Febbdabt 6, 1013. 



The Florists^ Review 



15 



our products are perishable. Our qual- 

 ity is a personal matter. Were all the 

 glass built in the last ten years con- 

 structed by a florists ' trust it would, be 

 no small concern. Do you believe for 

 one minute that such an organization 

 would sit idly by and allow the product 

 to sell itself? I doubt it. Now, I'm 

 not here knocking the wholesaler, for 

 he does his best to sell it to advantage, 

 and" the retailer no doubt tries in his 

 way to reach the people, but I am trying 

 to impress on you the one fact that we 

 are all in one boat, and that boat is 

 drifting for lack of some power that is 

 not gasoline. 



The Fortunate Florists. 



The retail florist without glass in any 

 city is perhaps the most indefpendent 

 one of our fraternity. All he has to 

 do is to stop buying and he is out of 

 business. All his assets, usually the 

 case when he fails, are an unexpired 

 lease, some poor accounts and an ice- 

 box. I wager that nine out of ten of 

 these men are above realizing that they 

 are with us in the boat, that our suc- 

 cess is theirs, although we all know 

 how much of their failures is ours. The 

 retail florist so situated with relation 

 to what he sells is not independent, for 

 the source of supply rules, but he will 

 continue to rule so long as the pro- 

 ducers allow it, and no longer. The re- 

 tailer who realizes that he is in the 

 boat and that the welfare of the one 

 i» the welfare of all is usually the man 

 with the busy store, who is trying to 

 help move stock, and who by so doing 

 has increased his business. These men 

 are the salvation of the grower. 



Then there is the retailer who grows 

 his own product. I could almost defy 

 you to name one who is not successful. 

 I can name many who are, and some of 

 them are among our best known men in 

 the profession. And why are they suc- 

 cessful? Because they grow the stock 

 and must sell it. There is business in- 

 stinct there. They cannot sign over the 

 ice-box and leave the janitor to wash 

 their name from the window. The spirit 

 of self-preservation keeps them at the 

 task, and I would be almost willing to 

 state that they enjoy being business 

 men in the modern sense of the word. 

 You will find the advertisements of 

 these men in the daily papers of their 

 home towns, and people with moderate 

 means in their stores buying flowers. 

 Some of these men were growers first 

 who took up the retail end because of 

 the failure of existing flower stores to 

 move their output at prices paying to 

 them as producers; and others are 

 growers to maintain a supply they must 

 have, but however they got into it 

 doesn't alter the fact that they have 

 invested capital and brains and are 

 keeping both working to get to the 

 one market we all want to reach — the 

 people. 



The Small Grower's Troubles. 



The small grower who places his 

 product direct is fortunate. He is in 

 a class by himself, and yet in this pajper 

 is considered one of the crowd in the 

 boat, for his welfare is dependent on us 

 all. Unless the retailers with whom he 

 deals directly are above par, he is get- 

 ting below par for his stock. That is 

 the way I have found it. When the 

 market drops, they drop him; but they 

 stick to him hard and fast when it goes 

 up. This grower ends by becoming one 



"WHO'S WHO-AND WHY" 



WALLACE B. PIEBSON. 



PUBLICITY" PIERSON is the name the trade has given to this energetic 

 young man from Cromwell, Conn. For nearly a year he has been going up and 

 down the country, preaching to florists the power of the press and the need 

 for modern publicity methods to increase the number of flower buyers. Mr. Pier- 

 son is the son of A. N. Pierson and secretary and assistant treasurer of A. N. 

 Pierson, Inc., whose range of glass at Cromwell is one of the most interesting 

 places in New England. He puts his whole energy into anything he undertakes. 

 What he has to say is said earnestly, and in language that never fails to impress 

 his audience. It is because of Mr. Pierson 's enthusiasm and the force with 

 which he has pushed his idea that florists' clubs from coast to coast, as well as 

 several of the national organizations, have taken up the present publicity move 

 ment. 



of the class who ship their product to 

 the wholesale market to share the honor 

 of shipping to the big city with a lot of 

 others to get less than he got before for 

 his product, and finally he stays out in 

 the suburbs and advertises his carna- 

 tions and roses "at the greenhouse." 

 The next season he has a new show 

 house in front and a delivery car, and 

 so far as the market is concerned he 

 becomes a buyer rather than a shipper, 

 advertising in the local papers having 

 brought business to him and made him 

 independent to a large extent. 



The small florist out in the country is 

 not so located that this is practical. 

 How can he better himself? By being 

 a specialist. Grow the one crop that 

 you can do well — maybe roses, maybe 

 snapdragons — only grow it well. Keep 

 the supply and the business is yours, 

 for the specialist gets to be known and 



his goods in demand. There is no place 

 today in the big cities for job lots and 

 this the small florist must realize or be 

 the loser. The odds and ends of stock 

 from a small grower, although perhaps 

 of good quality, are in the same class 

 with a few odd roses of unusual excel- 

 lence. They do not bring what they are 

 worth and the competition of the spe- 

 cialist and of the large concerns is too 

 strenuous for a mixed lot from the 

 country that takes in all of them, for 

 the large grower specializes in more 

 than one line, but each department is 

 capable of holding its own as a rule, 

 and the big places, by holding a steady 

 supply, can maintain a sale for their 

 goods and can, as a rule, produce better 

 goods for the money than the small 

 places that do not specialize. The 

 wholesale house is between them all, a 

 clearing house, a necessary evil, but a 



