CHAPTER IV 



DISTRIBUTION OF MILK 



Section i. Collection of Milk from the Farmers 



THE collection of milk from the farmers may be con- 

 sidered under two heads, the direct method and the in- 

 direct method. In the case of the direct method the milk 

 is brought right from the farms to the city milk plants. 

 In the smaller centers the more common way is for each 

 producer to bring his own milk to the plant or perhaps 

 for two or three producers to cooperate by taking turns 

 at hauling. This method often results in a great amount 

 of unnecessary duplication. Jennings * cites an instance 

 where fifty men and wagons using sixty horses were em- 

 ployed to bring to a central plant milk which could have 

 been delivered by twelve men and wagons with twenty- 

 four horses. Not only would cooperative delivery or 

 delivery by a single trucker have saved the time of a con- 

 siderable number of men and horses, but the unloading 

 at the plant would have been facilitated, since one large 

 load may be unloaded much more rapidly than many 

 small ones. As a result of these possible economies, the 

 tendency is more and more to have the milk brought in 

 by men who make a business of hauling. Where an indi- 

 vidual farmer will haul three or four cans, such a hauler 

 will haul from twenty to fifty ten-gallon cans, and an auto 

 truck will often double or treble that quantity. In some 



1 Jennings, I. G., A Study of the New York City Milk Problem, p. 17. 



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