BUILDING NOW 



OR NEXT YEAR 



Summer's approach is causing much hard thinking on the part of many 

 growers on the subject of to huild or not to build, ivhether 'twere better to 

 wait in the hope of lower prices or to add glass now and earn a profit on it 

 next season. Here are figures showing how costs are dropping. 







NE of the most striking 

 impressions which a trav- 

 eler in Mexico brings 

 back with him is the aver- 

 a g e Mexican 's seeming 

 inability to do anything 

 except to say "manana, " 

 which means tomorrow. 

 The Mexicans delay doing 

 everything as long as pos- 

 sible. We florists today are doing the 

 same thing in regard to building green- 

 houses. The only difference between a 

 Mexican's "manana" and a florist's 

 tomorrow is that the first is caused by 

 tropical laziness, while the latter is 

 prompted by a seemingly good reason. 

 Whether or not it is a good reason, 

 nobody knows, and nobody will know 

 for some time. But we can all study 

 the situation and 

 rely a bit on the 

 judgment of some 

 of the shrewdest 

 and best - known 

 business men in 

 the country. 



Nobody Knows. 



Even they do 

 not know. They 

 are simply draw- 

 ing their own con- 

 clusions from past 

 known facts and 

 present happen- 

 ings. The adjust- 

 ment after this 

 war may be as 

 different from the 

 adjustment period 

 after the Civil 

 war as day is from 

 night, yet it may 

 be the same. So 

 let us spend a 

 moment in recall- 

 ing the revisions 

 in prices for the 

 readjustment period during the years 

 following in the wake of the Civil war. 

 During the war and for two years fol- 

 lowing, prices went steadily up, some of 

 them going away over double what they 

 were before the war. The second year 

 after the war there was a sharp decline 

 in prices, the same as there was the lat- 

 ter part of last year and the first part of 

 this year. But they did not go any- 

 where near the pre-war level. Then for 

 a period of about ten years the prices 

 slowly descended until, in some cases, 

 they touched the pre-war prices. 



Historians, in recording those days, 

 state that the reason for some articles 

 hitting the actual pre-war prices was 



the era of invention after the war. 

 Many labor-saving devices were de- 

 signed and put on the market. But 

 there were some articles which never 

 did return to the same price. 



Just how closely the period of read- 

 justment after this war will follow in 

 the steps of the Civil war reconstruc- 

 tion period is hard to tell. In the first 

 place, the Civil war was limited to this 

 country. The south was affected the 

 most and the north, of course, suffered, 

 too. In the late war the whole world 

 has been affected. So now the whole 

 world must underga a period of adjust- 

 ment. Predictions as to what will hap- 

 pen will probably be as accurate as 

 the predictions of the wise heads in 

 the time of the Civil war; some will 

 be partlj' correct, others will be a lit- 



The Rise and Fall of 

 Building Material Prices. 



Pecky Cypress, 1 x 6-inch, per 1 000 feei 



No. 2 Common Cypress, 1 x6-inch, per 1000 feet, 



Tank Cypress, I ^-inch, per 1000 feet 



Tank Cypress, 2-inch, per 1000 feet 



Steel, bar base, per 100 pounds 



(U. S. Steel Corp. prices) 



Glass, 1 6x24-inch, per box 



Black Steel Pipe, 2-inch, per ton 



Cement, per barrel 



Paint, per gallon 



Average per cent of decrease 



tie closer to the real truth, and still 

 others will be altogether wroiig. 



Conditions Similar. 



But, so far, conditions have been 

 similar to those after the Civil war. 

 The higli levc) price was reached in 

 most commodities about two years 

 after the war in both cases. Then 

 there oarae a sharp decline in both 

 eases. Now we are in the midst of that 

 sharp decline. Whether or not we shall 

 follow history and descend slowly from 

 now on can be told only by waiting to 

 see. Men in control of large businesses 

 in the country say they do not look for 

 more than from ten tc fifteen per cent 



decline from now to the spring of next 

 year. 



So much for the general outlook. Now 

 to get back to the conditions at pres- 

 ent prevailing in the matter of build- 

 ing greenhouses. In 1919, two years 

 ago, most of the greenhouse building 

 materials were at their highest prices, 

 materials were extremely difficult to 

 obtain, and yet florists wanted to build. 

 Now, prices have come down and mate- 

 rials are comparatively easy to get, and 

 florists do not want to build. Why this 

 strange change? It is easy to explain. 

 In the last two years prices have come 

 down, but not to the pre-war levels. 

 Florists, like business men in all other 

 lines, are waiting for the prices to hit 

 the pre-war levels before they start to 

 build many houses. But will they ever 

 hit those old 

 prices, and, if 

 thej' do, how soon 

 will they do it? 



Ouess Again. 



Once more we 

 have to look at 

 history, study 

 present conditions 

 and hazard a 

 guess. Men at the 

 heads of the larg- 

 er companies 

 supplying the nec- 

 essary materials 

 are all firm in their 

 belief that prices 

 cannot recede any 

 more than twenty 

 per cent, if that 

 much, in the next 

 year. Perhaps ten 

 per cent is all that 

 is even likely. We 

 can do no more 

 than to take it for 

 granted that they 

 are the best in- 

 formed as to the conditions regulating 

 their particular industries and, there- 

 fore, know better than others just what 

 can be expected from those industries. 

 Suppose that the average cost of 

 building a greenhouse does go down ten 

 per cent in the next year. A florist 

 desiring a greenhouse at the present 

 time is quoted a price, we will say, of 

 $10,000. He thinks it is too high and 

 decides to wait till next year. At that 

 time, if the ten per cent drop has come, 

 he can build the same house for $9,000, 

 or at a saving of $1,000. But he is so 

 engrossed in the $1,000 saving that he 

 forgets an important fact: He can 

 probably do a great deal more business 



