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THE NATIONAL NURSERYMAN 
The National Nurseryman 
Established 1893 by C. L. YATES. Incorporated 1902 
Published monthly by 
THE NATIONAL NURSERYMAN PUBLISHING CO., Inc. 
Hatboro, Pa. 
Editor .ERNEST HEMMING, Flourtown, Pa. 
The leading trade journal issued for Growers and Dealers in 
Nursery Stocks of all kinds. It circulates throughout the 
United States, Canada and Europe. 
AWARDED THE GRAND PRIZE AT PARIS EXPOSITION, 1900 
SUBSCRIPTION RATES 
One Year in Advance .$1.50 
Foreign Subscriptions, in advance .$2.00 
Six Months .$1.00 
Advertising rates will be sent upon application. Advertisements 
should reach this office by the 20th of the month previous to the 
date of issue. 
Payment in advance required for foreign advertisements. Drafts 
on New York or postal orders, instead of checks, are requested by 
the Business Manager, Hatboro, Pa. 
Correspondence from all points and articles of interest to nursery¬ 
men and horticulturists are cordially solicited. 
Photographs and news notes of interest to nurserymen should be 
addressed, Editor, Plourtown, Pa., and should be mailed to arrive 
not later than the 25th of the month. 
Entered as second-class matter June 22, 1916, at the post office at 
Hatboro, Pennsylvania, under the Act of March 3, 1879. 
Hatboro, Pa., May 1922 
TRADE WHOLESALE Looking through the various 
AND RETAIL PRICES catalogs that come to this office 
one cannot help be impressed 
by the lack of uniformity in percentages from the retail 
price that are allowed the trade. 
These range from nothing up to 50% or more even with 
firms that cater both to a wholesale and retail trade. 
A very common percentage offered is 20%, yet the very 
nurseryman offering it knows that he would not attempt 
to handle nursery stock at such a percentage except in 
an emergency to complete an order 
There is only one possible interpretation for such a 
price, namely the nurseryman is catering to the retail 
trade and sells to the trade as an accommodation only. 
Other nurseries again allow varying discounts accord¬ 
ing to the item, indicating they want to make all the profit 
on the things they can sell themselves but are willing to 
let the retailer make a little on their surpluses. 
It is quite proper for any nursery firm to decide its own 
policy of doing business, hut foolish to expect to build up 
a business with the dealer and jobbing gardeners unless 
it enables them to prosper. 
It is extremely difficult to sell fairly to the trade and 
the consumer. 
There are really three sets of prices in the nursery 
trade: 
Retail prices for the small consumer buying small 
quantities. 
Wholesale prices for the large estates, orchard- 
ists, landscape gardeners and those who buy in large 
quantities. 
Trade prices for the nurserymen and dealers who 
buy to sell again. 
Some firms sell to all three, others to the two last and 
very few confine themselves strictly to the trade. 
This fact is one of the prime causes of instability in 
prices and causes some of the dissatisfaction that finds 
outlet at the conventions and on other occasions. 
Comparing the nursery trade with other lines of mer¬ 
chandising, some nurseries are the manufacturers, job¬ 
bers, wholesalers and retailers all in one, besides taking 
in a side line of professional landscape gardening to help 
them dispose of their products, so it is no wonder the 
ethics of the business are a little involved. 
The nurseryman would be scarcely human if he could 
act fair to all at the same time, especially if he does not 
know his costs in each capacity. 
There is an all supreme law or power at work that will 
straighten things out for us, if we do not do it ourselves. 
The large growers who are also retailers and try to 
monopolize the business and who do not serve well the 
small retailer merely encourage the small nurseryman to 
grow for himself what he cannot buy to sell at a profit. 
Monopolies are impossible when the source of supply 
is uncontrollable. 
Leaders in the trade should lay down policies to govern 
the trade that are based on fairness to all to gain enough 
adherents to insure success. 
CONFERENCE ON The conference which is called 
QUARANTINE 37 by the Federal Horticulture Board 
to meet at ten A. M., May 15, 1922, 
at Washington, D. C., will he a very important one. It 
is for the purpose of considering the advisability of any 
modifications—additions to or reductions from—the 
classes of plants permitted entry under permit for im¬ 
mediate sale under Regulation 3 of Quarantine 37. 
Quarantine 37 has a good many supporters in the 
nursery trade. It would he difficult to decide without a 
vote whether the majority would be for or against the 
Quarantine as it is now administered, although it is 
fairly certain that those in favor of returning to the 
days of unlimited imports would be very much in the 
minority. 
All business is essentially selfish and of course each 
nurseryman would like the priviledge of importing such 
stock as is not readily procurable in this country, and it 
does seem as if some branches of the business were 
favored with the special permits over others. The nur¬ 
serymen who applied for a permit to import Norway 
maples failed to impress the Board with their evidence 
that there was a shortage in the country and that it was 
necessary to import seedlings in advanced maturity to 
supply the shortage. 
The Board took the stand that Norway maples could 
he grown in the United States and the country must 
wait for them even if it took six or eight years to satis¬ 
fy its needs. 
Perhaps the one thing more than any other that 
creates controversy and dissatisfaction is the feeling 
that the Federal Horticulture Board exceeds the powers 
given to it by the law which brought it into existence, 
when it put in operation Quarantine 37. 
To the understanding of the average layman, the bill 
does not give the Federal Horticulture Board power to 
put in operation a blanket quarantine, such as Quaran¬ 
tine 37, against all imports of nursery stock, and then 
give permits for special items. 
Section 8 of the hill says: 
' That whenever, in order to prevent the introduction 
