38 STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETT. 



apples and harvest them ; but that is not the money in his pocket. 

 He has then got to market them and it is all too true that many of 

 us fruit growers and farmers are very poor market-men. In order 

 to be a good market-man, one has got to follow the market reports, 

 keep himself posted as to the supply of and demand for the article 

 he is producing, in order to get the most for his labor and skill in 

 his particular line of work. 



If he does not do this it is equal to a tax on what he has pro- 

 duced. After a fine crop of apples has been grown it is of the 

 first importance that they should be well marketed. Now one of 

 the greatest questions of the day is how shall that be done? It is 

 now the fashion to sell them to some shipper ^'■riglil through" and 

 he takes them all and packs them himself, in that way the fruit 

 grower gets rid of all his apples, at a low price to be sure, but he 

 gets them all marketed. A large fruit grower told me within a 

 week that he had shipped the last of his apples, 810 barrels, and 

 the packers took practically all of them. It would seem to a dis- 

 interested party that that sort of business would, in the end, react 

 on the producer a few years later ; next year or a little later our 

 apples will not stand quite as high in the markets of the world and 

 consequently shippers cannot pay quite as much for them and we 

 shall be obliged to take a little less for them. 



Now it is one of the easiest things in the world for a person to 

 find fault, tear down and pick methods and systems into pieces, 

 but not so easy a matter to substitute something better for the old, 

 institute reforms that are an improvement. But it would really 

 seem as though the growers of large quantities of apples could do 

 better, get more money out of the business, if they would put a 

 little more time and business tact into them, by packing them 

 themselves, doing it well and honestly, and then put their own 

 name and residence on every package. In that way, in time, con- 

 sumers would find out who raised and packed good apples, and 

 there would be a call for good fruit, well packed, at an advanced 

 price. 



As the business is now conducted it is the "barrel" the world over, 

 prices all over the world are quoted by the '■'■barrel" One of the 

 questions that is being asked many times over is this : Is the barrel 

 the best thing to pack apples in, and if it cannot be shown that 

 there is more money in packing them in some other way then it 

 will remain barrels to the end of the chapter. In favor of the barrel 



