MARKET METHODS AND PROBLEMS 523 



blackboard and bids are also written down as they are received. 

 This "call board" is intended to bring open competition on the cheese 

 market, and its use became general between 1896 and 1900. Unfor- 

 tunately, less than 10 per cent of the cheese is sold on the boards, and 

 that is in a large measure bid off by the men who have contracts for 

 much larger quantities of cheese which they are to receive at board 

 prices. It is commonly believed that the dealer who knows that 

 every J of a cent he bids up on the cheese on the board will increase 

 the price on all his contracted cheese by the same amount lacks the 

 courage which a true competitive bidder should show. It has been 

 alleged that the dealers sometimes get together before the board 

 meetings and have an understanding as to what bids are to be made 

 and as to who shall have the cheese. In answer to this allegation the 

 dealers say that the independent brokers who have to depend upon 

 the board as a place to buy their cheese will often bid up the price 

 so that no such combination could be effective in controlling the price. 

 Investigation tends to confirm the belief that at times the board is 

 under the control of the dealers and again at other times the bidding 

 becomes highly competitive. 



The great bulk of cheese is sold on the basis of board prices with- 

 out being offered on the board. This is less trouble to the salesman 

 but destroys, in a great measure, the value of the "call board" as an 

 open market. There is evidence to show that the dishonest practice 

 of paying the salesman a tip has been indulged in for the purpose of 

 keeping him off the board. If all the sales were made in the open 

 market provided by properly regulated call boards, much of the 

 occasion for suspicion of dishonesty would be removed. 



During the summer of 1912 there developed in Sheboygan County 

 a widespread dissatisfaction against the prevailing methods of selling 

 cheese. It was charged that prices on the Plymouth Cheese Board 

 were not really competitive but arbitrarily fixed beforehand and that 

 there was a mere pretense of competition while the board was in ses- 

 sion. Accordingly the Sheboygan County Cheese-Producers' Federa- 

 tion was formed to undertake the selling of the members' product inde- 

 pendently of the Plymouth board. This selling organization embraced 

 48 factories, with a joint output of six to eight million pounds about 

 half the product of the county. There were difficulties at the start, 

 but within two months the federation was selling a million pounds 

 of cheese a month at somewhat above Plymouth board figures. 



