QUESTION BOX 131 



The people consequently are not buying apples like they did a few years 

 ago. In 1896 there was a production of almost seventy million barrels of 

 apples in this country, and this year, forty million. Just about half of the 

 production of sixteen years ago, and yet apples are comparatively cheap 

 in this country. Now what we have to do is to cut down profits. There 

 is a great problem that the growers have to work out, or we are going to 

 have an over-production, if we are going to keep these apples so high in 

 price that the ordinary man can not afford to buy them. We are going 

 to •produce more fruit than there will be a demand for; but if we will keep 

 the price down so that the ordinary man, the poor man, can buy apples, 

 then you will find that it will be a long time before there will be an over- 

 production. 



Mr. Yeager: Right along that line I have in mind something that 

 came to my notice last September. Down in Otoe county they produce 

 a great many peaches, and on this certain day that I am speaking about 

 peaches were on hand in Nebraska City, in quite large quantities at 30 

 cents 'per bushel. On that same day in Omaha, they were $1.25 a bushel, 

 and the cost of transporting a bushel of peaches from Nebraska City to 

 Omaha, a distance of something like fifty miles, in round numbers, is 

 about 8 or 9 cents. Now that is along the line of what Mr. Marshall said 

 and he has said something that is worthy of notice to the grower, be- 

 cause you have got to have a price for the consumer, on a basis of getting 

 a fair revenue or return to the grower. But the trouble is, there are too 

 many middle men. Now there is a concrete example, and I am quite sure 

 my figures are right; I have them, but not at my command now, but that 

 is approximately true. That is a concrete instance I call to mind now 

 in support of what he said. 



A Member: Doesn't this bring you back to the proposition, that it is 

 just as important to sell right, as it is to grow right. The shortest route 

 from the producer to the consumer brings the most profit to the producer, 

 and better satisfies the consumer. Now^ you are right back to your organ- 

 izaiion foi selling, and having your men who make it a business to market 

 your stuff, and study the market and make it a business, just as much 

 as you make it a business to grov, the fruit. There is not one man out of 

 fifteen that knoAVs how to sell, hut he knows how to produce, and it is 

 because of the reason that he has not studied how to sell. He has not 

 the time to do it, and there is a necessity now for your selling organi- 

 zation. 



The Chairman: I see that Mr. Odell is in the room and we will now 

 listen to a paper from Mr. Odell, on "Advertising the Apple." I am sorry 

 that a great many of the crowd went away. 



