HOW EGGS ARE MARKETED 
Buying Eggs By Weight. 
Whenever an improved method of buying is installed, eggs 
should be bought of the producer by weight. As far as selling 
to the consumer is concerned, the present scheme is more 
feasible; this scheme is to grade according to the size and 
other qualities, and sell by the dozen, the price per dozen 
varying according to the grade. 
Buying by weight simplifies the problem of grading. It will, 
in addition, only be necessary to have a fine of so much for 
eggs that are wrong in quality. For rotten or heated eggs 
should be deducted an amount considerably in excess of their 
value, for their presence is a source of danger to the reputa- 
tion of the brand. Shrunken eggs, are hard to classify. In 
order that this may be done fairly and uniformly the specific 
gravity or brine test should be used. All eggs that float in a 
given salt brine of, say, 1.05 specific gravity should be fined. 
Two or more grades can be made in this fashion if desired. 
The Retailing of Eggs by the Producer. 
In poultry papers the poultryman has been commonly 
advised to get near a large city and retail his own eggs at a 
fancy price. This sounds all right on paper but in practice 
it works out differently. A man cannot be in two places or do 
two things at the same time. The poultryman’s time is valu- 
able on his plant, and the question is whether he can handle 
city sales as well as a man who made it his business. If the 
poultryman tries to retail his own goods he will be working 
on too small a scale to advertise his goods or to make deliv- 
eries economically. The man making a specialty of the city 
end can sell ten to a hundred times as much produce as one 
poultryman can produce. 
With a group of poultry farmers working co-operatively, 
or a large corporation having contracts with producers, the 
producing and selling end can be brought under the same 
management advantageously. The isolated poultryman, unless 
he find a market at his very door, will do better to permit at 
least one middleman to slip in between himself and the con- 
sumer. But there is no reason why he should not know this 
middleman personally and insist upon a method of buying 
that will pay him upon the merits of his goods. 
Consigning eggs or any other produce to commission men, 
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