TRADE IN PURE-BRED POULTRY AND EGGS 579 



In a well-established large business of this class the egg trade 

 may run through nearly half the year and sales of poultry be made 

 throughout the year, but the bulk of the egg trade comes in two 

 or three spring months, and the bulk of the sales of stock in two 

 or three preceding months. In a new business, trade in both lines 

 is quite closely limited to the short periods of greatest demand. In 

 most cases this means that a great deal of stock (the best of the 

 ordinary good breeding stock) must be carried, at heavy expense, 

 for several months after it is ready to ship, and must then be sold 

 in competition with later-hatched stock of distinctly less breeding 

 value. The breeder having an established and growing trade can 

 work off a large part of his early-hatched stock in the fall and 

 early winter, and can usually get prices for the rest, when sold 

 later, which warrant his holding it. 



Beginners, as a rule, hold too much stock for the trade which 

 comes late in the winter, when small poultry keepers begin to think 

 of mating breeding pens, and hold too many specimens of inferior 

 quality. Many breeders make it a rule to carry nothing over that 

 cannot be sold at five dollars for males and two dollars and fifty 

 cents or three dollars for females. A beginner with ordinary stock 

 may make his minimum prices somewhat lower, but to be on the 

 safe side of profit he should make it a rule to sell no fancy stock for 

 less than double its market value, and to carry over none (males 

 especially) that he cannot sell on that basis. Male birds sold for 

 market the last of the winter will often bring less than if sold as 

 broilers the preceding summer. 



Confideace the basis of trade. Trade in this line depends, even 

 more than usual, on the buyer's confidence in the seller, who is 

 usually the producer and so is presumed to know absolutely the 

 merits and faults of the goods. The purchaser of eggs for hatch- 

 ing has only the seller's word for their quality. The purchaser of 

 breeding stock relies upon the seller to deal honestly with him in 

 regard to removable faults and faults in ancestry. Only by secur- 

 ing the confidence of customers is it possible to retain their trade. 

 A dishonest breeder may maintain himself in the business by work- 

 ing new trade, but it is the consensus of opinion of those in the 

 trade that honesty is the best policy, — that it costs less to hold 

 old customers by square dealing than to get new customers by 



