The morning call., 1893-06-07
PRICES OF FRUIT.
Merchants and JObberS in
Combination.
THE RETAILER FROZEN OUT.
To Force Sales on the Street and
Prevent Dealers and Consumers
From Buying at Wholesale.

or middlemen have com bined for mutual
protection-at least. that is the avowed
purpose of the combination.
To-day an agreement will be presen ted
for signatures to every commission mer-
chant, providing that hereafter the latter
will begin the sale of fruit and produce
upon the wharves al the hour of 6 o'clock
and that no produce will be sold to any
one in smaller quantities than manifest
lots.
A meeting of jobbers and commission
merchants was held yesterday afternoon
at the store of W. j. Murray, 416 Davis
street. Nearly thirty producemen at
tended. All present agreed to stand by
the new arrangement, and if sufficient
number of commission men sign the agree
ment the measure will go into effect imme-
diately.
The commission merchants and middle
men both claim that the new rule will
benefit the public. the merchants. the job
bers, and finally the fruit-growers.
At the conclusion of the meeting a men,
Der of the firm of Wolf & Sons, one of the
houses prominently connected with the
movement, stated his views on the subject.
There is no city in the United States.
as far as / know. which carries on its
produce commission business in such a
loose manner as IA at present the case in
San Francisco. For a long time it has
been customary for the commission mer-
chants to dispose of large part of their
shipments upon the wharveS at which they
are received the Jackson-street wharf
especially. They sell small quantities, a
few dollars worth or even less at time, to
small retailers and even consumers at
wholesale prices-that is at the samelprices
which the middlemen have to pay.
'Of course most of US commission men
are also jnbbers and sell during the day to
retailers i'll the same way and at the same
prices at which the fruit is sold TO the
middlemen on the wharf where we receive
the shipments.
tom among the retailers of buving in small
quantities and at wholesale prices directly
at the wharf is spreading rapidly and will
ultim ately ruin their business.
I'VE are perfectly willing to make this
agreement because it is a great nuisance
to be obliged to divide shipments into
small lots and parcel them out to retailers.
bread right out of the mouths of the mid
dlemen.
"The way the fruit-growers will be
benefited will be in the fact that much less
fruit will be spoiled and dumped over
board. for the reason that consignments
w III D6 TdpiuIy SOU III fnAUIItSl lOtS 10 JOD-
bers and disposed of at once"
Alliston Gray said that he was heartily
in favor of the plan, and would sign the
agreement. The reason for the 6-oclock-
opening clause is that some of the men
can gel down no earlier, and this Irregular
opening of sales leads to a lack of uni
formity in prices, and consequent loss to
some of the mef chants.
The reason the jubbers insist upon the
arrangement Is very obvious. Every time
a retailer or consumer Is sold fruit at the
wharf 1t is so much money out of thier
pocket. They insist that the public will
also be benefited by the new arrangement
for the reason that now they are obliged
to get what they can from such of the
dealers who come to them instead of buy
ing at the wharf, while If they felt secure,
and had the entire handling of the retail
ers, they could 10 more business and con-
seQuently sell cheaper.
81. Hickman, one of the oldest commits
sion merchants in the city, expressed him
self as being ia favor of the scheme. He
also claimed that the growers would be
directly benefited. Large lots OF fruit,
such. for instance, as cantaloups, are sold
in small quantities. Each man has mis-
pick, and, of course, they take the best,
even transferring melons from one crate to
another. The result is a residuum, which
nobody wants and which Is a dead loss to
the shipper
Ii. Dutard said he had not been invited
to attend the council. but asked TO be put
on record as saying that whatever the
ostensible object of the combine might be,
the real purpose and the practical result
would be to rob the people Refusing TO
sell to any but middlemen forced consum-
ers upon the mercy OF middlemen. That,
he said, was a self-evident proposition.
Edward A. Bunker said he could not
understand how the commission men could
abide by the promise to sell only manifest
lots. AS many as 1000 or 1000 sacks of
potatoes might appear on the manifest as
one lot, and no one house Of middlemen
could possibly handle such an amount.
He believed that the merchants would fail
to keep their word and so gradually drift
back again to the old method.
At the present time, however, a majority
arrangement.