44 
FLORIDA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
for their object the improvement of the 
crop must also have the dollars-and-cents 
end in view. The utilitarian object can¬ 
not be neglected and the improvements 
which may follow the investigations must 
be made profitable to the growers. We 
have endeavored in the work which has 
been done never to lose sight of this fact. 
It is useless to raise a crop of fruit, 
no matter how fine it may be, unless it 
can be marketed or sold at a profit. This 
selling or marketing end of the fruit in¬ 
dustry is a special business of itself, re¬ 
quiring special talents and training. Es¬ 
pecially is this true in an industry like the 
citrus fruit industry which has now 
reached such large proportions that the 
marketing problems are becoming more 
complex every day. Fruit growers are 
recognizing this fact and now employ 
specially trained and competent managers 
and salesmen to attend to the selling end 
of the business. 
The basis of all succesful marketing of 
fruit products is good fruit put up in at¬ 
tractive shape and gotten to market in 
sound condition. The problems of hand¬ 
ling a fruit crop of the extent of the cit¬ 
rus crop are problems of wide distribu¬ 
tion, the solution of which depends largely 
upon the possibility of getting the pro¬ 
duct to market in sound condition. 
The fruit growers have mastered many 
of the problems of production. These 
have to deal with the various orchard 
practices of planting, cultivating, fertil¬ 
izing, pruning, control of insect pests and 
fungus diseases. Most attention has been 
directed toward these factors in the past. 
But it has frequently happened that 
growers who do their utmost to produce 
fine fruit, and who succeed in producing 
fine fruit, nullify all these efforts by the 
way in which they prepare their product 
for market. It has not uncommonly hap¬ 
pened that the bureau workers have ob¬ 
served fine fruit which the growers have 
spared no expense to produce, utterly 
ruined in its preparation for shipment, as 
a result of the attempt to save a few 
cents per box in the cost of handling it. 
In a general way, most fruit growers re¬ 
alize that fruit must be handled carefully. 
But few realize what careful handling 
really means, and still fewer appreciate 
or realize the amount of injury which is 
actually due to careless methods of han¬ 
dling. 
Decay affects the grower in two ways: 
First: Decay is a direct loss to the 
buyer of the fruit and is always charged 
to the grower. He always has to pay for 
it. 
Second: Decay affects the market rep¬ 
utation of the grower’s pack. 
The first loss is relatively easy to cal¬ 
culate. It is estimated that the loss to 
the California growers was from i to i 
1-2 millions of dollars annually. The 
loss to the Florida growers has equaled a 
half or three-quarters of a million an¬ 
nually. 
The second loss is perhaps the more 
important, but cannot be easily estimated. 
The actual money value of the reputa¬ 
tion of brands arriving consistently sound 
and in good, attractive condition cannot 
be stated. It means not only a premium 
above ordinary market prices, but a more 
ready sale and active demand. In times 
of low market conditions such brands will 
find sale at fair profit while those with 
