May 7, 1910 



HORTICULfURi: 



693 



DURING RECESS. 

 Florists' Club of Washington. 

 Tbe annual banquet given by the 

 club was held at Rauschers on the reg- 

 ular meeting night. May Sid. This 

 banquet has for years been a special 

 feature, but this one outdistanced any- 

 thing ever before attempted by the 

 club. The banquet hall had tables on 

 three sides; in each corner were pyr- 

 amids of palms and American Beau- 

 ties, while the space between tables 

 was partly taken up by a magnificent 

 pyramid of Beauties, topped by a 

 specimen Keutia. Table decorations 

 were of Killarney roses, ferns and 

 pink carnations. The orchestra which 

 played throughout the evening was 

 hidden in a balcony of palms. The 

 banquet this year was delayed by rea- 

 son of so early an Easter and the rush 

 incident thereto. But the law of com- 

 pensation holds good under all circum- 

 stances, for every one agreed that it 

 was the most successful ever given by 

 the club. 



John Robertson, the newly elected 

 president, presided and offlcially intro 

 duced the toastmaster, Wm. F. Gude. 

 Mr. Gude in his usual happy manner 

 introduced the soloist of the evening. 

 Miss Siebling, who sang "Beautiful 

 Garden of Roses." A thunder of ap- 

 plause greeted this beautiful song and 

 she was twice recalled. 



Ex-Commissioner H. B. F. McFar- 

 land next spoke on the importance of 

 civic improvements, and paid a glow- 

 ing tribute to the generosity of Wash- 

 ington florists. He then made the pre- 

 sentation of a silver loving cup to 

 Wm. P. Gude which bore the following 

 inscription: "In token of appreciation 

 of services rendered the Florists' Club 

 of Washington. Presented to Wm. F. 

 Gude." 



Commissioner C. H. Rudolph was 

 next introduced and after a pleasant 

 speech he presented the outgoing pres- 

 ident, F. H. Kramer, with a silver lov- 

 ing cup. All cups were alike and all 

 bore the same inscriptions. Secretary 

 O. A. C. Oehmler was next introduced 

 and presented with one-half dozen 

 knives and forks. 



Robert N. Harper, ex-president of 

 the Chamber of Commerce was next 

 introduced and he presented Geo. 

 Cooke with a loving cup. All of the 

 fortunate receivers of cups replied in 

 a most pleasant and grateful manner, 

 expressing their gratitude and surprise 

 at being so pleasantly remembered, as 

 well as their interest in and love for 

 the club. 



Harrison Klingman spoke ot the 

 florists as one of the most important 

 factors in all events, both social and 

 commercial and expressed his per- 

 sonal appreciation of them. Frederick 

 B. Owen was then introduced as a 

 man who has done more than any 

 other man to make Washington's 

 crude and unsightly places beautiful 

 by means of shrubbery, etc. His re- 

 sponse was most happy. Then came 

 a turn of the tide, and as has been 

 the history of all time, woman was 

 flnally recognized as an impoitant fac- 

 tor in the workings of the universe. 

 "Better late than never" seems to be 

 the key note. Wm. F. Gude here in- 

 troduced Mrs. Loeffler as one of 

 Washington's foremost business wom- 

 en. She responded in a pleasant, con- 

 cise manner. 



Next in order, men all standing. 

 Wm. F. Gude announced the follow- 

 ing toast to the ladies: "God bless 



the ladies, may they be with us al- 

 ways." Peter Bisset, one of the ex- 

 presidents of the c]ub, who has just 

 returned from a very extended tour on 

 the Pacific Coast in the interest of 

 Uncle Sam, spoke briefly of his inter- 

 est in the welfare of the club and of 

 his pleasure at once more being with 

 them. 



Adolph Gude was then introduced to 

 the company by F. H. Kramer and he 

 paid tribute to Com. R. M. McFarland 

 and the ladies present, and to John 

 Robertson as a man and a leader. 

 Frank Siebling, official of police court, 

 spoke of his pleasure at being pres- 

 ent. 



Chas. Woodhead then delighted the 

 audience with several solos. Both he 

 and his wife have done much for the 

 pleasure of the club in the past, as 

 ijoth have fine voices and always re- 

 quests to sing. 



The banquet closed at a late hour. 

 The elaborate decorations were done 

 by Gude Bros., and freely attested to 

 their exceptional taste along those 

 lines. 



From the foregoing report one can 

 easily see that the pleasant occasion 

 was a feast of reason and a flow of 

 loving cups. 



Chicago Bowlers. 



These teams will roll each Friday 

 evening until July 26th when conven- 

 tion team will be decided upon. 



L. Vaughan ISO 171 197 



V. Pasternioli 152 157 . 147 



F. Krauss 115 111 1.33 



C'npt. T. C. YaniaM 14S 157 17.3 



S95 596 650 



J. Huebner 146 184 152 



i-;. Winterson 141 1.34 12:i 



Wm. Wolf 129 173 120 



e.npt. Geo. Asmns 1.35 176 138 



571 667 539 



Capt. V. llergman 164 151 158 



F. I.ieberman 127 135 148 



E. Farlev 193 134 19T 



T. Vogel 125 98 135 



609 518 638 



Capt. E. Joliiison 2ii2 171 IfiS 



Alex. Wieozorowski 125 187 168 



Wm. Graff 118 167 155 



u. II. Gf>ei-iseh 172 116 116 



617 651 607 



FLORISTS' CLUB OF PHILADEL- 

 PHIA. 



