THE MARKETING OF MILL FEEDS. 15 
which they are not liable. How this happens is not generally under- 
stood, but is easily explained. 
The freight allowances on delivered shipments are customarily de- 
ducted from the seller's invoice, but as many shippers have under- 
standings with transportation companies that all of their shipments 
are to be handled ** freight to be prepaid," the invoices of snippers 
which have made such arrangements will show in the column on the 
invoice, used for the purpose of indicating the freight allowance, that 
no freight will be collected, i. e., " freight prepaid," and the gross 
amount of the invoice will be shown in the outer column and will be 
collected by draft. 
Through the oversight of railroad employees many shipments are 
allowed to go forward " freight collect," although instructions from 
the shipper were to collect the freight from him. The result is 
that the buyer not only pays the freight when making payment of 
the gross amount of the invoice but he is also asked to pay freight 
to the railroad agent upon arrival of the shipment. It is, therefore, 
very important for the buyer to check carefully all invoices with 
his freight bills to avoid the double payment of freight charges. 
Charges that may have accrued while the shipment is in transit and 
that are due from the shipper, such as diversion and "demurrage, 
will be found readily and claims for such items should be lodged 
with the seller as promptly as possible. 
While familiarity with rules and definitions enables the country 
feed dealer to carry out the various operations incident to a trans- 
action in feedstuffs, it does not necessarily qualify him to carry on 
his feed business successfully. He must study closely the conditions 
in the principal sources of supply, which may be thousands of miles 
away or may be close to the consuming section in which he is located. 
Frequently for many reasons requirements may be purchased in 
heighboring markets to better advantage than in distant producing 
markets. Particularly in cities or towns with more than one feed 
dealer and where there is more or less competition it is usually well 
worth while for dealers to acquaint themselves as fully as possible 
with prevailing conditions, such as supply, demand, and stocks on 
hand in distant markets. 
HOW TO STUDY MARKET CONDITIONS. 
The associative action of jobbers, brokers, and wholesale dealers 
has resulted in the formation of exchanges and trade organizations. 
One of the functions of these organizations is to collect and dis- 
seminate market prices and information, which makes it possible 
for the feed trade in the large shipping and distributing markets to 
keep posted relative to conditions affecting their business. Country 
dealers and cooperative societies, however, are not always in a posi- 
tion to avail themselves of the services of the exchanges and are 
largely dependent on the generally bullish ideas of visiting salesmen 
in forming their opinion of conditions. 
A large number of trade journals devote space to the discussion 
of feedstuffs conditions in various markets. While no doubt much 
of the information is valuable, it has often been said that, as most 
of it is obtained from firms that specialize in the feeds they discuss, 
