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26 



The Florists' Review 



NOVBMBBB 4, 1920 



fl 



Eatablished 1897 



Pabllsbed every Thursdar by 

 Thk Florists' Poblishino Co., 



600-560 Oaxton BulIdlnK, 



608 Soatb Dearborn St., Ohlcasro. 



Tel., Wabash 8195. 



Reffistered cable address, 



Florvlew, Cblcago. 



Entered as second class matter 

 Dec. 3, 1897. at the poet-ofllce at Chi- 

 cago, III., under the Act of March 

 3.1879. 



Subscription price, $2.00 a year. 

 To Canada, $3.00; to Europe. $4.00. 



Advertlslntr rates quoted on 

 request. Only strictly trade ad- 

 vertlsliiK accepted. 



n 



EESULTS. 



We give them. You get them. 



We both have them. 



Business will now return to normalcy. 



Even the price of cypress has fallen; 

 some day glass will break! 



Credit men watch closely those who 

 advertise themselves instead of their busi- 

 ness. 



There are those who predict that the 

 price of a lily next Easter will pass all 

 records. 



Now that the landslide is over, there 

 will be more attention to business and 

 less to politics. 



Among the things taught us by the 

 war and its aftermath is that we did not 

 exhaust our rose plants before discard- 

 ing them. 



Growers will benefit through recent 

 sharp decline in the prices of fertilizers, 

 caused by the fall in prices for farm 

 products. 



Next week, November 10 to 14, the 

 Chrysantheum Society of America will 

 hold its annual meeting and exhibition 

 at Washington, D. C. 



The October issue of the S, A. F. 

 Journal, just sent members of the so- 

 ciety, carries the second installment of 

 the Cleveland convention proceedings, as 

 well as a page of publicity campaign 

 comment from Secretary Young's pen. 



A GENTLEMAN who is in the insecticide 

 business says it is the best little business 

 that ever was: no matter how "punky" 

 the times, the bugs display their cus- 

 tomary fecundity. True, but many of 

 us note that people are not so lavish as 

 they were in their purchases of funeral 

 flowers. 



Nine out of ten corporations fail with- 

 in ten years of their formation, and the 

 average held good last year, J. David 

 Larson, commissioner of the Omaha 

 Chamber of Commerce, told 350 dele- 

 gates attending the convention of the 

 National Association of Commercial Or- 

 ganization Secretaries at Chicago Octo- 

 ber 25. "In considering the failures," 

 he said, "we find forty-eight per cent 

 are due to incompetency in management 

 and thirty per cent to lack of capital. * ' 

 Every florist knows that to do business 

 now takes more capital than was needed 

 before the war. 



The movement back to the farm has 

 begun. It is possible once more to get 

 a bed in a factory town. 



Coal is on the toboggan; production 

 in October exceeded two million tons 

 each working day, with consumption 

 small, than^ principally to warm 

 weather. 



At $40 each the slogan signs offered 

 by the national publicity committee are 

 the cheapest decoration possible for the 

 grower's boiler shed or similar place. 

 There are not many left. 



- There is not even one strictly florists' 

 flower show of the first magnitude any- 

 where in the United States this year. 

 The local shows are principally in the 

 hands of the private gardeners. 



Business with florists usually is good 

 or bad in reverse ratio to the state of 

 the weather. The Indian summer was 

 long and flowers became too plentiful; 

 then the weather turned, the supply of 

 flowers shortened and business at once 

 began to pick up. 



By recent notice the quarantine of the 

 Department of Agriculture on account of 

 the European com borer has been ex- 

 tended to include the towns of New Bed- 

 ford, Sherborn and West Bridgewater, 

 Mass.; Portsmouth and Eye, N. H.; 

 Knox, Arkwright, Portland, Villanova, 

 Westfield and Tonawanda, N. Y. 



Probably no department of the aver- 

 age florist's business now is of greater 

 importance than collections. With fall- 

 ing prices and increasing unemployment 

 many customers heretofore prompt pay 

 will lose the ability to meet their obliga- 

 tions. Every florist should bend his 

 efforts toward reducing his accounts re- 

 ceivable at once. 



FLOWER SHOW. 