Antoine Wlntzer of West Grove, 

 gave a very interesting talk on "Roses, 

 Past and Present," at the regular 

 monthly meeting of the above Club on 

 the :3rd inst. He gave many personal 

 reminiscences of his rose-growing ex- 

 periences dvring the past forty years, 

 mentioning many of the old-time vari- 

 eties of roses that are still good and 

 worthy of extended culture. He also 

 gave warm praise to many of our lat- 

 ter-day raisers of new varieties, among 

 them especially Dr. Van Fleet, W. A. 

 Manda and Jackson Dawson. On exhi- 

 bition were several fine vases of roses, 

 including Duchess of Wellington from 

 Robert Scott & Son, Sunrise from H. 

 W. Collins, Perle and Niphetos from 

 Charles E. Meehan, American Pillar 

 and other climbing roses from Conard 

 & Jones Co. The speaker for June 

 will be Alphonse Pericat on "Com- 

 mercial Orchids." John Dale, of Dale 

 & Yost, the newly established growers 

 at Pittville: Hilborn Darlington, son 

 of the late E. D. Darlington, Doyles- 

 town, and Lewis Catherez of Michell's, 

 were elected to membership in the 

 Club. 



THE COST OF OPERATING A 

 RETAIL FLOWER STORE. 



[A itiiyivv read before Detroit Florist Club, 

 -May 2, by F. Dauzer.) 

 My original intention was to pre- 

 sent statistics tabulated and arranged 

 in such form as to show where ex- 

 penses almost imperceptibly cut up 

 the profits, but the few reports re- 

 ceived from local or out-of-town flor- 

 ists show such a difference in meth- 

 ods of bookkeeping that it was not 

 posible to so arrange them. Some ot 

 these reports clearly show an unwar- 

 ranted disinclination to divulge so- 

 celled business secrets. 



The capital investment of a retail 

 store consists of: I. Storefixtures, 

 from which at least 10 per cent, per 

 year must be deducted; in case of a 

 short term lease this deduction should 

 be in such proportion that the fixture 

 account is wiped out where the lease 

 expires, because a removal makes 

 these fixtures obsolete. II. Livery 

 outfit — horse and vehicle or automo- 

 bile, on which an annual depreciation 

 of 20 per cent, must be figured. III. 

 Palms for decorative purposes, the up 

 keep of which is accounted for in the 

 merchandise account because they al- 

 ways are to be kept at least 90 per 

 cent, standard and are as much a sal- 

 able article on the closing day of busi- 

 ness as they were at the beginning. 

 IV. Working cash on hand when busi- 

 ness is begun. Xext is the merchan- 

 dise account, which includes all mer- 

 chandise purchased to do business 

 with or whose exchange into money 

 brings about gain and loss according 

 to our (and I am sorry to say some- 

 times according to our competitors') 

 manner of management. 



To attain a clear understanding ot 

 the business year's result accounts 

 should be subdivided into: Supplies, 

 flowering plants, cut flowers, plants 

 such as palms, ferns, etc., for sale. 

 Next is the most important account 

 of all. one which in the course of a 

 year is apt to cut immense holes into 

 our profits — the expense account. 

 This account cannot be divided up 

 too much, and let nobody ever be de- 

 terred from a very thorough analysis 

 of it by the word "Red tape." The 

 principal items of this account are as 

 follows: (1) Rent, to which must be 

 added such proportion of lease if the 

 same had to be purchased as will 

 wire out this item at the expiration 

 of the same. In such cases where a 

 building has been erected for the sole 

 purpose of conducting a retail flower 

 store for a certain term of years only 

 the cost of such building must be 

 cbarped to rent in its annual propor- 

 tion. (2) Delivery, daily cost of main- 

 tenance, wages of boys, car fares, ex- 

 tra wagons or automobile hire during 

 days of rush. (S) stationerv. postage 

 and corresDondence. (4) Telegrams 

 and telephone. (5) Heat and light. 

 f6) Flower boxes. (7) Wrapping ma- 

 terial, from string to fancy boxes. 

 (8) Cost of renewal of decoration 

 Plants. ('91 Salaries. flO> Accounts 

 ontstanflinf. (11) Surrlies. (12) 

 Green stuff. 



Before goins- further we must con- 

 sider the subject fro-n three different 

 standpoints: (11 Annual business, 

 SlO.OOn. (21 Annual hu«ipos<! $50 000. 

 (?,1 Annual busipc^s 'SiOOOOO. The 

 man who transacts tiflOOO worth of 

 business per ve.ar de''ls with a class of 

 customers wi'o r'o not 'lemand an ex- 

 travagantly fitted-up salesroom. They 



