CHAPTER XI 



AFFILIATED COOPERATIVE ORGANIZATIONS IN THE 

 CITRUS INDUSTRY 



The existence of one organization connected with the 

 exchange system is partly adventitious. To pack its enor- 

 mous output of citrus fruits the exchange required im- 

 mense quantities of box shooks. These shooks had been 

 furnished by the various lumber companies at thirteen cents 

 a box. But after the San Francisco fire in 1906 lumber 

 was in great demand, and the companies served notice that 

 the price of box materials would be advanced to twenty- 

 one cents. On packing boxes alone this advance repre- 

 sented an increased cost to the exchange of some $800,000 

 annually. Almost all of the pine box manufacturers were 

 represented by one selling agency to which buyers of shooks 

 were compelled to turn, and consequently prospects of re- 

 lief for the associations seemed quite remote. 



After an attempt to supply their needs through other 

 channels than the pine box agency had met with only in- 

 different success, various conferences were held for the 

 purpose of devising some escape from exploitation by the 

 lumber manufacturers. Here again the advantages of an 

 organized industry were apparent. Up to the time of the 

 rise in the prices of box shooks each association had pur- 

 chased its packing supplies without reference to the policies 

 of other associations, whether members or non-members 

 of the exchange system. As soon as trouble arose, how- 

 ever, nothing was more natural than to turn to the cen- 

 tral organization as the most likely means of escape from 



189 



