CHAPTER XX 



PREPARING THE BUTTER FOR MARKET 

 A. BUTTER PACKAGES 



A FOOD offered for sale should possess quality, it should be 

 put up in a neat and attractive package, and it should be of full 

 weight or measure. The quality may not at all times be under 

 absolute control of the manufacturer, as it is largely dependent 

 on the quality of raw material received; but the appearance and 

 weight, however, are under absolute control of the manufac- 

 turer. It is a recognized fact that in order to receive prizes at a 

 butter show the package of butter should reach the judges in 

 perfect condition. Therefore the package is usually wrapped in 

 burlap or heavy paper or both. The same appearance of neat- 

 ness and carefulness which in this case influences the butter 

 judge at a butter show will, to just as great an extent, influence 

 the butter buyer and the consumer. The author knows of a 

 creamery where the manager required that each box of prints 

 be wrapped with heavy paper before shipping. During the 

 summer seas*on the paper would have some insulating value, 

 but the greater value derived from this method lay in the good 

 condition in which this butter arrived at the dealer's store. 

 Some of the merchants were even placing this clean box on the 

 counter as an advertisement for the butter. In some places the 

 ordinary plain butter boxes are returned by the city buyers. 

 Although this saves money to the manufacturer, yet the sys- 

 tem should not be encouraged, as the boxes when returned are 

 never clean and even if they are washed their appearance will 

 never be that of a new box. Butter put up in these boxes will 

 suffer in prestige with the dealer. During the summer season 

 butter which cannot be shipped in refrigerator cars should be 

 shipped in refrigerator boxes (Fig. 32). 



272 



