224 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOLRNAL. 



Mar. 24, 1904. 



When the producer becomes retailer the price is again 

 increased, and usually also the expense. The small producer 

 may be fortunate enough to sell his entire crop at the house 

 with little expense. Further sales must be made by a house- 

 to-house canvass. This takes time and travelling expense, 

 but honey is thus taken into houses where it might never 

 be used, and the increased consumption and gain in price 

 will probably pay for the extra expense. The farther one 

 gets from home in retailing honey the greater the expense, 

 until a point is reached where the expense eats up the profit 

 and wholesaling must be resorted to. In this also a point 

 is reached where it will pay to ship the balance to wholesale 

 firms or commission men in the large cities. These are a 

 few of the points to be considered in deciding how best to 

 dispose of the honey. 



The home market depends largely upon the bee-keeper 

 himself. He must put up a uniformly good article at a uni- 

 form price. Supply honey in whatever form the trade de- 

 mands, but use every effort to educate people to buy it in the 

 cheapest form, that is, extracted honey granulated, in tin, 

 wood or paper. Push the sale of large, cheap packages. Do 

 not sell a pound bottle, hoping that the next order will be a 

 lo-pound pail. Families will take a 5-pound pail every Satur- 

 day when, if shown a 2-pound package, they would probably 

 cut down their weekly order to that. Last season a local 

 dealer showed in his window a 6o-pound cake of granulated 

 white-clover honey, having removed the tin with a can- 

 opener. The honey was cut in squares and sold by the pound, 

 wrapped in paper like butter or cheese. This season he is 

 selling granulated honey for me again, but it is in Aikin 

 honey-bags. These prove a good seller where people have 

 learned that the granulated form is the natural and most 

 palatable condition of honey in cool weather. Every bee- 

 keeper should be an educational institution disseminating 

 knowledge in his neighborhood and beyond. He should teach 

 the nature and habits of honey, and its value as both food 

 and medicine. By all means strenuously strive to reduce 

 the cost of production and marketing, and maintain the 

 price. 



I have omitted detailed instructions which may be found 

 in text-books and bee-papers; but I would say to bee-keepers 

 who personally meet the consumers of your honey: Struggle 

 against this pernicious habit of reliquefying honey, and put- 

 ting up in expensive bottles. Show them that granulated 

 honey in its natural state, is attractive and palatable, and is 

 more apt to be pure. 



A point which I would like to bring up particularly for 

 discussion is this question: How to meet the competition 

 of small producers who do not know the value of their 

 product nor their time. They think to gain advantage by 

 cutting a cent or two from the price. Then we must either 

 meet that, and the result is all lose a cent per pound, and 

 no more honey is sold, or else let them have the retail trade 

 and sell wholesale, when there is a general lowering of price. 

 Of course, the remedy is local organization, which is slow 

 and difficult, or a local "corner" which is expensive and well- 

 nigh impossible. 



To establish a home market is commendable, in that it 

 promotes the universal distribution and consumption of 

 honey. It is also expensive; but with the cooperation among 

 honey-producers necessary to their highest success it will 

 certainly pay. Morley Pettit. 



Pres, York — The paper is now before you for discussion. 



Mr. Abbott— We hear a good deal said about the middle 

 man. This is an age in which they are trying to eliminate the 

 fellow in the middle. All sorts of societies and organizations 

 are trying to get rid of the middle man. He is a fellow who 

 lives in the city, and pays big prices for help and rent, and 

 sells goods on small margins. It just occurred to me that he 

 was the man to encourage to get rid of having the market 

 spoiled. Here is this fellow in every city who handles honey. 

 The fellow who comes in and doesn't know the price, he 

 hasn't the time, and if he had he hasn't the adaptability. This 

 is an age of the divisibility of labor. In a watch factory one 

 man makes one wheel, and another man makes another, and 

 every man makes his wheel all right. There isn't a man that 

 can make a whole watch, and they do that because they get 

 better results that way ; and so with the fellow selling. I am 

 now handling comb honey, and I don't want to be in business 

 for fun. A man came into my place along in the season and 

 he says, "What's honey worth?" I said, "That depends on 

 the character of it. I am not buying it, but it ought to bring 

 a good price because there is a small crop, and if I had honey | 



I would get a good price for it." He said, "I have been 

 around the city retailing mine. I have got a wagon-load, 

 and I have been retailing it at 25 cents — two pounds for 25 

 cents." I said. "My dear, sir, are you a candidate for the 

 lunatic asylum? .-^re you giving away your labor like that? 

