286 
THE NATIONAL NURSERYMAN 
ing by the part-cash-in-advance plan have already been 
mentioned above. 
The nursery adopting this plan lias less cancellation of 
orders, better collections, less stock left on hand at de¬ 
livery time, has less bad note losses, and has consider¬ 
able extra capital received early in the season, thus re¬ 
ducing the necessity of borrowing from the bank. 
All of these factors tend to put the nurseryman’s busi¬ 
ness on a firmer foundation, reducing business failures 
and permitting more business to he handled—and han¬ 
dled on a higher plane. 
THE NURSERY RUSINESS 
Address by Mr. D. V. Hill, Dundee, III., before the South¬ 
ern Nurserymen s Association, September 15, 1922 
Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen: 
I find that 1 am assigned the subject to “Growing 
Evergreens,” but as it is of little use to grow Evergreens 
or any other nursery stock for that matter, unless it can 
he sold. I will take only a few minutes of your time to 
cover briefly some of these points as they appear to me. 
Refore the war, it was, of course, customary to import 
many of tin 1 different varieties of coniferous and broad- 
leaved evergreen trees and shrubs. It was generally un¬ 
derstood that a great many things could not be grown 
here in America through lack of skill or soil or climatic 
conditions. It was thought that the propagation of some 
of the Junipers, Thuya, Taxus, Cedrus, Cupressus and 
Biota varieties required some secret process such as only 
foreigners possessed. Rhododendrons and Azaleas and 
Boxwoods were out of the question. Magnolias, Camel¬ 
lias, Abelias, Ligustrums, Viburnums, etc. were a down¬ 
right impossibility for American growers to even attempt. 
One writer even went so far as to say that American 
growers didn’t have the intelligence to grow certain need¬ 
ed articles of stock formerly imported. 
Gentlemen. T am glad to say that these myths were 
soon exploded. As one travels around the country there 
is plenty of evidence that the stocks are already here or 
on the way. The central and eastern growers are getting 
into their strides. All through this great beautiful south 
land, your leading growers big and little, are equipping 
themselves to produce trees and plants formerly import¬ 
ed from Europe and Asia. Some of the most important 
tree and plant producing units in the country are located 
in the area embraced by the Southern Nurserymen’s As¬ 
sociation On a trip to the important growing centers a 
year ago last winter. I was amazed at the great progress 
as wadi as the push, enthusiasm and confidence displayed 
by Southern growers in the work of producing plants 
formerly shipped in from abroad. You have the skillful 
and experienced growers and your leaders stand foremost 
in accomplishment. This, combined with every needed 
variety of soil and climate, will produce the stock want¬ 
ed bv the American consuming public. 
The Pacific Coast with its especially favorable climatic 
conditions also offers wonderful opportunities for the 
growing of varied lines of nursery and florist stock, and 
these are being taken full advantage of by the growlers 
there. There is in process of production a vast amount 
of needed stock that will help to fill the gap, and put 
American horticulture on the map. After two months 
spent last winter among Pacific coast growers, not a 
word of discouragement w r as heard. Everywhere they 
were throwing themselves into the work with renewed 
energy and confident determination. 
With all this intense activity in the production of nur¬ 
sery stock going on all over the country, what will be the 
outcome? For a few years the market will undoubtedly 
absorb what is produced, but after that, unless something 
is done, there will unquestionably arise the old problem 
of overproduction and brush piles, useful only for bon¬ 
fires, also ruinous prices both wholesale and retail with 
cut throughout competition. 
The nursery industry is composed roughly of about 
4000 nurserymen, with annual sales of about 20 million 
dollars. These figures are from the 1920 census. Lead¬ 
ing members of the nursery industry agree that 20 mil¬ 
lion dollars is less than one-fifth of the present potential 
market. One hundred million dollars in sales should be 
reached or substantially approached by the nursery in¬ 
dustry in the next ten years. This advance in sales is 
entirely within the range of practical accomplishment. 
The consuming public of 110.000.000 people of this na¬ 
tion will gladly pay an average of -$1.00 each to the nur¬ 
sery industry for the utility and beauty of trees and 
plants. We, however, as a trade must develop tree plant¬ 
ing into a national habit. This can he done by remind¬ 
ing this vast audience again and again throughout the 
year to plant trees. 
The nursery industry has neglected to promote the idea 
of a tree planting habit. The nursery industry has been 
playing its tune on the piccolo, while other industries 
have been beating the base drum. It is time to kindle the 
fire beneath the boiler, get up steam, blow the whistle 
and go ahead. Failure to do this means that the nursery¬ 
men will be left waiting at the depot. 
The American Association of Nurserymen has never 
gotten very far in national publicity work, although sev¬ 
eral conscientious starts have been made. Some of the 
sectional and state associations have used one plan or 
another, but the point is that some one plan and one slo¬ 
gan must finally he adopted, that all nurserymen in the 
industry, whether member of an association or not, can 
tie up to. 
We all know r what success the florists have had in their 
“Say it with Flowers” campaign. As a result of this pub¬ 
licity the live florists are getting rich, and even the sleepy 
florists make money and sell goods in spite of themselves, 
because of the tremendous demand created by a unified 
activity. One of the members of the American Face Brick 
Association stated that his firm was assessed for national 
publicity last year the sum of $22,500.00 and that they 
considered this money one of the most cheerful checks 
written during the year. Whether the nursery industry 
has national publicity or not. we will pay for it. Pay for 
it in unsold goods, surplus stock, fire piles, overgrown 
trees, low prices, ruinous competition etc. 
The message I bring then, to the Southern Nursery¬ 
men’s Association, and to the industry at large, is a plea 
for the adoption of some kind of organized national pub¬ 
licity. 
