December, 1919 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



771 



WHOM CAN BEEKEEPERS TRUST 



On What Honey Market Rotations 

 Can They '^ly? How Does the 

 Honey-Buyer Work? Associations? 



By Prominent Beekeepers 

 (Tog«tIier with the camera's story of a sale of honey.) 



_£^ you get 



honey 

 quotations"? 



' ' Do you rely 

 on the quota- 

 tions printed in 

 the bee jour- 

 nals"? 



"Do you be- 

 lieve the Government quotations are cor- 

 rect? the wholesalers'? the producers' "? 



'•'How do the honey-buyers apj)roach 

 you"? 



"How do you try to get a fair price"? 



"Do you think uniform prices can be es- 

 tablished by honey-producers ' associa- 

 tions?" 



"If dissatisfied with present methods of 

 buying and selling, what is your solution of 

 the problem ' '? 



Those seven questions were sent a month 

 ago to about a half-hundred sut-cessful and 

 prominent beekeepers thruout the United 

 States and Canada by Gleanings in Bee Cul- 

 ture, with a request to send answers. We 

 said to these beekeepers: "You would be 



Scene 



-Ihe buver arrives, and — 



interested in these questions, wouldn't you, 

 if a lot of live, wide-awake beekeepers 

 would answer them and you could read the 

 answers"? We invited the beekeepers to 

 answer in their own way and to take any 

 scalps they pleased — -and we would publish 

 their answers. 



Our purpose was to give all readers of 

 Gleanings the best possible ideas as to how 

 to get the most reliable honey quotations 

 and the best price for their honey. 



The most significant fact, perhaps, about 

 the result of this appeal to 50 successful 

 honey-producers for marketing information 

 and experience was the answers we didn't 

 get. Only about a third of those addressed 

 responded. We thought we wrote them the 

 sort of letter that would bring all of them 

 out of their holes, so to speak. It seems we 

 didn't. Two-thirds of them stayed in. 



Well, why? 



Some of them were probably too busy to 

 reply. We suspect one or two (we are chari- 

 table in making this estimate) said to them- 



selves: "It's 

 none of Glean- 

 ings' business 

 nor anybody's 

 else how I sell 

 my honey. ' ' We 

 suspect more of 

 them thought 

 this way — in 

 very brief: "I 



am not going to give anything away to the 



honey-buyers. ' ' 



The reasons of those not replying, we 



don 't question at all. It was entirely their 



approaches tlie teekeeper, whO' — 



own business. But the answers of the third 

 who did respond we shall try to give here 

 fully for the benefit (as we believe) of all 

 beelceepers who may now or hereafter have 

 honey to sell. As will be seen, we are let- 

 ting the bee journals "take their medicine," 

 and no "scalp" taken is kept from our 

 readers nor any of the discussion contained 

 in the answers repressed. Only one or two 



is iiresented with the buyer's card. 



of those who replied gave answers to all the 

 questions asked. 



"How Do You Get Honey Quotations"? 



To this question, five gave no answer; 

 three say they get their quotations from 

 the Government market reports; two from 

 the Government market reports and bee- 

 keepers' journals; one, from Gleanings and 

 American Bee Journal only. 



J. E. Crane of Middlebury, Vt., says: 



