2 CIRCULAR 10 0, IT. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



of the Bureau of Agricultural Economics. This division has made, 

 and is making, similar studies of cooperative associations handling 

 various farm products, but this is the first business-analysis study 

 which it has made of a cooperative tobacco-marketing association. 



PURPOSE OF THIS STUDY 



To enable other cooperators and cooperatives, especially those deal- 

 ing with tobacco, to benefit by the policies, mistakes, and experiences 

 of this association the economic and social background in Virginia 

 and the Carolinas, the inception of the association, its formation, 

 organic set-up, operations, membership relations and policies, prob- 

 lems, and difficulties are analyzed in considerable detail. Special 

 effort has been made to emphasize the conditions and policies that 

 led to the suspension of operation of the association in June, 1926. 



PROCEDURE OF THE STUDY 



Four main sources of information and data were used in preparing 

 this bulletin: The department's records, the files and records of the 

 association, interviews with officials and others in intimate touch with 

 the association's operations, and a membership study. General in- 

 formation and data relating to the tobacco industry as a whole were 

 obtained from the department libraries and from publications of 

 the various States and of the United States Department of Agricul- 

 ture. Statistical material relating to the production, prices, and con- 

 sumption of tobacco was assembled, analyzed, and studied. 



The receivers of the association made available all the records and 

 files covering the entire period of the organization's operations. 

 Careful and detailed examination was made of all information in 

 the association's offices pertaining to the phases of its organization 

 and operations studied, and interviews were held with most of the 

 former directors of the association and with many men who had been 

 connected with it as executives or in other official or advisory capaci- 

 ties or as employees; and interviews were also held with other men 

 who were active in this tobacco area. Many of these men had been 

 in close touch in some way with the organization; others, interested 

 but free from bias, had, at a distance, watched the rise and fall of 

 this cooperative enterprise. These men included bankers, lawyers, 

 merchants, editors, agricultural leaders, members of the staffs of 

 State colleges, State and county officials, tobacco buyers, representa- 

 tives of tobacco companies and of other business interests, and many 

 nonmember tobacco growers in the tri-State area. To learn the atti- 

 tudes of the members, about TOO members were interviewed over a 

 territory covering practically every county in which the association 

 had operated. Of the TOO questionnaires filled in during these inter- 

 views, 643 were tabulated, and give what is considered a fair and 

 representative sample of the attitude of the members of the tri-State 

 association as a whole. For purposes of comparison several other 

 tobacco cooperatives were visited. An attempt was made to secure 

 data in regard to tobacco grades and prices from several of the larger 

 tobacco manufacturers, but without success. 



