1934 Want List 
We shall require the following 
varieties of dahlias to fill out our 
contracts or to complete our own 
planting needs. If you have any of 
of these varieties which vou wish to 
sell for cash, or on an exchange basis 
for other varieties we have in stock, 
communicate with us at once. We 
can use small lots as well as larger 
ones if stock is good and price is 
right:— 
The Emperor 
Judge Alton B. Parker 
Doazon 
White Jack Rose (small quantity 
only needed) 
Black Jack 
Thomas A. Edison 
Fort Monmouth 
Sagamore 
A. D. Livoni 
Good red decoratlves in most any 
of the standard varieties. We have 
sold ourselves short on reds and must 
have more for our own planting. 
What have you in this color? 
Some of our largest customers are 
having us mail their tubers direct 
from here under their own labels. 
We are prepared to attend to this 
part of the business to your entire 
satisfaction; and as we buy our boxes 
and cartons by the carload at bottom 
prices, we can probably save you 
money on your mailing, besides do¬ 
ing away with the work of rehandling 
which is necessary when stock is 
shipped in bulk packages to you and 
repacked at your end. If interested 
in this service, we should be pleased 
to hear from you. Or, better, send 
your buyer or representative to in¬ 
vestigate our plant and facilities, as 
well as our local standing. All mail¬ 
ing is handled with strictest confi¬ 
dence, and as we send out no retail 
catalogs ourselves, you may be ab¬ 
solutely certain that your customers 
are treated just as if we were a 
department of your own business. 
A number of our leading nursery 
customers sell through agents. These 
agents take their orders for dahlias 
in the fall, and they get lots of 
them. Nearly all our seed house cus¬ 
tomers put out a fail catalog of 
spring flowering bulbs, such as tulips, 
crocuses, narcissus, etc. We believe 
it will pay these houses to offer 
uuliiias at that time also. Just when 
'me dahlia is in bloom your tall cat¬ 
alog will reach the customer, and 
you will find him ready to buy. Offer 
a good collection at a fair price, 
anu you will get many orders for 
spring delivery. Several of our cus¬ 
tomers have already expressed then- 
intention to try out this suggestion, 
and we believe it will pay you to 
consider this proposition and get in 
touch with us by July 1st. so we 
can arrange to supply your needs. 
We will be ready to make prices at 
that time, and can offer suggestions 
as to varieties that will be best suited 
for fall offerings—such varieties as 
will be most commoniy seen in neigh¬ 
bor s gardens throughout the coun¬ 
try, and will therefore be most at¬ 
tractive to your patrons. 
The sale of dahlias through floral 
stores is becoming an important item 
in our business. In even the smaller 
towns it is not hard to place from 
two to four hundred tubers each 
spring, while in the larger cities the 
sales should run mucn higher than 
that. For example, Frcyling & Men¬ 
dels, leading florists, nurserymen 
and landscape architects, at their 
store on Monroe Ave., Grand Rapids, 
Michigan, sold over five hundred 
tubers of the better class varieties 
last year. This year their order calls 
for over seventeen hundred tubers, 
and we should not be surprised if 
stiil more would be required before 
the end of the season. Satisfied 
customers soon increase any business. 
We occasionally have an order sent 
us at less than our prices as listed. 
Such orders are always returned, be¬ 
cause it is absolutely impossible for 
us to cut our prices to anyone. We 
know exactly what it costs us to 
produce each clump of tubers, and 
when we set our prices we take this 
cost as a basis. We figure only a 
legitimate profit, and to cut this off 
would leave us without pay for our 
own labor and normal return on the 
capital we have invested. We want 
to continue doing business, and we 
can’t do so unless we make at least 
a small profit on sales each year. 
We cannot urge you too strongly 
to send your order early. There is 
a great shortage in dahlias all over 
the country this year, and nearly all 
growers are quoting higher prices 
than they did last year on most of 
the leading varieties. We set our 
prices last summer, and have not 
deemed it practicable to change them, 
although we believe we are below 
what conditions would warrant us in 
charging. 
We have discontinued our retail 
department entirely, and no retail 
orders are accepted unless placed 
here at our gardens during blooming 
time. This step was made necessary 
by the enormous volume of our 
wholesale trade, and in fairness to 
our many wholesale customers. 
Theory alone won’t work in the 
seed and nursery business. It is a 
matter of hard facts. No one can 
predict crops accurately, nor can one 
predict demand to a definite figure. 
Crops or supply ordinarily form a 
sound basis for price; but with de¬ 
mand an uncertain item, the ratio 
of supply and demand cannot be 
established even after supply is 
known. The best basis of price is 
therefore not theory, but facti—ex¬ 
perience—upon which we can hope 
to proceed in creating our demand. 
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