56 



The Florists' Review 



Dkcbubeb 10, 1914. 



Establtahed, 1897. by O. L. GRANT. 



Published every Tburaday by 

 Thk Florists' Publishing C!o., 



63 )-560 Caxton BaildiDRr, 



508 South Dearborn St . Chicago. 



Tele. Wabash 8195. 



Re^i^tered cable addiess, 



Florrlew, Chicago. 



Entered as second class matter 

 Dec. 3. ISin, at the post-office at Chi- 

 ca«ro. 111., under the Act of March 

 3. 1879. 



Subscription price, ll.on a year. 

 To Canada, $2 00; to Europe, $3.00. 



Advertlslnir ratos quoted upon 

 request. Only strictly trade ad- 

 Tertlslni; accepted. 



NOTICE. 



It i* impossibl* to cu«r«nt«« 

 tk* insertion, discontinunnc* 

 or altorntion of amj adTortito- 

 mont unless instructions sr« 

 rocoivod by 



5 P. M. TUESDAY. 



80CIETT OF AMEKICAir FLORISTS, 

 (ncorporated by Aot of Conrrsu, March 4, 1901. 



OlBeer* for 1614: Preftld^-nt, Theodore Wlrtb. 

 MlDo^apolU; tIcc president. Patrick Welch. Bos- 

 too; BPcr»^t«ry, John Young. 53 W 2Stb St.. New 

 fork City: treaiurer. W. F. Kai<tlns, Buffalo. 



OfllctTS for 1815: Presld^-nt. Patrick Welch. 

 Beaton: Tic* prealdent, Oaulel MacRorle, Ssd 

 rraoi-iiii'o: secretary, Joho Toudr, 58 W. 28tt 

 •t.. New York City; treasurer, W. F Kaatlng. 

 Buffalo. 



Thirty flrst aonaal oooTeDtlon, San Francisco. 

 Cal., AuKiiHt 17 to 20 1915. 



RESULTS. 



We give them. You get them. 



We both have them. 



Che.\p juices never built up a jierma- 

 nent businps.«. Sell good stock, give good 

 service, and charge a price that will let 

 you maintain quality. 



The grower who is getting the money 

 is the one who grows the newer varieties 

 and does them well ; he does not have 

 any more competition than he did when 

 the trade was younger. 



Thekk always is much complaint at 

 this sc'ison of tiie year regarding weak 

 stems of cariiiitioiis. A little l;itcr the 

 troul)!e disa]i]>cars, becinse, in most i-ases, 

 it is due to atmospheric conditions. 



Stranck as it may seem, florists still 

 are cas'iing checks for strangers. One 

 would suppose, after all the items that 

 have been [irintcd about this ancient 

 swindle, that the j)resentation of a check 

 calling for casti change would be like the 

 sight of a red flag to a railroad engineer. 



RULE FOR BEGINNERS. 



In picking out a town in which to 

 start a flower business, remember tluit 

 if you clioose a town that has only one 

 industry, be it agriculture, wiitches, 

 shoes, or automobiles, your flower busi- 

 ness will have all the ups and downs 

 of the town's one industry. Find a 

 town that has agriculture an<l a diver 

 sity of industry; there you have a 

 town in which business n<'ver will })c 

 bad for long. 



THE HOOSIER FHILOSOFHER. 



1 wish to thank The Review for the 

 nice little write-up you gave me in the 

 edition of t^ovember 2(5. 1 am glad to 

 think I have succeeded in making some 

 friends, but what I am most thankful 

 for is that those I admire nu)st include 

 Mien of all nationalities. Dave Harum 

 liad it right when he said: " The 's 

 as much human nature in some folks as 

 th' is in others, if not more." 



Notwithstanding all we hear to the 

 lontrary these days, nothing can shake 

 my belief that all civilized nations all 

 over the earth produce about the same 

 number of extra sj)ecial8, seconds and 

 shorts to the square foot. H. .lunge. 



HONORABLE MENTION. 



.Not ;i few subscribers save them 



selves the bother of annual renewal by 



sending The Review .$2, $'.i, or some 



times $~>, instead of the dollar-bill that 



insures fifty-two \ isits of the paper. 



.Xniong those who hav(> this week en- 



idlled thenisehes for more than one 



year in advance ;ire: 



TWO YEARS. 



r.rowii. l'( tor, I.niicastor, I'a. 

 \;ittci-, (;,(!., Miiriiiotte, Wis. 

 DmiscIi, Martin, 'J crre Haute, Iiid. 

 l.rii;,'ciirchl('i , C, Hcnvcr, Colo. 

 Itnix, K., Sioux Fjills, S. I). 

 • Irandi', .lolin, ludiaimpolis, liid. 

 (Jreen, I"aniil II., Jioonslioro, Md. 

 I.iltle, .lolin \V., Pliilndelpliia, I'n. 



The Review stops coining when the 



subscription runs out. The green notice 



with the last coj>y tells tlu^ story; no 



bills iire run up; no duns sent. 



