PRINCIPLES OF VALUE AND PRICE 465 



The demand for whiteness, to which should be added plumpness, 

 has pursued the delicious oyster until hi some markets it has lost 

 much of its flavor. 



Flour made from cereals is perhaps the most conspicuous illustra- 

 tion of the consumers' insistence upon whiteness, and that the origin 

 of this preference was in efforts to secure cleanliness in bread making 

 is a suspicion, although it may have been due to the telltale dark color 

 of bread made by the inexpert maker who allowed the dough to take 

 too long a time in rising. Perhaps for one or both of these reasons 

 grew the bread-maker's pride in the whiteness of her bread. Thus 

 was enforced the housewife's demand for wheat flour that should make 

 white bread. In the estimation of the old lovers of buckwheat cakes 

 buckwheat flour has suffered because of the growing demand for 

 whiteness. Formerly buckwheat flour was slightly brown and the 

 buckwheat flavor was unmistakable and easily detected, but more 

 recent milling processes have made this flour much whiter, and besides 

 this the adulterator has not neglected the opportunity to promote the 

 whiteness by combining with the buckwheat flour some cheaper and 

 whiter wheat or corn flour. 



Further pursuit of this subject is unnecessary to enforce the lesson 

 that runs through the foregoing pages. Farmers should learn the 

 whims and fancies of the markets that they reach, or can reach, and 

 endeavor to meet those fancies. By so doing the highest prices and 

 the largest profits may be obtained. If a farmer's products are such 

 as go to customers who are whimsical or fanciful in their choice, and 

 fall short of meeting such requirements, there is likely to be no profit 

 in his operations. The farmer should not produce primarily to please 

 himself and his own ideas of excellence; when he does so he may find 

 a wide chasm between himself and the people whom he would like 

 to have for customers. 



146. DEMAND AND MARKET PRICE OF FRESH FRUITS 1 

 BY A. U. CHANEY 



We must concede that the market price of any article is deter- 

 mined by the law of supply and demand. The demand, I believe, 

 affects the price on fresh fruits more quickly than the supply. Then 

 let us first discuss what influences the demand. 



1 Adapted from an address by the general manager oi the American Cranberry 

 Exchange, delivered before the Twelfth Annual Meeting of the Western Fruit 

 Jobbers' Association, printed in the Western Fruit Jobber, February, 1916. 



