Page 6 



BETTER FRUIT 



June 



some cities wholesale brokers are al- 

 ready considering this problem. As an 

 example of such developments the 

 Produce Organization of Pittsburg has 

 recently decided to take advantage dur- 

 ing the coming year of newspaper 

 reports on the markets to inform the 

 public of fluctuations in the wholesale 

 prices of various commodities. This 

 organization believes as a result of such 

 a step a larger consumption and lower 

 retail prices can be secured with profit 

 and satisfaction to themselves and to 

 the community alike. Were such 

 methods adopted in all cities, consider- 

 able information would be made avail- 

 able to the public. Then the Con- 

 sumers' Leagues in the various cities 

 are already doing good work along 

 these lines. In some cities such leagues 

 have notified their members and the 

 public of changes in wholesale prices 

 and have demanded from their grow- 

 ers correspondingly lower prices. On 

 certain occasions when retailers de- 



clined to lower prices materially, these 

 organizations have even gone so far as 

 to advise their members to refuse to 

 buy such connnodities until jirices had 

 been lowered, thus practically declar- 

 ing a boycott, with the result that the 

 retailers were forced to yield. In 

 addition to these direct movements 

 much general information is being 

 placed before the consumer. Newspa- 

 pers, as a result of the modern demand 

 for such information, are devoting 

 more and more space to market re- 

 ports. The government is also assisting 

 through its rapidly ileveloping crop 

 reports, which now reach directly or 

 indirectly large numbers of consumers. 

 Many other organizations and agencies 

 which are doing somewhat similar 

 work might be cited. 



Since such a change is already taking 

 place, the farmer can well alTord to 

 assist the movement. This assistance 

 can be given in various ways. Close 

 relations should be formed with the 



various organizaticms disseminating 

 knowledge and material of great value 

 can be placed in their possession. It 

 might prove desirable to furnish the 

 newspapers with tlirect market infor- 

 mation. Then the Department of Agri- 

 culture should be encouraged to widen 

 the scope of the work along this line 

 and to make its bulletins more avail- 

 able to the consumer. As a more 

 direct step, the various ajjple-marketing 

 organizations may find it profitable to 

 adopt advertising methods which will 

 place the facts in the hands of the con- 

 sumer. In these various ways it 

 should be possible to bring retail and 

 farm prices more nearly into line, to 

 make them move together, to develop 

 an elastic demand which will consume 

 more apples when the price is lowered 

 and thereby prevent the extreme fluc- 

 tuations in prices which now cause 

 considerable risk and loss to all farm- 

 ing operations in such industries as 

 that of apple production. 



Advertising and Merchandising Northwestern Apples 



By R. C. Gano, Editor Judicious Advertising, Chicago, Illinois 



MERCHANDISING is a science 

 which no group of apple grow- 

 ers has yet mastered and applied 

 to the marketing of apples. It doesn't 

 matter how many groups of apple 

 growers have mastered the science of 

 growing fine apples, provided only one 

 of the groups uses merchandising 

 science. That one group which, in 

 addition to growing apples as tine as 

 any others, establishes a selling system 

 which is basically correct will inevi- 

 tably lead in the markets. At the pres- 

 ent time there is a remarkable oppor- 

 tunity for some one group of apple 

 growers to take the lead in the apple 

 market and keep it. The only (lualifi- 

 cations they need are two. Their 

 apples must be able to hold their own 

 against other apples on a basis of plain 

 quality and merit. And the growers 

 must be willing to adopt the most etfi- 

 cient marketing plan that can be de- 

 vised, and must have the grit to see it 

 through. 



The apple growers of the Northwest 

 have heard such talk as the above 

 before, have hearkened to it, and have 

 conscientiously attempted to get to- 

 gether on a marketing plan. That no 

 plan has accomplished much to date 

 either indicates that the plans were 

 good but were not thoroughly "sold" 

 to the growers, or that the plans, 

 though thoroughly believed in by the 

 growers, were actually faulty, or that 

 both the plans and the growers' mental 

 attitude toward them were at fault. 

 For there is no (luestion that a plan 

 which actually solves the problem and 

 which shall enlist proper sup|)ort will 

 succeed. To doubt this is to admit that 

 you are licked before the fight begins. 

 Now I don't doubt that the apple 

 growers of the Northwest have had the 

 example of the Sunkist orange growers 

 cited to them time after time, when 

 movements were on foot to form mar- 

 keting organizations. But it is one 

 thing to have a person say to you, 



"Why, look what co-operation has done 

 for the California Fruit Growers' Ex- 

 change" and quite another to have cer- 

 tain intimate inside facts about the 

 California Fruit Growers' Exchange 

 that really illuminate the apple prob- 

 lem presented in a way that appeals to 

 mathematical and business sense. 



As regards the point that apple pro- 

 duction is widespread and orange pro- 

 duction concentrated, a little reflection 

 will show that this diirerence is ap- 

 parent only to the producer, not to the 

 consumer, and hence makes no differ- 

 ence so far as the effect of advertising 

 is concerned. When a consumer goes 

 to a grocery store for oranges she is 

 confronted with a variety of unknown 

 brands and only one known brand — 

 Sunkist. This isn't true of every con- 

 sumer, but the average housewife can 

 name only one single brand of oranges. 

 This has been proved by the California 

 Fruit Growers' Exchange by house-to- 

 house canvassing. An average test in 



a certain city showed that of 772 house- 

 wives canvassed 45 per cent said they 

 buy Sunkist oranges, and only a single 

 person out of the 772 named another 

 brand of oranges, during the question- 

 ing by the investigators. Orange com- 

 petition may be narrowly restricted. 

 Yet at any grocery store one will find 

 several competing brands. Sunkist will 

 be one of, say, four. Does the con- 

 sumer know anything about the mar- 

 ket conditions surroundings oranges'? 

 Rarely. All she knows is that in Sun- 

 kist she recognizes a familiar name 

 with pleasant associations and adver- 

 tised as California's highest quality 

 orange. 



It makes no particle of difference that 

 oranges are gi'own only in two states 

 instead of forty-five. The grocer would 

 probably not handle more brands than 

 he does in any event. Advertising does 

 its real work when the consumer, at 

 the store, or in 'phoning her grocer, is 

 confronted with choosing among sev- 



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