7l(j AuKlCULTURlC UV MAIM-:. 



do it, but first he has got to know what he has to sell ; and you 

 must have enough produets so that when the expense of the 

 organization is divided, the cost is very small ])er bushel or 

 box of apples or ton of hay. The same selling organization will 

 take care of large amounts of products. If you have something 

 to sell you will find there is a buyer. The way is to create a 

 market for more products than you have, and then you can raise 

 the price. I want to give you some examples of some mar- 

 keting right here in Maine. I know a man who sends eggs to a 

 large commission firm in Boston and it returns to him 50 

 cents a dozen and over. I also know of other eggs coming from 

 the very same town that return the farmer 28 cents a dozen. 

 The man who gets 50 or 52 cents has been sending eggs for 32 

 years. Every single tgg is marked. There are no eggs over 

 four days old. He has a special fancy tra le that calls for those 

 eggs. In the other case, the man has been sending a case of 

 eggs a week. Sometimes they are pretty good eggs but once 

 in a while a hen steals her nest, and once in a while a nest egg 

 gets in. The commission man has to candle the eggs ; it is a 

 bother and Ire does not like to attend to it. He would rather 

 take eggs graded from a western association. 



There is a very successful egg gathering corporation on 

 Prince Edward Island and it has been getting very good 

 prices from the commission houses. The main thing is to keep 

 in touch with the commission men and market them at the right 

 time. For instance, suppose a man in Maine has 100 barrels of 

 apples in his cellar. He writes to a reliable commission house 

 and says, "I have 100 barrels of apples, 50 Baldwins and 50 

 Greenings, fairly well colored. I would like to get the money 

 out of these by such a date. When shall I ship them?" If that 

 man selects a good house he is going to get from 10 to 30 per 

 cent more than a large majority who will pack up and ship 

 their apples and write to the commission man, *T am sending you 

 100 barrels of apples. Kindly return me the highest market 

 price." In the latter case the commission man gets the letter 

 and he gets a telephone message that the apples are at the sta- 

 tion. He has to send a man over there and open those bar- 

 rels of apples and that takes time, and time is money. He puts 

 the apples on the sidewalk and perhaps sells them to the first 

 man w^ho comes along and he has to charge as much as though 



