172 COOPERATIVE MARKETING 



kets of the country who are ready to act as agents for 

 associations and district exchanges which do have fruit to 

 sell. Failure to make this discrimination has been re- 

 sponsible for the very prevalent notion of a citrus fruit 

 trust in California. 



The clearest concept of how the . marketing mechanism 

 of the California Fruit Growers Exchange actually operates 

 may be had by considering separately the organization and 

 duties of the Eastern representatives and the operations 

 of the Los Angeles office. At present the territory of the 

 United States and Canada is divided into six grand 

 divisions, each in charge of a division manager. These 

 divisions center at Boston, New York, Chicago, Minneapo- 

 lis, Fort Worth and Seattle. Then the Exchange main- 

 tains agencies in seventy-seven of the principal markets, 

 each agency reporting daily to the proper district manager. 

 The duties of the agents are to secure orders for fruit, to 

 sell fruit under the orders of the district exchanges and 

 associations, to supervise exchange sales on the auction, 

 to collect and transmit proceeds, to develop new customers 

 and new markets, to cooperate with jobbers and retailers 

 and to secure accurate and comprehensive information as 

 to the condition of the market. All of the agents are 

 bonded and are on salary rather than on a commission basis. 

 They do nothing except attend to the interest of the asso- 

 ciated exchange growers. 



This latter point is important; in fact, it is largely re- 

 sponsible for the admirable efficiency of the exchange sys- 

 item. By appointing salaried agents whose sole occupation 

 is selling citrus fruits the exchange system develops an 

 esprit de corps that is impossible under ordinary marketing 

 methods. What particular interest does the commission 

 man have in his clients ? He sells all kinds of products for 

 all kinds of people, and his welfare depends only on his 



