Nov. 16, 1899. 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



725 



falsehood. For instance, when you show your customer a 

 comb of fancy white clover, and say you ask 16 cents, you 

 find he will reply to j'ou very often, " I can buy some very 

 nice honey at 11 cents ;" but he doesn't tell you that it is 

 buckwheat or some other honey much inferior in quality. 



Again, you must make a study of human nature. Some 

 customers you can slap on the back and say, " How are you, 

 old fellow ?" Others would be shockt at such proceedings, 

 and order you out of the store. Here is a great secret of 

 the salesman who studies his customer, and learns his per- 

 sonality and caters to it ; by so doing he can often secure a 

 buyer that will not leave him for either cheaper prices or 

 better quality, and this is the trade that is worth having. 



Remember honey is a luxury, not a necessity. If your 

 customer is busy, don't bother him. If he likes a joke, tell 

 him one. If he likes a little history about bees, give it to 

 him. If he is fond of honej- on his own table, present him 

 a jar or comb with your compliments, and then be honest 

 with yourself. There is an old saying that if a man tells 

 a lie repeatedly, in time he himself will honestly believe 

 that it is the truth. 



We become very much blast by what honey we produce 

 ourselves ; but because we may produce white clover or 

 other honej' it does not make it for that reason alone 

 the best goods. The man from Florida says mangrove 

 or palmetto is the best in the world ; in Califoriiia. the sage ; 

 in the Carolinas, the ti-ti ; Maryland, the blue thistle ; Col- 

 orado, Utah and Arizona, alfalfa ; New York, basswood ; 

 Pennsylvania, the clover ; Delaware, sniartweed and 

 heartsease; Michigan and Wisconsin, willow-herb — and 

 so on. 



Now you ask me who is to be a judge to decide what 

 hone.y is the best honey produced by this country to-day, 

 represented by this session. While I realize that cultivated 

 taste has largely to do with a man's judgment of which is 

 the best, the only way to decide is by popular judgment, 

 and not from any locality. Having traveled very exten- 

 sively over the United States and made this a special sub- 

 ject of study, I would not question for a moment the popu- 

 lar verdict, which is for white clover ; and I will say that if 

 you took one man from every State in the Union and sent 

 him samples of all the honeys from the different States that 

 I have mentioned ; let him be a man who does not use to- 

 bacco or liquor in any form (as tobacco and liquor both de- 

 stroy the nerves of taste in the tongue and gums), and let 

 him be a man who is in no way interested in the honey- 

 business, and if three-fourths of them don't decide that 

 white clover is the best then I don't know anything about 

 it ; but I have tried it so often, and know the territory, and 

 the verdict has always been the same. 



Another condition that the producer of honey has to 

 deal with is what is called the cut-throat competition of 

 grocery-stores in our large cities. I believe in honest com- 

 petition, and especially where the purchaser demands lower 

 prices. Take for instance, a comb of honey. A grocer will 

 not sell one more comb in a year at 17 cents than he would 

 at 19, nor would he sell one more comb at 21 cents than he 

 would at 23 cents. Your wife and family, or my wife and 

 family, visiting the stores to make their purchases do not 

 demand lower prices on honey, mainly for the reason that 

 honey goes further than almost any other article of food 

 purchast, and being a luxury, and considered a delicacy, a 

 few cents in price makes no difference. 



Now we see every year a large firm here on a promi- 

 nent street that fills their window full of comb honey. It 

 is of inferior quality, but a very fair appearance. They do 

 this every year, sometimes in August or early in Septem- 

 ber, and mark it at a price below which any other honest 

 grocer can buy white clover honej' and sell it at a profit. 

 What is the result of this action ? It immediately fixes the 

 market for the others to follow, if they will, and in many 

 cases the purchaser is the sufferer by the storekeeper being 

 compelled to buy inferior goods to compete with his neigh- 

 bor's prices. 



If the purchaser demanded the low prices I would have 

 nothing to say, but when the dealer uses honey as a 

 "leader," and then makes it up on his teas, coffees and 

 other articles, then the honey-purchasers are the sufferers. 



And now, no doubt, you are anxious to know what pack- 

 ages are the best to put honej- up in. I have been surprised, 

 time and time again, to know the difference there is in dif- 

 ferent localities on this subject. One city 25 miles from 

 another city will handle entirely different kinds of pack- 

 age. I would say that a large-mouth glass package is the 

 best, and one that can be sold at popular prices holding one 

 pound of honey, and less ; where over a pound of honey is 



desired a tin package is much preferable. These are sold 

 very larg-ely in 6 and 13 pounds. 



