MARKETING CABBAGE. 39 
In smaller markets, those m cities of medium size, the marketing 
route is shorter. In such markets the car-lot receiver may be also 
the jobber and small-lot wholesaler, and perhaps he has a retail 
department as well. He sells the carload in lots of any size from 
one package upward. Wholesale prices may be chiefly based on 
small-lot sales and may range higher than jobbing prices in large 
markets. Commission sales are mostly in small lots; but some 
large-lot sales occur and also a few car-lot sales at prices below those 
of small lots. Returns to the shipper may show different prices for 
various parts of the same consignment, according to the different 
sizes of the lots sold. 
In small cities there may be no regular car-lot market, except 
for car lots of mixed staple vegetables from the same shipping points. 
These lots are parceled out to retailers. Still smaller places are 
supplied by reshipments of large or small lots from wholesale dealers 
in the nearest large market center. 
Car lots of late cabbage are not usually sent to markets of less than 
first rank, except on previous arrangement with the receiver. Most 
dealers in cities of small or medium size prefer to buy outright and 
sometimes refuse to handle consignments. Early cabbage for such 
markets is often shipped for sale on consignment, but preferably 
by arrangement with the receiver, who may arrange to divert the 
car to other markets if his own market is already oversupplied. 
Dependent markets, — Cities and towns outside of the actual dis- 
tributing center depend more or less regularly on its market facilities. 
Some of these places may be 200 miles away, but as a rule they are 
within 100 miles. The produce dealers in these places often carry 
on a combined receiving, jobbing, and commission business. They 
may receive many cars of cabbage direct from shipping points, buying 
them through a broker in the largest near-by market, or perhaps 
directly from a country shipper or association; or they may have 
them reshipped from the distributing center. Some of these dealers 
can handle only a few car lots during the season, mostly storable 
cabbage, but may take early cabbage in car lots when demand is 
active enough to insure the sale of large lots quickly. At other 
times they buy less than car lots directly from the receivers and 
jobbers in the large market. Outside dealers are likely to buy cab- 
bage in smaller lots when prices are high. To supply these small-lot 
orders requires unloading of many cars in the large markets. This 
is one reason why unloadings at large markets are of ten surprisingly 
heavy in the seasons when crops are short and prices high. 
SPECIAL FEATURES OF GREAT MARKETS. 
The methods of handling and distributing cabbage in the large 
cities are much the same. The following brief accounts of several 
leading cabbage markets will indicate some distinguishing features: 
Early cabbage received at New York arrives at the railroad piers 
in half-barrel hampers or barrel crates. It is sold in large lots, often 
in straight carloads to jobbers. The late crop arrives almost entirely 
in bulk and is handled by another group of receivers. The jobbers 
put up the late cabbage in barrels and sacks. According to the most 
reliable estimates obtainable, about 5 per cent of the cabbage supply 
at New York is from adjoining producing sections and is delivered 
in trucks and wagons. Most of the main-crop cabbage is sold on 
