©6c RURAL NEW-YORKER 
A Try-out of a New Milk Plan 
Lon.c' rersistent iifiitation for clioaper delivery of 
milk is besiniiing to have effect. Even the Federal 
Milk Commission came together again last week, and 
while they protected the hig distrihntors in the old 
price of 1.3c and loc on qnart bottled milk, and np 
to 20c oil smaller bottles, they did reduce the price 
a cent a qnart on the smaller distributors for the 
sale of loose milk. 
But the sensation of the week in the city papers 
was the sale of fluid milk to the families thi'ough 
the stores at 7c a quart. The story was expressed by 
the New York F!un as follows: 
The promoters of the project are N. A. Van Son and 
John .T. Dillon, former State Commissioner of Foods 
and Markets. For three years or more Mr. Dillon has 
cherished a plan for bringing milk direct from the farm 
to the consumer and the formation of tlie company 
marks the first important step in the materialization of 
that .scheme. 
The milk is shipped from the country at 4 o’clock in 
the morning, and upon its arrival in the city is carried 
directly to the retail stores. In distributing the milk 
to the stores it is their plan to use some of the inde¬ 
pendent milk dealers, who, according to Mr. Dillon, 
were driven out of business by the opei-ations of the 
“trust.” The company will sell its milk and cream at 
the cars to the small dealer, and the latter, in turn, 
will work up a trade by selling it to the retail stores. 
The new scale of prices fixed by the company will go 
into effect this morning. Grade B milk, which contains 
,3.5 per cent of butter fat, will be sold at the cars to the 
distributors for .$2..30 per can, or 5% cents per quart, 
and delivered to the retail stores for 6^/^ cents per quart, 
which, the company fig¬ 
ures, will allow the store¬ 
keeper to retail it to the 
consumer for 7 cents per 
quart and still realize the 
same profit that he makes 
from handling milk for 
the big companies. 
Grade A milk will be 
sold at the cars at ip2.;‘)0 
a can of forty quarts and 
delivered at the stores at 
•$2.80. Sweet cream con¬ 
taining 40 per cent butter 
fat for which the big deal¬ 
ers are charging 78 cents 
a quart, will be delivered 
to store.s, hotels and fac¬ 
tories at 54 cents a quart. 
Cream of a lighter 
grade, containing 20 per 
cent butter fat, for which 
the big companies are 
asking .37 cents a quart, 
will be sold at the cars 
for .$10 a can and deliver¬ 
ed at the stores at 28 
cents a quart. Condensed 
milk, containing from 0 
to 10 per cent butter fat, 
will sell at $!) a can at 
the cars and will be de¬ 
livered at the stores for 
2(5 cents a quart. 
Farmers are selling 
milk this month at 4 
cents a quart The price 
is less than the cost of 
production. The dealers 
sell it for 1.3 to 15 cents 
in bottles and bulk milk 
at 10 to 11 cents in the 
stores. Farmers have de¬ 
cided to combine patriot¬ 
ism with bu.siness and de¬ 
liver milk to the city cus¬ 
tomers cheaper than the 
milk trust dealers have 
ever attempted to do. 
At this price it will be 
the cheapest food in the 
city. It is the best food 
and every child in' the 
city of New York may 
now have a full supi)ly of 
milk at a reasonable cost. 
Mr. Van Son represents the farmers, and Mr. Dillon 
has donated his services during .Tune in order to put 
into effect his plan for giving the public cheap milk and 
to increase the output of milk from the farms.. 
The first day of the new price the sales were in¬ 
creased 10,000 quarts. Six salesmen are at work 
among the grocers, and it is estimated that a thou- 
siind grocerymen are already selling 7c milk to fami¬ 
lies that have been paying 10c to 11c a quart for it. 
Mr. Van Son has already placed an oi-der for bottles 
and in two weeks expects to he in a position to sell 
bottled milk through the stores to the families at 
8c and 9c a q\nu't. If his plan is pnrsiied, nothing 
can .stop it. The trust will fight it; hut Van Son and 
Dillon are fighters, too, and the city is already with 
them. When the full force of the Dairymen’s League 
is behind the plan, as it must he, the milk problem 
will he solved. 
795 
ter fat. The Borden Company is to take its require- ‘at one time at investment values, but the Borden’s 
Company has indicated its willingness to wait a rea- 
sonai)le time for cash to allow the League to accu¬ 
mulate fund.s. The proposition is being considered 
to allow the purchase of the plants on installments. 
Du this plan it is proposed that the League pay in 
regular installments for a number of years. The 
Borden’s Company would continue to own aud oper¬ 
ate the plants Tintil the sale price is paid. Nothing 
definite has he'"’ settled, however, but it is expected 
definite statements can be made in about two weeks. 
ments of fluid milk for its city con.sumers, including 
cream and buttermilk. The surplus is a problem for 
the League. The Borden’s Farm Products Company 
to take all the milk and sell it to any condensed 
milk company, including the Borden’s Condensed 
Milk Company, or any manufacturing company, or 
they will manufacture it into butter or cheese. The 
loss sustained on the re-sale or manufactui’e of the 
surplus is to be deducted from the account of far¬ 
mers who sell milk to the Borden’s Farm Products 
Company, hut who are not League members. The 
losses due to the handling of the surplus will be pro¬ 
rated among the non-League members on the basis 
of 100-pound lots and deducted from the returns of 
the non-I.eague members. If it works, this plan 
would give I.eague members the League price in full 
and put the losses due to the suri)lus on the non- 
League members. Producers have been notified that 
they will get full returns for IMay, because the com¬ 
pany is not able to figure the surplus loss in time 
for ,Tune 15th payment.s, hut the ^May losses will he 
deducted from the June hills payable July 15th, and 
the losses for .July will be deducted from the August 
15th bills. 
