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Are prices all shot to pieces? 
What Do You Mean 
Get Busy? 
Is the business in general, in bad odor?S 
Before we go any further, let me explain that this talk has to do with trying to bring about 
better conditions in the Nursery business. 
Conditions that will make your business more pleasurable and decidedly more profitable. 
As the business, as a whole, now stands, you know that a lot of things are dead wrong—let’s 
talk them over. 
Let’s see what can be done about it. 
1 . There is no bottom to prices. 
Competition is without regard to ac¬ 
tual cost of production. 
Prices are often quoted to customers 
lower than to the trade. 
ISN’T THIS TRUE? 
2. There isn’t near the money there 
might be in the bueiness. Consider 
the large amount of tied up capital in¬ 
vested. Think of the long hours and 
the skill demanded. Look at the slow 
turn-over and risks you must run, that 
are absolutely beyond control. 
Compare your profits with those of 
other industries, and you see at a 
glance, they are way too low. 
ISN’T THAT YOUR EXPERIENCE ? 
3. There exist no 
tice.” 
‘Standards of Prac- 
By that, I mean those unwritten laws, 
customs, and codes of honor, which are 
a large part of any sound business. 
They have never been standardized 
among nurserymen, as in most other 
industries. • 
As a result—there exists uncertainty, 
suspicion, quoting of trade prices to 
those not entitled to them; and any 
number of other bad practices. 
ISN’T THAT ALL SO? 
WELL THEN-WHAT’S WRONG? 
It isn’t because you haven’t worked hard, that 
results haven’t been better. 
It isn’t because you have not been thrifty, that 
you haven’t more money in your sock. 
Still, year after year, you have been expecting 
better things. 
But they haven’t happened like they have been 
happening in other lines of business. 
Where then, have the cogs slipped? 
Has it ever occurred to you that the trouble is 
that your time and effort has been mostly spent 
along go-it-alone lines? 
That you have not done your share to help or¬ 
ganize the business as a whole; just as hun¬ 
dreds of other industries have been organized 
so successfully. 
Where, for example, would the California Fruit 
Growers be today, if they had not organized, 
standardized, and advertised? 
Why have the Florists organized and adver¬ 
tised? 
Why have they planned to spend $100,000 this 
year, instead of the $40,000 they did last year? 
What’s the use of standing back, and all the 
time growling about the “crooks in the bus¬ 
iness,” and how “prices have gone to the dogs,” 
and still never do a doggone thing to better 
things ? 
The Nurserymen’s Service Bureau was organ¬ 
ized to help you, to help others help you. 
Are you going to sit still and not profit by the 
services of this Bureau? 
Do you realize what it’s going to mean to use 
The Little Blue Tag? 
Let me send you particulars of just what the 
Bureau is, and exactly what it is both doing 
and going to do. 
That’s what I mean by “Get Busy.” 
Manager. 
NuRSERXAiENsNATIONALSERyiCEBlJREAU 
220 West 42nd Street 
New York City 
Whdn writing; to Advertisers please mention the National Nurseryman. 
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