THE NATIONAL NURSERYMAN 
241 
Who are Entitled to Receive Trade Lists? 
By John Dayton, Painesville, Ohio, Bead at the Milwaukee Convention 
P ERHAPS, if there is one thing more than another 
that we need in our rather demoralized nursery 
business, it is an authorative body to publish 
“Who's Who” for the trade and compel all of us to accept 
its findings. 
What is a trade list? T should say a list quoting low¬ 
est prices to legitimate nurserymen, who are engaged in 
the trade and buy stock to sell again at trade or whole¬ 
sale prices. These nurserymen are the foundation of the 
nursery business, the superior of the national and state 
organization the producers of the stock that makes the 
wholesale and retail business possible; they carry the ac¬ 
counts and notes which tides many a poor man over his 
poor season; they finance the movements and committees 
which give the trade a standing in the eyes of the Gov¬ 
ernment and business world, and helps through, or en¬ 
deavors to kill the good or bad laws, introduced in our 
national and state legislatures. 
Who receives the trade list? Nurserymen, dealers, 
florists, agents, landscape architects, state and private 
institutions, including parks, cemeteries, etc., depart¬ 
ment stores, schools, and almost any private planter who 
wants to buy or says he does, a fair amount of stock, 
and has had a little experience in working the trade. 
How do you make up, or keep corrected your mailing 
list? Does your office hoy, or the newest stenographer 
have charge of what ought to be about as closely watched 
as your bank account. Are names entered indiscrimin¬ 
ately without investigation, and lists sent to men who 
long ago have retired from business, or to men who have 
gone to a climate where trees do not grow, even if well 
mulched? How many trade lists, do postmasters, in 
the kindness of their hearts, hand out to parties who 
think they may be interested in them, hut not entitled 
to them? 
A few years ago, Ohio examined and gave nursery 
certificates free, and issued, if I remember correctly, 
nearly 400, largely to men who have from one-eighth to 
three acres of small fruits, and all of these names were 
promptly copied into nurserymen’s directories and are 
still there, although when the state charged a minumum 
fee of $5.00, the number dropped considerably more 
than half. 
I have seen in the office of more than one florist, who 
has a range of greenhouses, and handles tender stock 
exclusively, doing nothing with trees, shrubs, etc., a 
drawer full of nurserymen’s juice lists; they come reg¬ 
ularly every season, although no order ever goes back. 
We used to receive many, and do still occasionally re¬ 
ceive orders from retail buyers, stating their florist, Mr. 
Brown, to whom they had applied for trees, had handed 
them our price list, and told them to order direct, the 
list always being the wholesale prices. 
I believe that every one growing stock in quantity for 
the trade, ought to issue a trade list, mailed only to men 
actively engaged in growing nursery stock, and selling 
it together with what he buys, to the trade for reselling, 
and that just as far as their orders will justify we ought 
to hill at lowest quantity rates. That we ought to issue 
a wholesale list, quoting by the ten, hundred and thou¬ 
sand, when stock will justify, holding the juices strictly 
according to quantity ordered, with usual packing 
charges, and that wholesale jirices ought to be high 
enough to allow the legitimate nurseryman to huy at 
trade prices and to break even, or make a little profit in 
selling at wholesale rates. That if we are growin- 
greenhouse stock to sell to florist s trade we ought to 
send them a list, quoting only tin* stock they handle and 
are likely to buy. Then if we sell at retail, our lists 
according to the way we do business, hut in all cases 
retail prices should be high enough to allow the whole¬ 
saler to sell at a fair margin of profit. 
From what little 1 know of the organizations and the 
way other lines of business are conducted, the above 
are responsible propositions, and in fact almost indis- 
pensible if we would make our business a self-sujiport- 
ing one. Would the majority of the nurserymen adopt 
and live up to such plans? Not in a thousand years, 
judging from our past experience. 
Most of us are growers, wholesalers and retailers, and 
if not wholesale seedsmen and florists, mean to be as 
soon as possible, and according to our particular trade, 
education, circumstances, or environment, see things at 
a little different angle from the other fellow. While 
many of us are getting so that we talk co-operation, 
w hen we come down to actual practice we are ready to 
take all we can get, but not ready to do the giving that 
is necessary to make any co-operation effective. 
Take landscape gardeners, for instance; like many 
nurserymen, some of them are willing to do business in 
any old way that they can get it, but the majority of 
them hold together and do business along well defined 
plans and control the buying of an immense amount of 
stock, mostly ornamental, every year. I take off my 
hat to them. Judging from results, they have an 
efficient organization that means something. 
I have cited landscape gardeners, and we could go 
through a long list and find fault with conditions, but 
we all know them, and who is going to make us see alike ? 
One of the largest growers of ornamental stock, who 
has made a success of his business, issues only one list, 
makes no distinction as to buyers, and if they want 500 
trees they get 1000 rates, 25 trees 100 rates, etc. Planters 
who buy once in a lifetime, nurserymen who buy every 
year, he says the only proper way is to have one price 
for everybody, according to the quantity they buy, excejil 
that it is {Permissible to sell our surplus to the trade at a 
cut rate on quotations. 
Do not want to get into the question of cost of nursery 
stock. What about overhead expense? We all know 
that it is an impossibility to make planting and budding 
lists, one to six years in advance, even if we are honest, 
we will have some surplus varieties and have to buv 
others. It is not a legitimate item that we add to our 
overhead expense account a certain jier cent, every year 
to cover the cost of growing stock, which changing mar- 
