
December, 1949 
Dear Friends: 
At times we’d like to forget about the violets 
and spend every day at the typewriter. We’ve 
got the nicest customers in the world. You've 
gotten so you don’t even bawl us out about damag- 
ed plants anymore. We used to get some Irip- 
snortin’ nasty letters about that, but apparently 
everybody’s satisfied that we’re not out to skin 
"em. Thank goodness. 
And, as much as we dislike the fact, the plants 
do get torn up now and then. When the average 
customer gets a busted plant, he immediately con- 
cludes that the packing is all wrong. ’Tain’t so. 
There are many factors that enter into the pack- 
ing problem. The packer can control most of 
them, but certainly not all of them. No practical 
packing method can possibly be expected to take 
care of all the things that go wrong. I say “prac- 
tical” because, with elaborate cardboard forms for 
supporting the plants, foam rubber, and individual 
thermostatically controlled heating units for each 
packing box it would be possible to get every 
plant to its destination in perfect condition. A 
plant packed in this way would cost around $30.00. 
Wouldn’t have many customers, would we? It’s 
cheaper all the way around to make a replace- 
ment. Expensive packing materials and elaborate 
methods only add to the cost of your plant. They 
represent dollars and cents to the packer but 
they’re nothing but waste paper to you and your 
garbage man hauls them off as such. We think 
it’s better to settle for a cheap, simple method that 
will get 95% of the plants to you in good shape, 
and replace the other 5%. The customer benefits 
by getting more plant to keep and less packing to 
throw away. We benefit by a more streamlined 
packing system. 
But, as I say, things go wrong. Plants work- 
ing out of the pots is the most common trouble- 
maker. If your plants comes to your door that 
way, it’s because the box has ridden to its destina- 
tion stacked so that the plant is upside down. 
Furthermore it has probably received some pretty 
hard jolts while it was stacked that way. Now, our 
plants are heavy. With the exception of two or 
three varieties, every plant we send out repre- 
sents a good bit of bulky weight in leaves, crown 
and roots. If they’ve upside down long enough 
and jiggled hard enough, they’ll just fall out. We 
try to guard against this by building up with tissue 
around the crown, padding the pot with spaghnum, 
wrapping with more paper and tying that top col- 
lar down to the rest of the pot to hold the plant 
in the pot if it is turned upside down. But, postal 
clerks being what they are, and the force of gravity 
being what it is, sometimes the sticker (Please 
Don’t Stack This Face Down) is ignored, and the 
heavy plant rips loose from its roots and - - ooey- 
gooey!!! The longer the trip the greater the dan- 
ger. Consequently, when we choose plants for 
shipment, the father away the customer, the smal- 
ler the plant. I may be cutting off some good sales 
by saying that, but frankly, it gives us the jitters 
Copyright November, 1949, by Russell Gray 
PAWAR PARA PACAP LOA PAPAPA PACA S ABA AGAMA FAP ARAL PAPAWAMAMAWARA AI. 

