lus 



II () u 1 I (• r LT n RK 



Cat. 176S 



Pot Mahars for a 

 CanturyandaHalf 



HEWS 



STRONG 



RED 

 POROUS 



POTS 



July 28, 1917 

 Inc. 190-> 



World'a Larsaa' 

 Manufacturer* 



Standard, Azalea, Bulb, Orchid, Fern. Hanging;, Embaesad, Rose, Carnation, Palm, Cyclamen, Cut Flow*r. 

 Special Shapes to Order. Chicken Founts, Pigeon Nests, Bean Pots, Etc. 



.t7^:::,5r'"' ' A. H. HEWS & CO., Inc., Cambridge, Mass. -H5l!-w' 



PUBLICITY AND DISTRIBUTION 



An Extract from the Address Of President John Watson Before the 

 American Association of Nurserymen. 



> (111 iiavi' ii|i(in your | riisrani llie 

 two closely related siibjeot.s of Public- 

 ity and Distribution. Tocetlier. they 

 represent our Kreatest problem. If we 

 study our progress and our discussions 

 In the conventions that we have held 

 in the past forty years, we shall find 

 that we have given our thoughts very 

 largely to the production of stock, to 

 the matter of varieties and their adapt- 

 ability, to questions of propagation and 

 cultivation: to digging and packing. 

 We have (•oncerned ourselves with the 

 production of trees and plants and al- 

 ways more and nrore trees and plants 

 to the almost total exclusion of the 

 problem of their distribution: and in 

 that we have attempted to reverse the 

 law that makes the supply follow the 

 demand; we must make the demand 

 and the supply will take care of itself. 

 1 think we can safely concede that in- 

 dividually we are the poorest advertis- 

 ers in the world. And yet our goods 

 offer the most engaging possibili- 

 ties for attractive presentation: our 

 potential clients are the ones who 

 have the means and ample means to 

 buy what we produce; and they are 

 quite as deeply Interested in our goods 

 as we are. 



The trend in recent years has been 

 from the city; It has been towards the 

 development of country homes; the 

 era of automobiles has opened a won- 

 derful market for us. Yet It is a 

 curious fact that in a country liter- 

 ally overflowing with wealth, much of 

 it recently acquired and used gener- 

 ously in building beautiful homes, 

 where every sort of business is pros- 

 perous to a degree never known be- 

 fore, we nurserymen have come to- 

 gether for our forty-second annual con- 

 vention to talk over the increasing 

 cost of producing our goods and the 

 decreasing returns from their sale; 

 to sympatliize with one another on the 

 quantities of stock burned the past 

 spring and to ask how much longer we 

 can go on in this way. We shall hear 

 before the convention has closed, a 

 great deal about the suriilus stock in 

 the country and the low jirices obtain- 

 able Just as if in this wonderfully 

 new and rich country of ours, with a 

 population of over a hundred million 

 people, with thousands of new homes 

 building every year. — if there could be 

 such a thing as a suriilus of trees and 

 plants. Certainly the small acreage 

 in sight today cannot be called that. 

 Ratlier let us admit frankly that we 

 have only failed to bring the grower 



iind the planter. Ilic nicrclinni ami tlic 

 customer, together: that we have 

 neglected to use the agencies em- 

 ployed for that puriose. by every lino 

 of business save and exceiit our own. 



Several years ago I had a very In- 

 teresting talk with Mr. Kthan .\llen 

 Chase, the Dean of the nursery busi- 

 ness and I believe one of the first 

 nren to carry a plate-book: and Mr. 

 Chase told me that in tlie first conven- 

 tion of nurserymen he ever attended 

 and one of the first ever held I |)re- 

 sume, in Boston over fifty years ago. 

 the time of the meeting was taken up 

 largely with a discussion of the sur- 

 plus held by the growers and the 

 necessity for advancing prices. We are 

 still talking about the same things. 

