AUCTION HOUSES AS DISTRIBUTORS OF FRUITS 919 



at one time. The buyers arrive in time to inspect the fruit, which 

 is displayed in one large warehouse or on the railroad pier. In 

 that large exhibit each buyer whether the fine fruiterer, the 

 department store, the chain store, the retail grocer, or the pushcart 

 man finds the sizes and grades that he wants, or in fact that he 

 must have if he is to keep his customers from goiiiii next door for 

 their fruit. At a given time the gong rings and the buyers 

 assemble in the sales auditorium. As a winning bidder needs to 

 take only a limited number of boxes, the representative of the 

 largest jobbing house, department store, grocery house, chain 

 store, hotel, or large restaurant in town, who needs 200 boxes 

 of a certain grade of fruit, must bid against a buyer who wants 

 but a limited quantity. With this free working of the law of 

 supply and demand the price is fixed. Frequently, personal 

 rivalry among several bidders results in the price being raised 

 above what the natural law of supply and demand warrants. Many 

 a buyer goes to the auction with the idea of buying but fifty boxes, 

 and goes away the purchaser of one hundred. He sees what he 

 thinks he can make money on and buys. In the next hour he 

 and all of his farm are at work trying to sell the fruit he has 

 bought. 



In addition, every public sale is a matter of public record. The 

 catalogue and sale sheet are kept for a certain period before their 

 destruction is permitted. Some of the auction Companies keep 

 their papers for years. The shipper can write to the auction 

 company and get a mailing catalogue showing the correct prices. 

 In the city of New York, for example, the Daily Fruit Reporter, 

 an independent paper, publishes each day the results of the sales, 

 car by car and brand by brand. Anybody may sit in the public 

 sales auditorium and hear the auctioneer sell the fruit to the 

 highest bidder at a certain figure. He may note on a catalogue 

 what his fruit sold for and then compare that with the account- 

 sales subsequently rendered by the auction company. He will find 

 that they agree entirely. 



THE AUCTION PRICE STANDS 



No private salesman can get from the buyer more than the 

 market warrants. If a buyer overreaches himself and finds he 



