PROBLEMS IN MARKETING EGGS. 



Charles L. Opperman, 

 Berwyn, Md. 



Madam Chairman, Members of the Conference, Ladies and Gentlemen: 

 I fear that your chairman has given me a reputation which I may find 

 rather hard to fulfill. If I knew all that she claimed for me, I am sure I 

 could entertain you in a most satisfactory manner. However, even 

 though I cannot promise to furnish all the information she claimed, I 

 shall attempt to leave with you a few of the vital points connected with 

 the handling of the nation's egg supply. 



Before developing this subject I wish to add just a few words to 

 what Prof. Benjamin has had to say concerning a co-operative plan of 

 marketing eggs now in operation at Cornell University. Prof. Benjamin 

 has very ably discussed this phase of marketing eggs and I may say, if 

 he will permit me, that he has presented the strongest argument I have 

 recently heard in favor of the middleman. We have heard so much dur- 

 ing the past few weeks about the terrible middleman and the cold-storage 

 robbers that I am really almost afraid to express myself on the subject. 

 I think, however, that Prof. Benjamin's remarks open the way for me to 

 say a word or two about these much berated and little understood busi- 

 ness men. To my mind they are as much needed in the handling of eggs 

 and produce as the producer himself. Without the middleman in one 

 form or another, be it a co-operative concern or commission house, it 

 would be practically impossible to properly prepare eggs and many other 

 products of the farm in such a way as to be presentable to the buying 

 public and without the cold-storage man I do not dare to suggest to you 

 how much you would now be paying for fresh eggs and many of the other 

 very important commodities of life. 



The middleman and the cold-storage man are not, in the main, the 

 ones who are responsible for the present high price of eggs. If a few of 

 the women who are making such a to-do over this matter, would look 

 into the proposition more closely they would find that the retailer and not 

 the parties now being condemned, are in fact the ones who are robbing 

 the public pocketbook. By way of illustration, permit me to say that I 

 know of several large grocers who make a point of storing eggs in the 

 spring and then withdrawing them the next fall and winter as fast as their 

 trade demands. These men, as well as other grocers, who buy from 

 large egg dealers having holdings in storage houses, take eight or ten 

 cases of eggs, which have probably been purchased around twenty-five 



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