RAISINS— GEORGE F. STANIFORD 



Where all conditions are favorable, and skill and conscience is put into the 

 culture and packing, profits of $100 to $200 an acre are sometimes 

 realized. 



The shipments from California are increasing annually, and new 

 acreages are being planted. With a very moderate increase in the per 

 capita consumption of grapes there would seem to be room for a con- 

 siderable expansion of the business. A half-pound per capita seems a 

 ridiculously small allo wance for any hungry, fruit-lo ving American citizen. 



R aisin s. 



QEO. P. STANIFORD, Secretary Freeao Chamber of Commerce 



THIS industry is an important one in the production of California. The 

 acreage of this product is conservatively fixed at 70,000 acres of pro- 

 ducing vineyard, yet, during the past five years, many thousands of 

 acres of raisin grapes have been planted, and it is quite safe that Cali- 

 fornia to-day has between seventy-five and eighty thousand acres 

 of raisin producing vines. 

 The importance of the industry is that, as a separate product, more 

 growers are interested, there being about 3,500 California growers who pro- 

 duce raisins, and the result of about $3,000,000 income from the product 

 every year causes an active circulation of money that is beneficially appre- 

 ciated by the grower and merchant. 



Raisins produce from $50 to $1 50 per acre, owing to soil. Aside from 

 one or two localities in the West, California is the only raisin producer of tno 

 United States. The system and method of marketing the product com- 

 pares with the imported raisin in packages and quality, and at least 50 per 

 cent of the California product is being placed on the American market in one 

 pound cartoons of seeded raisins — seeded, cleansed and pure of any pro- 

 cessing — ready for use in the preparation of puddings, pies, cakes, and for 

 any other use that currants and raisins are required. These goods are sold 

 in the East at 10 to 12^c per pound, and are a household necessity, as there 

 is no labor needed in seeding raisins as in the olden days. 



Being a home product the American people should realize that in Cali- 

 fornia, one of their own States, raisins are being produced by a community 

 of farmers who expect and hope that consumers will buy their own home 

 product; superior in quality and modernized by machinery, placing the raisin 

 package in the kitchen of American homes ready for use without even wash- 

 ing. 



This product of California is commended to the housewife, therefore 

 use it and encourage home production, particularly when you are securing a 

 superior article for the purpose you intend it. If the consumers of our own 

 country can realize that California is producing from 80,000,000 to 120,- 

 000,000 pounds of raisins annually for the American market, why not en- 

 courage our own advancement and use California raisins. 

 California raisin production: 



1 902 1 00,000,000 pounds 



1903 120,000,000 



1 904 80,000,000 



1905 estimated 90,000,000 



These results produce 4,000 to 6,000 ten ton carloads annually. 



Drying grapes for raisins forms one of the most prominent features of 

 viticulture as carried on in California. For the last four years average output 

 has been 94,750,000 pounds. Yet, strange to say, this branch of the in- 

 dustry is carried on in California alone. How very expensively it is carried 

 on here the above figures do not show of themselves. But to produce an 

 average crop of raisins, 330,750,000 pounds of grapes are required. Per- 

 haps California is the only State which can afford to divert such a large part 

 of its grape yield to drying for raisins. It certainly pays, however, for the 

 average value of raisins during the last four years has been $4,374,125. 



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