 If you have the honey, and it is the kind you say, drop the 

 whole business right down here and I will give you a check, 

 and I will sell every bit, and I would just as soon have a 

 little of your money as somebody else." He says, "If that's 

 the case, I will take my honey home." He would better have 

 sold it to me and let me made 23^ cents than to have peddled 

 it around the city destroying the market for a lot of other 

 people. Don't you think the middle man would have been 

 an advantage? The producer could take his ready cash and 

 go home. He seemed to be glad to go home, and not have 

 to go to the trouble of peddling it, because he didn't like that 

 kind of work. We make a mistake about these things. The 

 man who sells honey, the man who starts from Cincinnati and 

 rushes to Baltimore, and rushes to Florida, and down to St. 

 Louis, and then to Chicago, if he is selling barrels of honey 

 he is making a market for you and me, and we want to stop 

 this talk about killing out the middle man. [Applause.] 



Mr. Wilcox — I have been to this convention ever since 

 it opened and I don't recall any talk about killing off the 

 middle man. . 



Mr. Abbott— It wasn't this time. 



Mr. Wilcox — I once belonged to the Farmers' Alliance, 

 and we talked middle man there. I don't believe the bee- 

 keepers of the country are trying to injure him. They are 

 looking after the industry in general, and we all recognize 

 the fact that all classes are necessary. It is impossible to kill 

 off the middle man. 



Pres. York — I think they would die awfully hard if you 

 tried it. 



Mr. Wilco.x — I have seen men try awfully hard. You go 

 to producers to buy their honey and they will say, "What do 

 you make?" And you tell them you make half a cent a 

 pound, or more, and they will say, "You can't have it ;" and 

 they send it to Chicago to the commission man and pay him 

 10 per cent. What I got up to say is, that we are not un- 

 friendly to the middle man, and not unfriendly to the supply 

 man, and not unfriendly to any class of dealers or producers, 

 but we wish to promote the general welfare of all. 



OBJECTIONS TO THE T SUPER. 



"Are there any special objections to the T super? If so, 

 what are they?" 



Pres. York — Dr. Miller doesn't know any objections to it. 



Dr. Miller — I do. It is in four pieces, and if you are not 

 careful you will have those four pieces scattered around and 

 step on one of the T tins and smash it. and if you don't 

 handle them exactly right, and somebody doesn't know about 

 handling it, the whole thing will fall out and smash your 

 sections ; and there may be others. 



Pres. York — Why do you use it, then? 



Dr. Miller — Because I don't know of anything else as 

 good ! 



Mr. Wilcox — I have studied that from Dr. Miller's writ- 

 ings. I have made and used a good many of them, but I 

 couldn't make others use them just as he did. In making 

 mine I made the T support solid, fast to the super instead of 

 loose, so it couldn't fall out. It requires accuracy of measure- 

 ment, and accuracy in size of measurements, and to secure 

 them I made the super myself, and I always buy my sections 

 at the same factory where they are made at practically the 

 same guage, then I can slip them in and they fit, and they 

 always fit and remain. 



Mr. Abbott — There won't anybody buy it down in my 

 country. 



A Member — I had three or four hundred, and I changed 

 them over into the section-holders. I had a great many rea- 

 sons why I didn't like them. 



Pres. York — But you have forgotten ;ill about the trouble. 



Mr. Niver — I think we have about 500 of them there at 

 home, and they are fine for kindling the fire under the steam. 



Mr. Abbott — I didn't know tin would burn. 



Pres. York — It does down in New York ! It gets hot 

 down there! 



Dr. Miller — I want to mention just one thing in regard 

 to Mr. Wilcox. If the T tins are fastened on (and there are 

 others who do that), then there is not the objection to falling 

 out. The only reason I like the support is because then I can 

 take the whole thing out at one time, T tins and all, and 

 there is a Imle advantage in that. One very serious objection 