THE PRICE CUTTER. 



The price cutter, like the poor, will 

 always be with us. And the price cut- 

 ter always will get business. But the 

 price cutter ne\'t r will be a menace 

 to the florist who offers quality — 

 the price cutter only is dangerous to 

 llii^ man who offers no better stock. 



Nobody ever knew quality stock to be 

 sold at cut prices. It happens occasion- 

 :illy, but not regularly. When one man 

 regularly prices his stock below the 

 other fellow it is a fairly safe bet 

 there is about the same <iifference in 

 the quality, perhaps a little more. 



Prices in this trade mean extremely 

 little until one h;is seen the stock. He 

 it ])lants or cut flowers, <iiiality is so 

 \aiiable that it should be the first 

 ruiisideraf ion, not jirice. 



Xinety-iiiiie titnes out of the hun 

 ■ Ireil, the m,an who thinks his stock 

 is as g(»o(i as the other fellow's is not 

 trying to undersell. (^uite the ojipo 

 site: he feels Ii.^ should get the same 

 money — a little more if his stock is 

 better. 



THE SITUATION IN VALLEY. 



I'he Avar in Europe has upset a lot 

 of calculations on the ]iart of the 

 trade in this country, but no one has 

 Pound himself farther from the fact 

 than h;is the man who .jumped to the 

 conciusioii that the war would shut 

 off 'supplies of liade commodities. As 

 suggested in The Review of August <i, 

 the ojiposite lias proved to be the c;ise. 

 .\nieii(:i has Ixmmi, if not the only 0[)en 

 market; the ono in which it seemcil 

 most feasible to try to work off the 

 sniplus. So America, instciid of being 

 starved by the war, has been surfeitcil 

 with man}' articles. And now the val 

 ley pips arc I'oming. Ordinarily, great 

 i(iiantities of Oennan pi]is go to Eng- 



land, with lesser quantities to France 

 and Kussia. This year they will take 

 none. The surplus, if it does not stay 

 in Hamburg, will come to America. It 

 looks now as though valley, instead of 

 being one of the scarce articles, will 

 be one of the most plentiful of trade 

 commodities as long as the war 

 lasts. 



BOUQUET GREEN. 



Apparently the quantity of bouquet 

 green picked this season was not so 

 great as in other years, Nbat-Nthe de- 

 cK^ase does not appear to have been 

 greater than the falling off in)demand. 

 It seems likely, however, tlret the late 

 business will be heavy, this being a 

 season when putting it off seems to be 

 a practice with buyers in all lines. 



It looks as though there will be 

 enough good green to go around, but 

 not so much that prices will be un- 

 stable. First-class green commands 6 

 cents to 7Vl> cents per pound at Chicago, 

 according to quantity bought. There 

 is a large quantity of early picked 

 green that can not be used without 

 (lyeing. 



One of the largest South Water street 

 houses in Chicago, credited with usually 

 winding about 200,000 yards of light 

 wreathing for the provision trade, is 

 reported as this season cutting the 

 (piantity in half. 



BUSINESS EMBARRASSMENTS. 



Buffalo, N. Y.— Leopold A. Fibers, 

 who not long ago sold the store at 

 2692 Main street to Charles Sandi- 

 ford, has filed a voluntary petition in 

 bankruptcy in the Federal court. He 

 owes $2,799.79 and has assets valued 

 at $507. 



Birmingham, Ala. — .\ voluntary peti- 

 tion in bankruptcy was filed in the 

 Federal court Tuesday, December 1, by 

 the McVay Seed Co., 2018 First avenue. 

 The liabilities of the concern are 

 scheduled at $16,290.49 and the assets at 

 $19,668.09. Dr. R. V. Mobley was ap- 

 pointed by Referee-in-bankruptcy E. M. 

 Dryer as the receiver, to opei'ate the 

 business as a going concern. 



CHICAGO. 



The Market. 



Business has been irregular during 

 the last few days. There would be an 

 occasional spurt, but on the whole sales 

 have not been coming up to last year's 

 record. It must not be forgotten, how- 

 ever, that comparisons made with last 

 season make an especially unsatisfac- 

 tory showing for the reai^on that last 

 year was an unusually good one, hardly 

 to 1)0 equaled except with extremely 

 fa\orable conditions. 



There has been considerable reduc- 

 tion in the supply of stock since last 

 report. The weather has been almost 

 uninterruptedly dark and gloomy ever 

 since Thanksgiving. It has not been 

 cobl, but the lack of sunshine is appar- 

 ent in the quantity and. quality of 

 stock arriving. (chrysanthemums now 

 are practically out of the market, 

 which in itself makes a big reduction 

 in the ()iianlity of flowers handled. 

 Also, carnations are much less abun- 

 dant than they were. Roses are suflii- 

 ciently plentiful for the demand, but 

 the supply neverthtdess is light. Violets 

 are more plentiful, but the*' are poor 