 A wise statesman said in regard to 

 the proposed resumption of specie 

 payments years ago, that the way to 

 resume is to resume. The way to get 

 better prices is to get them. The 

 way to dispose of our surplus is to sell 

 it. But we have made no serious effort 

 to do either. We are optimistic in 

 planting and pessimistic in selling. As 

 a trade, we nurserymen have not yet 

 learned the A B C of salesmanship; 

 our idea of salesmanship is the ele- 

 mentary and primitive one of under- 

 selling our neighbor. 



Now, I believe in competition. 

 There is something very fine and 

 wholesome in the idea of competition; 

 in matching one's wit and skill with 

 those of others; and the manufacturer 

 or the grocer who can produce his 

 goods for less cost than his neighbor 

 is entitled to our respect; but there is 

 nothing very inspiring about getting 

 orders upon the sole basis of price 

 without regard to cost; that is mere- 

 ly a confession of inefficiency. I do 

 not propose any plan of price-fixing by 

 agreement or understanding because 

 that is ethically unsound and sugges- 

 tive of the stone age in business and 

 entirely out of harmony with present- 

 day methods of salesmanship. 



It is a new world we live in, Gentle- 

 nren, it is not the same world it was 

 ten years ago, and ten years from now 

 it will not be the same world it is to- 

 day. The old order is clianged. The 

 whole method of production and of dis- 

 tribution has been changed, and if we 

 nurserymen are ever to place our busi- 

 ness upon the plane of dignity and 

 profit that it has not yet reached, it is 

 going to be necessary for us to adjust 

 ourselves to these changed condition.- 

 Tlie old competitive system has given 



way to the co-oporallve system; we 

 I'avo seen the men in various llneB of 

 iMisinoBH drawing closer togclher for 

 teamwork, becoming allies rather than 

 'i.iitinuing as enemies; we have Hcen 

 ilii'in combining their elTortM and unlt- 

 iiij; their strength rather than exhaust- 

 iiiu themselves in destructive compe- 

 liiion with one another: we have seen 

 I rouimission appointed by the Gov- 

 ernment at Washington, under instruc- 

 tions to assist and counsel and aid 

 these various lines of business in unit- 

 ing and directing tlieir efforts. 



I took occasion some time ago to call 

 your attention to a book written by 

 .\lr. E. N. Hurley, of the Federal Trades 

 Commission entitled 'The Awakening 

 of Business," almost every page of 

 which might be profilably applied to the 

 nursery husines.s. .\nil it has been my 

 aim during the past year to do some- 

 tliing towards the develoi ment of this 

 idea of cooperation in the minds of 

 the nurserymen ; 1 have had the hope 

 that we may finally come to realize the 

 fact for It is a fact — that the nursery 

 business of this country Is just one 

 business and that each of us is a stock- 

 holder and a director in it: and just 

 as a private business cannot hope to 

 succeed when all the directors are pull- 

 ing in opposite directions with each 

 following his own ideas without re- 

 gard to the plans and actions of other 

 directors, so in a general business enr- 

 bracing the whole trade, we cannot 

 expect any measure of success unless 

 we come together for counsel and ar- 

 gument determined to find the com- 

 mon ground on which all can stand; 

 and work in harmony and friendly co- 

 operation for the common good, for it 

 is only in the greatest common good 

 tliat we can find the largest measure 

 of individual iirofit. No matter what 

 our individual interests are, whether 

 we are producers or distributors or in 

 wliat manner we seek our clients, or 

 who they are, every apparent con- 

 fiict of interests is uilreal, for all who 

 gain their livelihood from the nursery 

 business or any dei)artment of It, 

 liave identically the same interests; 

 and we can advance those interests 

 surely and certainly only by means of 

 cooperative rather than individual ef- 

 fort along broad lines. And one of 

 those lines and by far the most im- 

 portant to each of us, is the develop- 

 ment of our njarket and the increased 

 (<>nsuniption of our luoducts through 

 the use of co-operative publicity. 



STANDARD FLOWER 



If your greenhouse, are within 600 

 iiilles of tb« Cflpltol, write n. ; we can 

 save you money. 



^A/. H. EF»IMEST 



28th ft M BU.. WaahlnKton, D. O. 



