'-^. ^.w"'t S^^v ."•»«■ 



24 



The Weekly Florists^ Review* 



January 11, 1912. 



tomer, at a low figure, say, from 50 

 cents to $1 per hundred, or at the same 

 price the faker pays? You will say 

 the latter buys thousands at one time; 

 true enough, but only when he can buy 

 at a loss to the grower. When you 

 are selling at a profit it is the store 

 man to whom you sell; in fact, you are 

 dependent on the legitimate retail flow- 

 er merchant for your profits. Then 

 why not assist the latter in upholding 

 the standard of the carnation? Make 

 it possible for him to send to his cus- 

 tomers occasionally two or three dozen 

 carnations gratis, the grower to bear 

 part of the expense, for you will surely 

 share in the profits that result from 

 such advertising. 



Bight here occurs to me a suggestion 

 from Mr. Elberfield, of Kansas City. 

 His idea is to advertise that with each 

 one dozen sold another dozen will be 

 sent free of charge to some friend of 

 the buyer. By selling them at 50 cents 

 per dozen at this time, you are really 

 not cheapening the flower, but merely 

 giving a few away. Mr. Elberfield 's 

 contention is that this will result in 

 two sales eventually, as the party re- 

 ceiving the flowers will want to recip- 

 rocate. Any such schemes will tend to 



son find an outlet. Still, the propor- 

 tion of first-class stores in those cities 

 is correspondingly greater and I am 

 sure a concentrated effort by grower, 

 commission man and retailer combined 

 would at least help some. 



The trouble is that there is too much 

 animosity between the two factors. It 

 would certainly be to the advantage of 

 both if more harmonjjr and more of an 

 exchange of ideas existed. If only the 

 producer of our wares were to enlist 

 his services in a retail store for one 

 season and there pieet face to face the 

 final consumer of the products of his 

 thousands of square feet of glass, I 

 am positive he would be well repaid 

 for his trouble. 



In my enthusiasm I have again edged 

 away from my subject, but I trust you 

 will pardon my negligence. 



How About a Summer Carnation? 



Speaking of exchanging views, why 

 wovdd not a summer carnation be a 

 good thing to develop? We have roses 

 which do especially well during the 

 warm summer months; surely our car- 

 nation growers of today can in time 

 produce some varieties which will be 

 at their best in summer. Not that 



Rose Sunburst. 



relieve a glut without injuring our 

 business. 



The Need of Cooperation. 



My suggestions for partially reliev- 

 ing a glut may be rather vague fancies, 

 in consideration of the fact that the 

 surplus in this city (Detroit) is naught 

 when compared with the hundreds of 

 thousands of carnations, violets and 

 roses for which the commission man in 

 New York or Chicago must each sea- 



many kinds would be required; a good 

 white and a good pink will do for a 

 starter. 



As previously stated, the odor of the 

 carnation is one of its valuable fea- 

 tures. Instead of giving so much 

 thought and care toward the producing 

 of larger, always larger blooms, I be- 

 lieve that the further development of 

 that spicy, ever-pleasant odor, so pro- 

 nounced in some white varieties, would 

 not be amiss. 



Another suggestion I might offer is 

 the growing of White Enchantress for 

 funeral work. If not disbudded they 

 will prove most profitable to the grow- 

 er, as they bloom freely and bring 

 good sized flowers, which in turn will 

 bring good prices from the retailer 

 when white flowers are scarce. 



My endeavor has been to make this 

 paper interesting and instructive and 

 I may have made remarks which some 

 of my audience will resent. I can as- 

 sure you that no harm was meant, but, 

 as stated before, it is only by the ut- 

 most frankness that we can make the 

 carnation still more true to the title 

 of my paper. 



Orading Flowers Honestly. 



Eight here I might bring to your 

 attention the fact that when a cus- 

 tomer pays a price for one dozen car- 

 nations, each and every flower in that 

 dozen must be up to the standard; one 

 poor flower in the lot will bring forth 

 a great big kick. Many customers even 

 go so far as to expect a baker's dozen. 

 Why, then, do some growers still per- 

 sist in slipping one or two culls in 

 with every twenty-five blooms? I 

 know it must hurt to have a number 

 of blooms in every day's cut which 

 will bring but little on the market; 

 still, by bunching these separately they 

 will bring some returns, and as soon 

 as it becomes known that you grade 

 your flowers honestly your stock will 

 be always in demand. Your brand of 

 carnations will sell before all others, 

 because the buyer will get value re- 

 ceived every time. 



As a final suggestion, I would say: 

 Do not resort to any more pickling of 

 stock than is absolutely necessary. 

 Nothing will so prejudice people 

 against a certain kind of flower as the 

 fact that it will not last long, and 

 pickled carnations or any other pickled 

 flower will positively not last. Bose, 

 violet and chrysanthemum growers will 

 also please note these last remarks. 



NEW S. A. F. DIRECTORS. 



Charles H. Totty. 



Charles H. Totty 's recent experience 

 seems to give strong support to the 

 statement that honors, like troubles, 

 never come singly. Within the last 

 three months three honors — and bur- 

 dens — have been heaped upon him; he 

 has been made chairman of the S. A. F. 

 national show committee, president of 

 the Chrysanthemum Society of America 

 and a member of the S. A. F. executive 

 board. 



Mr. Totty was born in Shropshire, 

 England, in 1873. At the age of 13, 

 after obtaining a common school educa- 

 tion, he began a three years' appren- 

 ticeship in the gardens of a Mr. Sher- 

 ingham. Then he spent a year in the 

 nurseries of Messrs. Dickson, of Ches- 

 ter, and a year at Norris Green, a noted 

 fruit growing establishment near Liv- 

 erpool. He came to America in 1893. 

 After being employed for a year and 

 a half on the estate of Mrs. Thompson, 

 at Canandaigua, N. Y., he removed to 

 Madison, N. J., and went to work on 

 the estate of H. McKay Twombly, under 

 the superintendency of Arthur Herring- 

 ton. After eight years of valuable ex- 

 perience there, he embarked in business 

 for himself by buying the James Hart 

 greenhouses at Madison. These he en- 

 larged and improved, and six years later 



, , ....^..- v^^...-...at^.,. 



■iuiUlMaiakllfal 



■•> . . IL ^>--.-.-.^L^-: 



