June 5, 1902. 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



357 



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Convention Proceedings, 



The Chicago Convention. 



Report of the Semi-Annual Convention of the 



Chicago Bee-Keepers' Association, Held 



Dec. 5, 1901. 



BY A SHORXnANI) RKI'ORTER. 



(Continued from patre 341.) 



THE PKOimCEH'S NAME ON COMB HONEY. 



" Should the producer put his name on the sections an<l 

 cases of the honey he sends to markets ? 



Pres. York — Mr. Burnett, you are one of the men %vho 

 control this market — so Mr. Dunn said — what do ro« think 

 about it ? 



Mr. IJurnett — I don't think that was really established 

 — that I am a market controller. Well, I don't know, where 

 people are sending honey to a large market, whether or not 

 it is any advantage for the names of the producers to be put 

 on the shipping-cases. As a matter of fact, my experience 

 has been that it is a disadvantage, as a whole. I presume 

 it would be conceded by most of you that the best honey is 

 the honey that a person likes. It is immaterial what the 

 name of it is, or where it was gathered. When the people 

 can see the name of John Jones, of Colorado Springs, Colo. , 

 on the honey, tl\ey might say, " Oh, I have seen that place 

 out there; that honey is all gathered from wild stuff; I 

 guess it is not very good ; I would rather have some clover 

 honey." On the contrary, if he wants some of that honey, 

 if you don't happen to have any of it, and you let him taste 

 something else, why he says, "' Yes, that is what I am look- 

 ing for." He will give it a name, and tell you what honey 

 it is, which may be quite the contrary to the fact, but he is 

 entirely satisfied that that is the honey he wants. I have, 

 as a matter of fact, lost sales of honey from the fact that the 

 producer's address was on the cases. For years we used 

 to scrape the names off the cases, so that people would buy 

 on their judgment, and not on their prejudices. Theques- 

 tion was up this afternoon, while I was here, with regard to 

 sweet clover honey, as to the taste of it, and its tasting 

 strong. There is a gentleman of means in this town, who 

 perhaps for years has bought a case of honey of us nearly 

 every autumn, and has happened to get something that 

 suited him, so a year ago he came; he is a man about 60 

 years old, and in business, a man of more than ordinary 

 intelligence. He bought a case of honey, and in two or 

 three days he came back. I happened to see him when he 

 came in. He went up to the cashier's window and asked for 

 a bill for the case of honey he had bought at such and such 

 a time. He got it, and after he had the bill receipted, hav- 

 ing paid it, he came over to where I was sitting, and said : 

 " I bought a case of honey here the other day, and it has 

 got to be like everything else, you can't get any honey that 

 is pure and fit to eat ; I want to send that case of honey 

 back." "Well," I said, "all right, sir." So he got his 

 money back, having returned the honey. As soon as I saw 

 it, I knew, of course, what the trouble was — he got a nice- 

 looking case of sweet clover honey, but he didn't know any- 

 thing about sweet clover honey, only that it tasted wrong. 

 People have heard that honey from certain sections of the 

 country is not good ; others have heard that the honey from 

 that same section is very good, but if they have an oppor- 

 tunity of judging what the article is, for themselves, and 

 not by the printed matter that is on it, so that their pre- 

 judice will prevent there buying something that they really 

 want, it often results in sales ; otherwise it might be a loss. 

 This is from an experience running over 25 years, and when 

 people really ask me, honestl)', whether their names ought 

 to be put on, I tell them, as a matter of fact, for sale in this 

 market, it ought not to be. But in nearly all cases we are 

 misunderstood ; they say we want to sell something on 

 which we are making a greater profit, therefore we don't want 

 their names ; also that people will want to buy this honey 

 and won't take any other, and so on. Now that isn't fair ; 

 we want to sell all the honey we can ; we at the same time 

 want to satisfy the people who buy it. Why, if there was no 

 one to buy the honey we couldn't sell it, so we are as 

 anxious to please the party who has honey to sell as we are 



to please tho.se who want to buy honey. A gentleman comes 

 in to see me occa.sionally, and twits me with what Dr. Mil- 

 ler here will enjoy very much, as it is a joke on me. He 

 was in one day, and wanted to know if we could hell honey 

 at a high price. "Oh, yes," I said, "we have the reputation 

 here for selling honey at a high price." There was a gen- 

 tleman standing right beside me who wanted to buy some 

 honey. I turned to him and said, "Do you \vant to buy 

 some honey '! " He said, " Yes, but I want to buy it cheap." 

