the volume. 
 
 The more prompt the delivery 
 the more satisfaction to the buyer. 
 
If the apple grower would dis- 
 pose of his fruit under the Public 
 Sale system his net results would 
 be greater than they are now. Ac- 
 tive, concentrated competition 
 makes good prices so long as the 
 competition is among the buyers; 
 but it is disastrous to the shipper 
 when it exists among the sellers. 
 
A chain is as strong as its weak- Conclusion 
 est link. The past season's lesson 
 should not be forgotten. What 
 happened then should be avoided. 
 The way to avoid it has been shown 
 here, you have the remedy. No 
 matter how high a point of effi- 
 ciency you have reached in growing 
 and packing, there is still left the 
 tremendously important factor of 
 marketing. 
 
 Instead of a few to bid on your 
 product you can have the many. 
 Instead of scattered selling units , 
 
 you can have concentration. Goods 
 on view in an alley cannot compete 
 with those shown on Main Street. 
 Main Street has the crowd. 
 
 Absolute fairness; prompt serv- 
 ice; the ability to sell at once in- 
 stead of storing; a saving in time; 
 a saving in money — all these are 
 yours for the taking. 
 
 If they seem worth having you 
 now know how to get them. 
 
Ship steadily, not occasionally, 
 all the grades and varieties you 
 produce. Instruct your agents 
 positively to have your apples sold 
 at Public Sale by the Auction 
 Companies. Then, when your 
 agents send your checks, and the 
 original account as rendered by the 
 auction, compare the speed, com- 
 pare the cost, compare the net re- 
 sults. 
 
 The Public Sale, as was stated 
 in the beginning, has been in suc- 
 cessful use for one hundred years 
 in Europe, for fifty years in the 
 United States. It is coming into 
 use more and more, eventually 
 every shipper will use it. The pro- 
 gressive man is he who grasps a 
 good opportunity promptly. To 
 wait is to lose a business oppor- 
 tunity worth using, worth your 
 using, this season. 
 
 It is up to you. 
 
AMERICAN FRUIT AND PRODUCE 
 AUCTION ASSOCIATION 
 
 202-204 FRANKLIN STREET NEW YORK 
 
 V. K. McELHENY, Jr., Pres. 
 
 N. C. IVES, Vice-Pres. 
 
 H. B. HEGEMAN, Sec'y-Treas. 
 
 EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE 
 
 W. E. BIGALOW 
 
 C. B. DOWNER 
 
 J. M. FANNING 
 
 J. J. CASTELLINI 
 
 V. K. McELHENY, Jr. 
 
 N. C. IVES 
 
 H. B. HEGEMAN 
 
For further information please communicate with: 
 
 Baltimore, Md. Baltimore Fruit Exchange 
 Boston, Mass. H. Harris & Co, 
 Buffalo, N. Y. Union Fruit Auction Co. 
 Cincinnati, Ohio United Fruit Auction Co. 
 Cleveland, Ohio Consolidated Fruit Auction Co. 
 Detroit, Mich. United Fruit Auction Co. 
 Kansas City, Mo. Kansas City Fruit Auction Co. 
 New Orleans, La. The Fruit Auction Co. 
 New York, N.Y. Brown & Seccomb 
 New York, N.Y. Connolly Auction Co. 
 New York, N.Y. The Fruit Auction Co. 
 Philadelphia, Pa. Philadelphia Auction Co. 
 Pittsburgh, Pa. Union Fruit Auction Co. 
 
Memoranda 
 
 r 
 
Memoranda 
 
Memoranda 
 
Memoranda 
 
LIBRftRY OF CONGRESS 
 
 002 671 705 fl %