284 MARKETING 



1. It utilizes the best business talent of the community. 

 This is a crucial point. It is only one man in a thousand who 

 has the head to run such a business, and the cooperative method 

 picks him out and lets him run the business for the community. 

 The rest of the men are free to devote their attention to produc- 

 ing a crop of good fruit for the manager to sell, and anyone who 

 has ever tried it knows that this is a serious enough proposition 

 in itself. It is no discredit to farmers as a class to say that not 

 many of them are good business men. Neither are many of the 

 men in the hardware business. But the fellows who are not do 

 not try to manage the business. They do something else — sell 

 goods or make goods. 



2. The distribution of the output is better. The members do 

 not all ship to Boston one day and to New York the next, but all 

 the markets are uniformly supplied. The manager looks after 

 that. If there is an association of associations, as there usually 

 is when the scheme is well started, the control of the distribution 

 is just that much better. 



3. The fruit is handled in large lots and therefore better 

 freight rates can be secured. The car-load shipment is much 

 more economical than the small lot. 



4. The association can adopt methods of advertising that 

 would not be open to the single grower. As a matter of fact, 

 the single grower usually does not advertise at all ; but even if 

 he does, there are many kinds of advertising that he cannot 

 afford. 



5. The manager of an association can keep in telegraphic 

 touch with the markets and thus know better whether to ship 

 or not, and, if so, where. 



Objections to Cooperation. — All these advantages and many 

 more are claimed and usually admitted for cooperation. Then 

 why do we not have more associations? There are probably 

 many reasons, but the one chiefly responsible seems to be con- 

 servatism. The farmer has always run his own business and 

 thinks he can do so still. Distrust of each other among farmers 

 is also usually given and probably is an important reason for 

 lack of cooperation. Someone has said that most men would 



