decide whether the aggregate justified tying up a bulk bin for the time 

 needed to fill and unload it in the course of regular deliveries of grain-feed 

 for that class of livestock (such as turkeys) and for other classes. 



Thus, it appears that the "potential market" for bulk feed is limited 

 in most areas to dairy cattle, laying hens, and chickens for replacement 

 and/or meat. Even with these items there are areas where the number of 

 units of desired size will be insufficient to justify bulk feed operations for 

 one or more of the preceding classes of livestock. Hence the "potential 

 market" for bulk feed for dairy cattle, laying hens, and chickens for re- 

 placement and/or meat is smaller than could be inferred from the data in 

 Table 26 and per unit feed requirements, but the exact relationship cannot 

 be stated in the absence of a comprehensive survey of the area served by 

 each distributing unit. The existence of a number of sellers in each area 

 further reduces the "potential" at least in the short run, the customers of 

 sufficient size for bulk feed service being spread among these several sellers. 



Data collected for southeai>tern New Hampshire in the course of route 

 efficiency studies are interesting from the standpoint of suggesting the un- 

 adjusted "potential market" for bulk feed in one area. For 60 bagged and 

 bulk delivery routes, 40 percent of the routes, or 24, were 1- and 2-stop 

 routes. These routes involved only 7 percent of the total number of stops, 

 but over 47 percent of the total tonnage. The average number of 100-pound 

 units delivered on 1-stop bagged routes was 104.3; on 1-stop bulk routes, 

 128.2. On 2-stop bagged routes, an average of 62.5 100-pound units were 

 delivered per stop; for 2-stop bulk routes, the comparable figure was 67.5. 

 In general, these are the types of routes which would receive first consider- 

 ation for conversion to bulk feed. 



Data tabulated for 408 deliveries (stops) of grain-feed on bagged 

 routes involved a total of 4,647 100-pound units. Deliveries of 40 bags (2 

 tons) or over, involved only 7.1 percent of the stops, but 48.2 percent of 

 the total tonnage (see Table 27). Apparently, most of the large customers 

 are supplied via 1- or 2-stop routes (regularly scheduled or on call). With 

 deliveries of 20 bags (1 ton) or over, 13.2 of the customers and 61.7 per- 

 cent of the tonnage were covered. 



These data are totals for all units operating in the area. It is unquestion- 

 ably incorrect to assume that the preceding data are indicative of the pro- 

 portion of customers or tonnage it would be possible to convert to bulk 

 feed for a number of reasons. It is known that the percentages should be re- 

 duced somewhat to account for the inclusion of several kinds of feed in 

 some of the orders. Neither is the area covered in the data typical for other 

 areas of the State. 



Table 27. Analysis of 408 Deliveries of Grain-Feed in Southeastern New Hampshire 



51 



