43 



pack top and bottom alike and every basket can thus be guaranteed. 

 Solid cars of one straight grade can thus be purchased any day dur- 

 ing the season, and we find that buyers will pay more for this fruit 

 than where they have to drive around the country and pick up a load, 

 of as many grades as there were packers. 



The obstacles in the way of this central packing house plan may 

 be mentioned as : First, what may be termed the natural conservatism 

 of the average grower ; second, the lack of confidence in his fellows 

 and of the results to be obtained by association and combination of 

 interest ; third, some expense in putting up and equipping a plant ; 

 and, fourth, enterprise and confidence in the outcome to carry on the 

 undertaking. A rather high order of ability and good judgment, 

 combined with some experience, is necessary in managing such an 

 undertaking, and the manager must command the confidence of his 

 associates and patrons. 



The principal advantage is the application of modern and sys- 

 tematic business methods to the fruit industry. Organization is the 

 basis of modern successful business operations, and only those lines 

 of business that are well organized are successful in a marked de- 

 gree. The statementjs often made that an organization among far- 

 mers is sure to fail, that farmers will not hang together, etc., ad 

 nauseam. I think that the experiment among our packing houses 

 disproves this statement, and I believe that the tendency among pro- 

 gressive fruit growers is toward such organizations. I believe that 

 these separate packing houses will eventually grow into a federation, 

 with a central head, that shall keep in touch with all of the principal 

 markets and keep the units of the federation informed regarding 

 markets and prices, — a fruitgrowers' ''trust," if you please. 



The packing houses furnish a more reliable and desirable qual- 

 ity of fruit and Chicago prices are obtained for the fruit at the point 

 of shipment, thus effecting a saving of nearly half the expense, as 

 noted above. It is evident that the dealer in Buffalo, who would be 

 willing to pay 75 cents per bushel for a car of peaches in Chicago, 

 of the uncertain and damaged quality that he would get there, would 

 willingly pay the same price for fresh, straight-packed fruit here, as 

 the expense of shipping is no more; and so the grower receives 75 

 cents at the packing-house for fruit for which the commission man 

 returns the consignor 50 cents. Experience has abundantly proven 

 this self-evident assertion. 



I trust that you will pardon me for speaking so at length about 

 what we have done at Fennville, but our successes have opened our 

 eyes to the possibilities of what may be accomplished by a unity of 

 action. If agriculturists could be brought to realize what co-opera- 

 tion might do for them, who could live without paying them tribute ? 

 In my experience among growers, I have found among them parasites 

 who would oppose co-operation in every form ,for no other reason 

 than that the less his neighbors know, the greater his opportunity 

 to profit by their ignorance. 



Co-operation is the beacon light of emancipation to the farmer 

 and the only means by which that traditional fear and suspicion, 

 born of wrongs and injustices as far back as Jacob and Esau, can be 

 dispelled. Where co-operation is the w^atchword, the community is 

 immune from the adventurer, who figures farmers generally as his 

 legitimate prey. 



