356 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



September 



opinion I will never buy or make an- 

 other pai-t to an 8-frame hive. 



First time I ever saw a honey flow 

 in a rain. Last fall we had a spell of 

 beautiful sunny weather and a heavy 



bloom of honey plants and not one 

 drop. It takes time to learn bee- 

 keeping in the South. 

 Louisiana. 



HONEY SELLING 



How M. V. Facey, in Building Up a Market for His Honey, 

 Used a Corps of Small, But EfTective, Mail Salesmen 



By R. A. Franklin 



Being an omnivorous reader. I fre- 

 quently, out of pure curiosity, glance 

 over the classified advertising col- 

 umns in the various magazines on our 

 reading table. In pursuance of this 

 habit, I noticed in that section of the 

 "Woman's World" this invitation: 



"SEND for price list of our se- 

 lect quality clover, basswood 



and buckwheat honey. Sample 



15c. M. V. Facey, Preston, 



Minn." 



As at intervals, over a period of 

 several years, I ran across this same 

 adlet, my curiosity was aroused as to 

 just what sort of results justified 

 such long-continued use of it, there- 

 fore, when a convenient opportunity 

 came, I called upon Mr. Facey. 



After our introductions were over, 

 I remarked : "You seem to believe 

 that it pays to use the classified ad- 

 vertising columns of magazines; at 

 least I should judge so from the num- 

 ber of years that I have seen your 

 name therein." 



"Well, that's the way I got all I 

 have. Yes, I should say that they do 

 pay — pay well" he replied, a friendly 

 smile lighting his pleasant face. 



And judging from the appearance 

 of his beautifully appointed home, in 

 the little hill-bound village of Pres- 

 ton, it must have paid vei-y well, in- 



deed, so I asked how such a program 

 of advertising was managed advan- 

 tageously. 



"Well," he began, "to get results, 

 one must use judgment in placing 

 these or any other kind of advertise- 

 ments. For instance, right now I am 

 not advertising as heavily as usual, 

 because of the money stringency and 

 the slackness of business in general. 



"Advertising in the agricultural 

 journals, usually one of my very best 

 mediums, I have discontinued for the 

 next three or four months. You see, 

 when the farmers began holding their 

 wheat and other commodities for high 

 prices, I knew money would not be 

 plentiful among the majority of them 

 this summer, and — right now — I'm 

 selling more honey to miners than to 

 farmers." 



"About how much honey do you 

 sell in a year?" I asked. 



"Well, between four and five hun- 

 dred thousand pounds, usually." 



"You certainly do not supply that 

 amount from your own bees, do 

 you?" I exclaimed, in amazement. 



With an amused, though kindly 

 smile, he said, "No, indeed; not a 

 pound of it. I buy from producers 

 and distribute direct to the con- 

 sumer." 



"Living in a small town, how did 



TIic Facey home al Preston, Minn. 



you ever happen to start in such a 

 line of business in the first place?" 

 was my next query. 



"Oh, you see, I used to be a bee- 

 keeper. In fact, until about thirteen 

 years ago that was my business in 

 life. I began this sort of advertising 

 to help dispose of the product of my 

 own bees, and before very long I had 

 more orders than I could fill. One 

 dislikes to disappoint a would-be cus- 

 tomer, so I took to buying honey to 

 fill those orders. I had tried sending 

 the money back, but people didn't like 

 that very well either, so I bought 

 more and more. 



"And presently the business of 

 buying and selling honey crowjied out 

 the beekeeping entirely; they don't 

 mix very well. A beekeeper who cares 

 properly for his bees hasn't time to 

 administer a growing business. So I 

 disposed of my bees and attended to 

 my business." 



"Do you get all your honey right 

 around here, or must you go farther 

 away to get enough to fill your or- 

 ders?" 



"About 150,000 pounds I get right 

 here in the vicinity of Preston, and 

 most of the rest of it within a radius 

 of 150 miles. When I need to go be- 

 yond that radius, C. C. demons & 

 Co., of Kansas City, and Hamilton- 

 Menderson Co., of St. Paul, buy it 

 for me in carload lots on a brokerage 

 basis. 



"Of course, most of my alfalfa 

 honey comes from Colorado and much 

 of my buckwheat honey comes from 

 New York State, because there is 

 where the best of its kind is made. 



"I have even bought 80,000 pounds 

 of honey in Cuba in time of extreme 

 shortage in the home product, but 

 Cuban honey is not very satisfactoi-y 

 to the trade — they don't care for its 

 flavor. It's a nice clear, thick, white 

 honey, too — but they don't like it. 



"Clover and sweet clover seem to 

 be the favorites, but the buckwheat 

 and alfalfa come next, followed by 

 basswood, locust, etc." 



"In what part of the country do 

 you sell the most of your honey?" 



"Well, most of it goes to the East. 

 Just now, Indiana, Virginia, West 

 Virginia and Kentucky are taking the 

 biggest amounts, though sizeable or- 

 ders are coming from other parts of 

 the East. Northern Minnesota, too, 

 in and around Duluth, takes a large 

 amount." 



"About how many magazines do 

 you use in your advertising cam- 

 paign?" 



"Usually I run ads in about thirty 

 magazines, mostly ladies' papers and 

 agricultural journals. I tried some in 

 such magazines as the Cosmopolitan, 

 but they didn't give very satisfactory 

 results. The Farm Journal, The Mod- 

 ern Woodman and the Woman's 

 World are three of my old standbys. 



"Recently the Woman's World dis- 

 continued the classification of their 

 advertising columns, and the results 

 ceased to come as before, so now, in- 

 stead, I'm advei-tising in Comfort, a 

 magazine published in Augusta, Me. 



"The Modern Woodman editor, too, 

 got the idea that classified ads didn't 

 pay, so wouldn't take anything but 



