ECONOMICS OF FRUIT MERCHANDISING 
his money, and on which he can and does 
make a satisfactory margin of profit. 
Must Finance Our Own Selling and 
Advertising 
We, as manufacturers, have got to fi- 
nance our own selling and advertising 
campaign. We ought to know by this 
time that the dealers are not going to 
do it for us. We have got to vitalize our 
selling system and abandon the primi- 
tive methods which work, perhaps, in the 
sale of cheap bulk commodities but which 
will not develop and maintain our trade 
in markets which are right in the heart, 
as it were, of the Eastern apple orchards 
The food manufacturer, even after ap- 
propriating large sums for advertising, 
does not expect his article to be sold with- 
out active work on his part. So he sends 
trained salesmen into the markets, not 
primarily to sell the wholesaler for ship- 
ment from the factory, but to work the 
retail trade. The wholesaler is the last 
link in the chain to consider, though an 
important one. The manufacturer’s 
salesman calls on every grocer in town 
and takes orders for as many cases of 
the commodity as the grocer is willing to 
buy. These orders are assembled, taken 
to the wholesalers, and the wholesaler’s 
order is taken for several times the 
amount of the aggregate of the retail or- 
ders. The retailers are sold at a fixed 
price, which allows them a fair margin of 
profit when sold at the advertised price 
to the consumer. The jobber, in turn, is 
allowed the customary jobbers’ discount. 
From first to last, the manufacturer, 
whose business it is, takes the initiative 
and assumes the expense. He can afford 
to, as his campaign is going to enable him 
to sell his product for a much higher 
price than would otherwise be possible. 
It is only by these necessary expenditures 
that he can accomplish his object. Hav- 
ing taken these steps, the town is ready 
for the advertising, and not before, for 
if the advertising were to be sprung pre- 
maturely the consumers would call once 
or twice for the article, would not find it 
in the stores, and the campaign would 
fail. 
1311 
Value of a Brand 
The foregoing is a plan which, in my 
judgment, is perfectly practical, with cer- 
tain modifications, to apply to our indus- 
try. The course I would propose is to 
select a brand with a catchy name, copy- 
right it, and allow it to be used only by 
strictly reliable packers, under a revo- 
cable license, and only on a few high- 
class varieties, and only on the extra- 
fancy 150 size and larger of those varie- 
ties. The brand would appear on the 
wrappers and also on the box. On the 
maintenance of the quality of this brand 
would depend its success, so too many 
precautions could not be taken to see 
that every box bearing the brand is 
strictly up to grade. The next move 
would be to select one state in the Union 
in which to make a thorough test of the 
plan. Let us say Indiana, as that state 
is not only rich and populous, but at the 
same time one of the poorest consumers 
of boxed apples in the Union, relatively. 
Indianapolis is a rich, prosperous city of 
253,650 inhabitants. Start, say, in In- 
dianapolis, with the special brand of 
Jonathans and Grimes Golden. I would 
ship several carloads of the brand to In- 
dianapolis, either placing them in storage 
temporarily, or else timing their arrival 
conveniently. The next step would be 
to send one or two thoroughly trained, 
experienced specialty salesmen there. I 
could lay my hands on just the right 
men in a moment. I would have a thor- 
ough canvass of the retail grocery trade 
made, and also the fruiterer trade. There 
is about one grocery store to every 200 of 
the population; fruiterers additional. 
This would make 1,168 groceries alone in 
Indianapolis. Not over one-quarter to 
one-half of these would be good stores in 
good parts of town. Say about 300 in all. 
The “live wire” salesman can work about 
25 grocers in a day if he has a quick-talk- 
ing proposition, which this would be. In 
two weeks’ work one man could cover the 
town pretty thoroughly. Have this sales- 
man explain to the grocer the extraordi- 
nary quality, appearance and merchant- 
ability of the product; the convenience of 
the package; the advantage of co-operat- 