The Borden’s Company will use its discretion in 
the distribution of the surplus, x'e-selling or manu¬ 
facturing the milk as it finds for best i-esidts. If 
non-members refused to sell on this basis, or if all 
L(t If Be a Fiylit to n Finish! Get Behind the Fanner! 
Borden’s and the Dairymen’s League 
In an interview last week, Mr. C. A. Weiant, pre.si- 
dent of the Borden’s Farm Products Co., Inc., gave 
the following statement to The Rural New-Yorker: 
Borden’s Farm Products Company has agreed to 
buy the milk needed for its New York fluid trade for 
the months of May and June from the Dairymen’s 
League in so far as the T.«ague could supply it. with 
the understanding that ’"he League would take care 
of the surplus, the price to be $2..34 in May and $1.80 
in June in the 150-mile zone for 3% milk and 4c extra 
per hundred for each one-tenth of one per cent but- 
milk producers became members of the League, or 
if the entire amount of milk .supplied by non-mem¬ 
bers be not enough to cover the surplus loss, the 
liOague would he obliged to find some other method 
of adjusting the los.s. The problem of taking care 
of the surplus is entirely up to the League. If the 
plan that they have suggested, to take the loss out 
of the non-memhers, is not practical, then the Leagxio 
shall he obliged to find some other way to make good 
the loss to the Borden Company. By July 15 the 
I.eague will owe the Borden’s Company for the sur¬ 
plus losses in May, and if the company cannot re¬ 
cover this loss from the non-League members, it 
shall then put it up to the lieague oflicials and it 
will be their duty to find a way to make up the loss 
to the Borden Company, and to find a means to take 
care of it for the future. 
The Borden’s Condensed Jlilk Company is not a 
party to the contract, and are not a party to the 
contract with Borden’s Farm Products Company. 
There is no formal contract for May aud .Tune, 
but there are written memoranda to supplement ver¬ 
bal understandings. 
The Borden’s Farm Products Company has also 
agreed to sell its country milk plants to the Dairy¬ 
men’s lA?ague at investment values, enabling the 
company to get its money out of the land and equip¬ 
ment. There is no formal contract for this option, 
hut the verbal agreement is supplemented by written 
memoranda. The proposition is to sell all the plants 
Wo can hardly credit the belief that League ofli¬ 
cials are innocent enough to thiidc that the surplus 
loss can be chargetl to non-members. Evidently the 
Borden’s oflicials have no such illusions. Since the 
Borden’s Company has purchased its supply from the 
League, it will buy of no other producer while the 
Leagxxe has a surplus. Consequently they cannot 
charge non-producers with anything. If there is a 
loss on account of surplus in May and June League 
members will pay it. Any other theory is food for 
babies. 
The option proposition is equally romantic. Far¬ 
mers have no notion of buying old plants at cost, 
and leaving them in the hands of the original owners 
for a number of years. To accept such a proposition 
would he to put their necks in the yoke for the rest 
of their lives. Farmers will own their own plants, 
and establish a reason¬ 
able cost for distinhut- 
tion, so that they can in¬ 
crease consumption of 
milk by getting it to the 
con.sumer at a reason¬ 
able cost. They will 
make no contract that 
will hamper them in 
that purpose. 
Stripped of romance 
the situation is that the 
Borden’s Company pays 
$2.4G for May and $1.80 
for .Tune milk, or about 
four cents per quart for 
June. They sell bottled 
milk for 1.3 to 20 cents 
per quart. If they sell 
one and a half millions 
in .Tune as estimated, 
they will get four mil¬ 
lion dollars for delivery 
aside from the original 
cost of the milk—some 
harvest. The surplus 
they will sell to conden- 
series, or make it into 
bxitter or cheese. They 
will sell the butter and 
cheese, and take out the 
cost of making, selling 
and storing. The pro¬ 
ducer will get what is 
left. Romance about it 
all you will, such are 
the facts. The non-mem¬ 
ber romance and the op¬ 
tion allurement may attract the minds of League 
members from the June prices, hut the propositions 
will not flatter their intelligence. 
The officers of the League who deposed President 
Brill in 191G now owe him reparation and public 
apology. His proposed terms with the dealers in¬ 
cluded less than one-half the concessions in the 
present surrender. 
What Kansas Farmers are Doing 
, , . - -i'gauized four 
years ago, and have something over 250 members. We 
have a Pomona, and I suppose have purchased for our 
county membership 100 carloads of stuff in those four 
, We knocked over the “rule” of the' State Board 
ot Health to appoint” a “competent man” (?) to dis¬ 
infect our 111 district schoolliouses at a “fee” of $10 
per sclioolhouse. It was denounced as “graft ” and 
suit startl’d by the appointee for $20,000 damages, but 
lie couulu t fjice the whole Grtiuge iu court, so it was 
dropped and hushed up. We called it the “Bourbon 
County Rebellion.” 
While trying to ship in apple's last Fall we could 
not get cars set to load them. We found one place 
where the freight agent was also ticket agent, express 
agent, telegraph operator, and se'eretary and treasurer of 
the Fruit Shipping Association at that place. Do you 
wonder we could not get a car to carry apples? We 
have a^ new plan. We are going in our automobiles 
and bring home our apples iu our own cars. About 
20 bu. iu each car, or trailer, and we’ shall go through 
Kansas City in a line of one hundred cars, all flying 
our Grange flag and number. Some of us are members 
of the Non-Partisan League, aud send our “Godspeeds” 
(Continued on page 801.) 
