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The Rorists' Review 



June 23, 1921 



ir 



Pablished every Tharsday by 

 The Florists' Publishing Co.. 



600-S60 Oaxton BulldlnK, 



S06 Sooth Dearborn St., Chicago. 



Tel., Wabash 819S. 



Retrlstered cable address, 



Florriew, Chicago. 



Entered M second class matter 

 Dec. 3, 1897. at the post-ofSce at Chi- 

 cago, 111., under the Act of March 

 3, 1879. 



Subscription price, t2.00 a year. 

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



Adyertlsing rates quoted on 

 request. Only strictly trade ad* 

 yertlslng accepted. 



n 



Besults bring advertising. 

 The Beview brings results. 



The best customer is not necessarily the 

 largest one; on the contrary, the most 

 profitable customers may be those who pay 

 with greatest regularity. 



Quality, not quantity, should be our 

 first consideration. Good stock seldom 

 goes begging; poor stock sells well only 

 in case of general shortage. 



This should be better than the aver- 

 age summer in the florists' business, be- 

 cause a smaller number of people than 

 usual will leave home for the summer. 



Efficiency is demanded of dollars, now 

 that they are not so easy to get, as much 

 as of employees. Spend your money, to 

 tho cent, where you will get something 

 ' for it. Cut out the nonessentials and the 

 lost motion you have been paying for. 



To the florist who sees that he is paid 

 the money that is due him and that he 

 gets full value for the money he expends, 

 the business readjustment will not cause 

 embarrassment. To do this, however, he 

 needs unremitting persistence and cease- 

 less care. 



Possibly florists are not different from 

 other men doing business of corresponding 

 size, but it seems that the greatest need 

 in this trade is for system and manage- 

 ment. Too few florists have adequate 

 office facilities; too few have accurate 

 accounting systems and weakest of. all 

 is the handling of collections and of ac- 

 counts payable. 



Although one of Bruant's earlier 

 introductions (1887), Beaute Poitevine is 

 today one of the geraniums most in de- 

 mand. It may be that its color, a lively 

 light salmon, is more popular now than in 

 some of the thirty-four years the variety 

 has been in the trade, which would ac- 

 count in part for the fact that the variety 

 has brought as good a price as any and 

 better than most this spring. 



Why pick a new name under which 

 to boost Armistice day as a flower day? 

 Under that name November 11 is known 

 in European countries and here, if not all 

 over the globe. It will be easier to 

 foster the sentiment already attached to 

 the name of Armistice day — which the 

 American Legion already celebrates — 

 than to create an occasion for flowers 

 under a name to which the public now 

 attaches no meaning. 



More sign^ point to underproduction 

 next season than the reverse. Every 

 grower should see that every inch of 

 space is utilized for the production of 

 good stock. 



Have you noted how large a propor- 

 tion of The Beview 's Classified plant 

 ads now come from the extreme east! It 

 is possible to draw various deductions 

 from the fact. 



Sentiment is the foundation of all 

 flower days. The bigger the sentiment, 

 the bigger the flower day. The trade 

 can make the flower day, but it cannot 

 make the sentiment. 



A GREAT many men in the florists ' busi- 

 ness have found the key to success, but 

 have not yet located the keyhole. It 

 frequently is concealed by the mass of 

 accumulated papers on their desks. 



The Bulletin of Peony News for May, 

 edited by Secretary A. P. Saunders, 

 Clinton, N. Y., for the American Peony 

 Society, is devoted to a symposium, the 

 result of the most successful "rating 

 list" questionnaire that has so far been 

 sent out, eighty responses having been re- 

 ceived. 



Despite repeated injunctions in this 

 column to mail photographs flat, they still 

 reach this office rolled in nothing sturdier 

 than paper or thin cardboard. They are 

 usually beyond repair and worthless after 

 having been crushed flat in the mail. 

 Wrap your photographs on a flat piece of 

 corrugated box board. 



In the issue mailed June 16 The Be- 

 view stated it would be glad to receive 

 lists of florists in every town and sug- 

 gested that classified pages from tele- 

 phone or city directories would furnish 

 the information wanted. Within twenty- 

 four hours the classified page showing the 

 florists of Kenosha, Wis., had been re- 

 ceived in the envelope of L. Turner & 

 Sons, and since then they have been com- 

 ing in from other points by nearly every 

 mail. The Beview is checking up the 

 names of florists from all available 

 sources and sending an invitation to sub 

 scribe in each case a florist is found who 

 is not already a reader of this paper. 

