Part IL] FRUIT GROWERS' ASSOCIATION. 181 



than his neighbor whose apples go to another sale. To counter- 

 act whatever difference there may be, we try to be as fair as 

 possible, dividing up the shipments, and plan never to have all 

 one man's apples on a single sale, but to split them up. Perhaps 

 I can best illustrate this point by showing how it has worked 

 out this present season. Early in the year, before any one 

 could tell what turn the foreign market would take, we sold 

 several cars at very good prices f. o. b. shipping point. As it 

 happened, apples exported began to bring unprecedented prices 

 and we wished that we had shipped everything we had. How- 

 ever, the orders taken early had to be filled, so to average 

 things we loaded a certain part of each member's apples in 

 export cars, and a certain part in those cars sold for a cash price. 

 We use a card in keeping a record of shipments. For every 

 car shipped one of these cards is made out. These are copies of 

 actual records in our office. We find them very convenient in 

 keeping our accounts correctly. A proper and well-ordered 

 system of accounting is very essential to the success of any 

 business, and is particularly desirable in the case of a co- 

 operative society, where the records are open to inspection by 

 the members at any time. 



After the apples are hauled to the cars for shipment the 

 individual member has nothing more to do with them. The 

 association looks after the whole business of marketing. It 

 attends to the billing, invoicing, tracing of cars, and, in short, 

 everything pertaining to shipping. It also, in the case of export 

 stuff, sees that space is obtained on the best steamers to the 

 most likely markets. The association also collects all moneys 

 from the sales, paying the grower for apples delivered by him. 

 We have always found it well to keep our members supplied 

 with money during the season, paying them on account from 

 time to time. We are able to do this because of the prompt 

 manner in which money comes in from our sales. Immediately 

 upon consummating a sale, the foreign agents make up our 

 account and cable the amount due us to our credit at the bank. 



It has never been our policy to increase our membership 

 merely for the sake of having our amount of business look big. 

 We have thought it best to limit our growth, keeping it healthy 

 and within manageable limits. At the present time we have 