The editorial rooms of The Eeview 

 have been gay during the last few days, 

 even though in the hands of carpenters, 

 masons and electricians, being expanded 

 to keep pace with the needs of a steadily 

 growing business. The air of good cheer 

 has been provided by the paper's 

 friends who sent flowers. First came a 

 vase of a new pompon chrysanthemum, 

 from Martin Bilon, head gardener at the 

 University of Michigan botanical gar- 

 dens and arboretum. The flowers are 

 semi-double, lavender. It is a sport of 

 1918, from a seedling. "These plants 

 are easy to grow and form a compact 

 bush full of lovely flowers, 250 to 350 

 in number," writes Mr. Bilon. "We 

 want to do something for the trade, if 

 possible, and have a number of other 

 new things under trial." 



From E, Vincent, Jr., & Sons Co., 

 White Marsh, Md., came a large box of 

 Dahlia Patrick O'Mara. This is a new 

 variety, to be disseminated in 1921. The 

 huge semi-double flowers are of an un- 

 usual golden bronze color and so tough 

 is the texture that they stood a two 

 days ' journey well and revived promptly 

 when placed in water in a cool place. 

 Some of the flowers lasted nearly a 

 week. 



WAGES TO COME NEXT. 



Now that the manufacturers in many 

 lines have taken losses in the descent of 

 prices and the producers of raw mate- 

 rials have done likewise, the wage earn- 

 ers' turn comes next, according to a late 

 review of the business situation. Such 

 an event will send back to this trade 



members who left it for other lines of 

 industry in response to the lure of high 

 war-time wages. The probability of 

 such an occurrence is outlined as fol- 

 lows: 



' ' Price declines in the industries i^ost 

 affected have gone as far as they can at 

 the expense of the profits of operators, 

 and as far as they ought to at the ex- 

 pense of producers of raw materials. 

 Cotton goods are being sold in some in- 

 stances below present production costs, 

 upon the belief that wage costs will be 

 reduced. There is a widespread belief 

 that wage earners who have had large 

 advances in the last five years will have 

 to make a contribution to the general 

 cause of lower living costs. At this 

 time, when everything is unsettled and 

 everybody is looking for the bottom 

 level, where it will be safe to operate 

 freely, this question of wages continu- 

 ally intrudes itself. Already instances 

 are announced where groups of wage 

 earners have voluntarily offered to ac- 

 cept reductions of ten, fifteen or twenty 

 per cent to enable industries to continue 

 in operation. The opinion is common 

 that the movement will become general, 

 if the consumers ' strike continues. That 

 is to say, if events demonstrate that 

 prices must be lowered in order to dis- 

 tribute the products of the industries, 

 wages eventually will be adjusted ac- 

 cordingly." 



PBEDIOTS CALM COURSE. 



In its review last week of the business 

 outlook, the National City bank, of New 

 York, found no , reason for pessimism in 

 the general downward trend of prices 

 and reaflirmed the belief that the coun- 

 try is not in for a long period of depres- 

 sion. Turning to the credit situation, it 

 feels that the danger of further inflation 

 is over for the present. 



"It is a sigfnificant fact that for the 

 first time in the history of this country 

 a period of expansion has culminated 

 and prices have turned decisively down- 

 ward without a banking panic. Here- 

 tofore the turn has been always accom- 

 panied and the downward pace acceler- 

 ated by a collapse of bank credit. This 

 time instead of the situation being ag- 

 gravated by the efforts of thousands of 

 banks to reduce their loans and increase 

 their cash reserves, the situation will be 

 supported by an adequate banking sys- 

 tem. Business houses that are entitled 

 to credit will continue to receive it. 

 Valuations will necessarily have to un- 

 dergo revision, but the whole financial 

 situation is altogether different frdm 

 that which has existed at any other time 

 of business reaction. The business com- 

 munity is protected from the shock, 

 alarm and stress which results from a 

 general contraction of credit. Not only 

 has there been none up to this time, but 

 there will be none; liquidation win fol- 

 low its natural course as shaped by con- 

 ditions in the markets. ' ' 



PEOOF OF THE PUDDINO. 



There is an old saying that nothing 

 succeeds like success. It is so with ad- 

 vertising. Eeview advertising brings 

 results and results bring The Eeview 

 advertising, like this: 



Enclosed find check. Put the same ad In The 

 Review again. It sure brought results. — L. van 

 Rompaey, Belgium Greenhouse Co., Huntington, 

 W. Va., October 30, 1920. 



If you hear a man complain of the 



cost of advertising you can be pretty 



certain he spends a good bit of money 



elsewhere than in The Review. 