 The publishers hope to be able to add 

 quite a number of new names to the sub- 

 scription list before the new season opens 

 up, as it is evident the trade is growing 

 rapidly. 



SIX! COUNT 'EM! SIX! 



The summer schedule of trade gather- 

 ings in the west includes the following: 



Tri-State Florists' Association (North 

 and South Dakota and western Minne- 

 sota), meeting at Fargo, N. D., June 24 

 and 25. 



Missouri State Florists' Association, 

 meeting at Kansas City, Mo., June 27. 



Oklahoma State Florists' Association, 

 meeting at Oklahoma City, July 7 and 8. 



Texas State Florists' Association, 

 meeting at San Antonio, July 12 to 14. 



Wisconsin State Florists' Association 

 meeting at Madison July 19. 



Kansas State Florists' Association, 

 meeting at Topcka, August 4 and 5. 



The middle western trade travelers 

 liave laid out their routes accordingly. 



rightly, that they are entitled to their 

 money's worth. More general and 

 thorough satisfaction might be obtained 

 by such buyers if they would give, on 

 their part, some contribution to the suc- 

 cess of their transactions. Some of the 

 points on which attention is needed are 

 set forth in occasional letters to The 

 Beview. Here is one, for instance: 



Many florists send orders for stock with the 

 request that it be forwarded by parcel post, but 

 they do not remit anything for postage. A few 

 days ago we received an order from California 

 for 400 gladiolus bulbs to be sent by parcel 

 post, but nothing was enclosed for postage. It 

 would have cost about $1.60 to send the pack- 

 age by mall, as requested. 



We have received lately seventy-five orders to 

 send goods by parcel post. Not over ten were 

 accompanied by a remittance. If buyers want 

 their stock sent by parcel post they should re- 

 mit the amount of the postage. If too much 

 Is sent, any reliable shipper will return the dif- 

 ference. 



It would seem that every business man 

 would attend to the details of his orders 

 with businesslike accuracy. Yet on this 

 point, it appears, attention is needed on 

 the part of the majority. 



But more marked want of regard on 



the part of buyers is exhibited by the 



following: 



Frequently florists will send a long list of dah- 

 lia roots, ordering from two to five of a variety, 

 and expect the buyer to put up these small items 

 at the hundred rate. We received an order a 

 few days ago for two of each of thirty-one va- 

 rieties, with remittance figured at the hundred 

 rate. Our price list reads plainly "per 100." It 

 requires a great deal of work to put up an order 

 of that character, and if the shoe were on the 

 other foot, the sender would not do it for the 

 low price per hundred. Those who send orders 

 of that kind should use some thought and Judg- 

 ment. 



The buyer who finds cause for dissatis- 

 faction in the way his orders for stock 

 are filled would do well to ask if he is 

 doing his part to produce satisfaction. 

 When he, through thoughtlessness or 

 something else, is guilty of such prac- 

 tices as those mentioned above, he is 

 tempting trouble. 



LADIES' S. A. F. 



The president of the Ladies' Society 

 of American Florists, Mrs. George 

 Asmus, has made the following appoint- 

 ments for the convention which will be 

 held in Washington, August 16, 1921: 



Auditor: Mrs. C. C. Pollworth, Mil- 

 waukee, Wis. 



Introduction committee: Mrs. Z. D. 

 Blackistone, Mrs. George H. Cooke, 

 Mrs. C. Schellhorn, Miss Amelia Gude 

 and Miss Louise Gude. 



Mrs. Albert M. Herr, Sec'y. 



A ROAD T.TTTTi A BOUZ^VAKD. 



The Pacific coast is advancing rap- 

 idly as the producer of stock required 

 by the trade in other parts of the United 

 States. It is a pleasure to believe that 

 The Beview plays an important part 

 in this development by affording Pa- 

 cific coast growers a direct road to 

 market. Like this: 



I wish to say that I am more than satisfied 

 with the results I have obtained through adver- 

 tising in The Review and I am sure that I will 

 use more space in the future than I have used 

 In the past. — Panl Ecke, Los Angeles, Cal., June 

 15, 1921. 



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 Beview. 



TEMPTINQ TROUBLE. 



Buyers of stock are ready to criticise 

 those from whom they order when every- 

 thing concerned with their transactions 

 is not as it should be. They believe, and 



BRIEF ANSWERS. 



F. N., Ga. — The specimens were badly 

 dried up on arrival, but the heath seems 

 to be Erica melanthera, which is not a 

 form of Scotch heather, and the acacia 

 is probably A. armata, also called para- 

 doxa. 