 " Certainly," I said, " we sell cheap." He said to me, "I 

 just heard you tell that man that you sold for a high price." 

 There is just this about it : The man who has goods to sell 

 watits to sell dear, and the other man wants to buy cheap. 

 It is a little ditlicult to please both of them, but we try to 

 strike a happy medium. 



Mr. Dunn — I want to take exception to Mr. Burnett on 

 this question. It is the duty of every man who produces honey 

 to brand it ; if it is a good article, he can afford to stand on 

 that ; if it is a poor article, he will soon find it out, and 

 know what the market for it is. I brand all my honey — all 

 my cases — and I stand on my record and guaranty, and there 

 is no trouble about it. I would recommend every bee-keeper 

 to brand his honey ; that is what gives it a standard. Make 

 a reputation for yourself by sending proper goods to the 

 market, and proper weights, and there will be no trouble 

 about selling your honey. 



Mr. Horstmann — I think we have to satisfy the people 

 we are buying honey from. I don't believe it is necessary 

 to stamp honey, if we are selling it to commission men who 

 are going to sell it again. In my own neighborhood I 

 would put my stamp on. They would notice that stamp. 

 But in sending it to a commission firm, I would not do so. 

 After I have sold the honey to them, it doesn't belong to me 

 any more, and I don't think it is right to put my nameon it, 

 unless they want it on. It all depends on the party who is 

 buying the honey ; if he wants it, all right ; if not, it should 

 be left off. If I had a lot of honey to sell in that way, I 

 would ask, " Do you want the stamp left on or ofif ? " and if 

 I was told to leave it off, it would be left off. 



Mr. Riker — If I were to buy honey from commission 

 men, I would much rather the name of the producer would 

 be on the case of honey ; then I would not be afraid that 

 the honey had been tampered with in any manner. 



Mr. President — This is comb honey, Mr. Riker. 



Mr. Ricker — I would have the producer's name on it, if 

 I were going to buy honey of a commission man. as that 

 would be a guaranty that it was good honey. That is the 

 way I would look at it ; I think other people would do as I 

 would do in that respect. 



;\lr. Burnett — Does a fact of a name being on a section 

 of honey guarantee that it is good ? 



Mr. Riker — Not necessarily. 



Mr. Burnett — Then that doesn't amount to anything. 



Mr. Riker — If the producer puts an article in the hands 

 of commission men with his name on it — the man who buys 

 it would expect that the producer was honest, or he would 

 not want his name on it. 



Dr. Miller — Like most questions, this one has two sides 

 to it, and I think it may have three sides. If I have comb 

 honey, and am supplying the market, if I am known even a 

 little bit as an honest man, people get to know the honey 

 that I sell, and I put my name on it. Say where one of you 

 live, you have the reputation there of being honest : people 

 will buy your honey and would rather buy it than any other, 

 and in that case it is well to have the name on it. if you are 

 the producer. Your grocerj'man will prefer it. providing 

 that you produce good honey. Here is another case, in 

 which a man has a trade. Suppose that I were selling 

 honey iu Chicago, and going around and delivering it. I 

 must buy from you producers ; now I would rather not have 

 the name on, because I have a trade of my own that I am 

 building up. If one of you should say to me, " I am willing 

 to supply you that honey, but I want my name on it," I 

 would say, " No, I have built up my trade, and have taken 

 pains to get customers, and I am entitled to get credit for 

 the work I have done. I want to sell my honey that simply 

 goes as my own, and I don't want any name on it : and if 

 you don't like that, you don't need to sell the honey to me." 

 If a man were doing a large enough business, so as to pro- 

 duce an amount to supply largely any one of the large mar- 

 kets, it might be possible that he would prefer to have his 

 name on it, because it would be handled largely, and his 

 name on it would have its advantages, and the dealers 

 might want it on. The same as I have in mind now — the 

 Atwood Clothing people handle the Rogers, Peet & Co.'s 

 ready-made clothing, and tlie Atwood people want that 

 name on those goods, because they are supplying those par- 



