TWENTY-NINTH FRUIT-GROWERS' CONVENTION. 



119 



markets from day to day. Between the man who has produced and 

 the man with an appetite is an army of middlemen, helping, by one 

 method and another, to bring the two people together, and likewise an 

 army of middle factors, of the speculative mood and method, whose 

 principal operations tend to keep these two factors apart, for the pur- 

 poses of profit, or extortion, if you wish; and so hopelessly interwoven 

 is the present-day fabric of commerce that it ofttimes requires micro- 

 scopic vision to distinguish the evil from the good. We have the men 

 who do tell us what price we ought to hold our product for, but they 

 offer us no guarantee that we will not lose by their advice, or that their 

 friends will not sell out at ruling figures while we hold the bag. 



In the solution of this problem of marketing come the questions of 

 organization and method of operation. In organization records we 

 have some bright successes and some ugly wrecks. Our Walnut- 

 Growers' Association stands with a seven years' record of continuous 

 success, and gradually ascending markets all the while. Next comes 

 the Citrus Fruit Exchange, which, with modified plans to embrace large 

 commercial packing concerns, represents a large body of small factors 

 compactly welded into one massive operating office. Then the Raisin- 

 Growers' Association, the history of which is too well known to need 

 repetition. And the Fresh Fruit Distributors, controlling ninety-seven 

 per cent of the fresh-fruit shipments, and so administered that for the 

 first time in the history of the State the whole crop was marketed with- 

 out a glut at any point at any time within the season. And then the 

 Vegetable Union of the south, which has made a record equal to that 

 of the Distributors for two successful seasons. And last of all the 

 Prune Association, which hath been but which is not now. 



Of these six great organizations of producers, the Raisin and Prune 

 Associations may be defined as liberally democratic in their govern- 

 ment; the others are operated on lines of representation bordering on 

 autocracy. 



The problem of organizing, in all its details, is insignificant as com- 

 pared to the marketing problem. In the consideration of this problem 

 there are three distinct classes of our products which must be consid- 

 ered separately, for the methods that apply to one can not possibly be 

 used with another. W^e have: 1st, Immediately perishable fresh fruit 

 and vegetables; 2d, Semi-perishable citrus fruit and apples; 3d, Staple 

 cured fruits, raisins and prunes. 



President Berwick, of the Postal Progress League, has told you what 

 the Postal Department might do for fruit-growers. I will only empha- 

 size. The establishment of a parcels post service in the United States, 

 such as already prevails in every civilized nation worthy of the name, 

 will bring producers and consumers so close together that, by one fell 

 stroke, all unnecessary middlemen will be eliminated. Mark the 

 words: ''unnecessary middlemen." 



