164 FRITZ BAHR'S COMMERCIAL FLORICULTURE 



So if you have a memorandum of all this year's details, it will be 

 much easier to place your orders for next year, to prepare and grow 

 on stock you were short of this season and perhaps to cut down on 

 other items; you won't have to guess at how many cases of Holly, 

 Winterberries or Wild Smilax to order or the number of wreaths 

 to make up. 



Made-Up Christmas Baskets 



The illustrations in connection with these Christmas notes are 

 not intended to show what elaborate and expensive arrangements 

 can be created, but are rather to give an idea of what can be done 

 with so-called inexpensive or ordinary stock with the help of baskets 

 and pot-covers. 



A single Roman Hyacinth doesn't mean much, nor do three of 

 them planted in a pot; but when you add a few small table ferns, or 

 Asparagus plumosus, a little Boxwood and Winterberries, and place 

 the pot in an inexpensive basket with a touch of red ribbon, you 

 behold a most attractive Christmas arrangement. The same holds 

 good with a Chinese, obconica or malacoides Primula, a small 

 Cyclamen, Celestial Pepper, Cleveland Cherry or anything else; 

 any of these plants needs a holiday dress in order to be attractive, 

 and often twenty per cent additional cost per plant in the matter 

 of dressing it up will increase its retail value seventy-five or one 

 hundred per cent. 



Handle all the expensive and beautiful large specimen flowering 

 and berried plants you can dispose of, and make up baskets to sell 

 at a high price ; use Begonias, Oranges, Ericas and large Cyclamens. 

 But also cater to those who cannot afford to spend fifteen, twenty 

 or fifty dollars for a basket. Every florist located in the country 

 has to prepare for this kind of trade, and even with not the best 

 faciUties he can himself grow quite a variety of the plants which, 

 while individually not perfect, are nevertheless nicely adapted for 

 basket work. 



Around Christmas the demand for made-up baskets is especially 

 strong. Your patrons want more than just a plant; a basket, even 

 if small, filled with an assortment of things appeals more strongly 

 to them. They enter your establishment with the intention of 

 spending a couple of doUars for what they want, but will spend twice 

 that much if the right kind of basket looks good to them. That 

 means that you must carry a good assortment. You often fill a 

 basket which may not suit you exactly in regard to color scheme- 

 or arrangement, but, strange to say, it may be the first one a lady 

 selects. You will find another patron choosing and finaUy deciding 

 to take for five or six dollars a made-up basket consisting of a small 

 Poinsettia, a white Primrose, a Bird's-eye Cherry and a few ferns, 