The largest consumers of honey are the manufacturers. 

 It is used by brewers who buy it in barrels, and tobacco 

 manufacturers, as well as biscuit-bakers. One singular 

 thing about the biscuit trade is that there is no honey pro- 

 duced in this country that keeps the freshness and moisture 

 of the cake as well as Cuban and Porto Rico honey. Large 

 lots of Porto Rico honey have been imported into the 

 United States this summer, but, on account of the scarcity 

 of other honeys, it has brought a good price. As tills is to 

 be embodied in a paper by another person, I will only say 

 that our new possessions, to my way of thinking, are going 

 to do a great harm to the bee-keeper. 



While many things I have said in this paper are, no 

 doubt, stale news to quite a few, there may be some here 

 for whom I have dropt some thoughts that may be a benefit. 

 If I have accomplisht this, I shall feel fully repaid. 



W. A. Selser. 



Mr. Abbott — Can honey be considered a luxury ? It is 

 not a luxury at my table ; if we don't have it, my wife 

 would feel the effects of it. I think we make a mistake 

 when we teach that it is a luxury. I think it ought to be 

 emphasized that it is a necessi/y. In almost any market 

 you can get two pounds of honey for what a pound of butter 

 would cost. If 3'ou can have but one, you would better let the 

 Jersey butter go. It is all a matter of taste. I do think we 

 should stop this talk about honey being a luxury. 



Pres. Whitcomb — I agree with Mr. Abbott. I believe 

 one pound of honey is worth more than two pounds of pork 

 or SO cents worth of patent medicine. Kidney disease is 

 benefited by the use of honey. Children are liable to this 

 disease, and honey will be of great benefit to them. 



Dr. Mason — (I have had it revealed to me why Pres. 

 Whitcomb and Mr. Abbott were so sleepy this afternoon. 

 They have not been having honey to eat since they left 

 home !) There is something more in this, it seems to me. 

 In our localit)' extracted honey is not a luxury, but comb 

 honey is. I cannot sell comb honey, but I can sell extracted 

 honey, but I would not sell my butter three pounds for 25 

 cents, tho I do sell my honey at 10 cents a pound, or three 

 pounds for 25 cents. Our president says a pound of honey 

 is worth more than SO cents worth of patent medicine. 

 Well, that depends upon the medicine. Some medicines are 

 worth more than their weight in gold in curing disease. 



Pres. Whitcomb — I did not say that. I said it would be 

 worth more than patent medicine. 



Dr. Mason — Now you are further off. You say I sell 

 honey too cheap. I wish Mr. Doolittle were here to help 

 me. There is one thing in which I agree with Mr. Selser. 

 I have had charge of many exhibits of honey and other 

 foods that require tasting in judging, and I never choose a 

 man as judge who uses tobacco, or tea and coffee, if I can 

 help it. Don't take a man who smells of tobacco and nico- 

 tine, and try to sell him honey by tasting it. He can't tell 

 a good thing by its taste. 



Pres. Whitcomb — Mr. Selser, what do the manufac- 

 turers pay for the poorer grades of honey for baking ? 



Mr. Selser — Five cents a pound. 



Pres. Whitcomb — Now, why not take this honey and 

 put it on the table ? 



Mr. Abbott — About 16 years ago my health failed me. 

 My voice failed me entirely. I said I would be all right in 

 a short time, and my brothers said, " Yes, he will be all 

 right." I knew what they meant. I went out West to die. 

 A man askt me, by accident, if I didn't want to go into the 

 honey-business. I began to produce and eat it, and pres- 

 ently my voice came back, and I could stand up two hours 

 and speak. 



Dr. Miller — I have been trying to find out what you 

 mean by the luxury business. Take two articles to sell, 

 and tell people that one is a necessity and one is a luxury. 

 Which one will they take first ? There need be no conflict, 

 because in a sense honey is a luxury and it is a necessity. 

 I am not sure that we are making a mistake by calling it a 

 luxury. 



Mr. Niver — I don't belieye it will make a particle of 

 difference. But I wish to dissent from one thing in the 

 paper, and that is that you can sell as much honey at 19 

 cents as at 17 cents per pound. It is not down to hard-pan. 

 When Mr. Doolittle tells of selling honey at a certain price, 

 how much was wheat ? 



Mr. Danzen baker — I differ from Mr. Selser in some 

 things, but I agree with him in part. Not every one can 

 produce honey ; some people are afraid of the stings. There 

 are people who buy it to eat, and as medicine. It is getting 



