yearly gbat wm Triewas Old ana Hew. 



Ic is iu)w ttlmosc springtime and spring is when 90 per cent of all plants are 

 purchased and planted, and rignt here I want to thank each and every one of 

 my thousands of customers for the very generous business which they gave me 

 last year. This wa s decidedly the largest trade I have ever had, in fact more than 

 double that of any pre7ious year. It might be interesting to some of my custom- 

 ers to know that during the spring months just past we sent our plants to more 

 than 5, 000 different people, consisting of about 7, 000, 000 plants, which would weigh 

 when'packed ready for freight, express and mail, something over seventy tons, 

 and at the very low price at which we sold the stock the sales amounted to over 

 $22,000.00. To get off this immense amount of plants we employed about 100 

 men for nearly the entire spring, many of whom worked from seven o'clock 

 a. m., till ten, eleven, and sometimes twelve o'clock p. m. To begin with, the 

 very backward spring made us late in getting started, consequently put us be- 

 hind. Everything possible was done to catch up and get stock off in time, but 

 it was such a tremendous rush through April that some of our customers were 

 not served as promptly as it was our desire that they should have been. Never- 

 theless, it is very seldom that we have a spring as cold, rainy, and backward as 

 the one just past, and with improved facilities and a better system, we hope in 

 the future to fill every order promptly. It shall be our constant aim to do this, 

 and give every customer entire satisfaction, as I fully realize that in this busi- 

 ness, more than in many others, success depends almost entirely upon the good 

 will and confidence of our patrons, and this I shall always strive to merit. 

 The past summer has been very dry. May was exceedingly so, continuing very 

 dry until our berry season was well advanced, which, on the whole, was al- 

 most an entire failure, owing to the lack of moisture. Our prospect was the 

 finest we ever had for a large crop of strawberries, and very conservatively es- 

 timated before the drought set in at 150,000 quarts of very fine fruit. This, 

 however, was reduced by the unfavorable weather conditions to 50,000 quarts 

 of very inferior fruit. This same drouth and others which followed also made 

 the plant crop much shorter than usual not only with me but basing my calcu- 

 lations upon the judgment of reliable authority in different sections of the 

 country I believe the actual supply of strawberry plants throughout the country 

 taken as a whole is shorter than it has been for several sears. 



Knowing this to be a fact my advertisement will not be found in all the 

 leading Agricultural papers this year as heretofore, and my catalogue instead 

 of being sent to a list of 70,000 as heretofore, will only be sent to about 20,000 

 who have actually bought of me in the last few years, and perhaps a few others 

 who may ask for it. I am doing thi3 so that I can give my old cu&tomers a 

 chance to get what they want at as near last year's low prices as possible. Most 

 prices will be the same; several new varieties much lower, and a few old stand- 

 ard sorts a little higher. Nearly all of my present stock of plants are growing 

 in. new land, and you will find they are very nicely rooted and all good clean 

 healthy stock No disease and no insect pest can be found on my farm any- 

 a'""""""^^^^^^ 1 """"? where. Wishing all my friends and patrons 

 a My 20th Century Resolutions. E mQre happines6 and more prosper ity in the 



z Make all the new friends £ new cen tury than they have had in the old 



-and new customers I can, but <r T „ „ .,,„ „ 



^hold fast the old ones and see E : remam Yours faithfully, 



3 that they first are served. E W. F. ALLEN. 



JtTTTTTTTTTTTT TT "t» TTTT TTTT TTTTTTTTTTTTTTT* 



