The Delta independent., 1911-11-10
The Business of Fruit Growing.

For long time many OF our fruit
growers evidently thought that in
ferior fruit and deceptive packing
fooled the customer. The packer OF
good fruit imagined, apparently
that the customer, after being de-
ceived with a bad lot of fruit would
turn to a standard article from the
same place with satisfaction, or that
a superior article would be enhanc-
ed in value by a contrast with the
inferior. The packer of poor fruit
thought he could sell it forever up
on the general reputation of the
state, or by deceptive packing, or
by counterfeit branding. But now
both classes are awakening to the
fact that it is the grower who has
been deceived and not the consumer.
The latter may have been mater
tally injured, but he has not been
deceived, for to him is given the
final test of all fruit and no I'M
wise or superficial policy can ever
cause the consumer to pay more on
the average than the produce is
worth, unless the seller monopol-
ICES a necessity. This the grower
CdH hol w, lOi hdo iiC thC AHSANNN-
ton. But the consumer can be
cheated whit a low grade article un-
til he becomes suspicious and dis
counts all grades and qualities to
a great extent. So the grower OF
good fruit is abandoning the belief
that he is receiving all the profit to
which he is entitled. and is casting
about for the removal of the influ-
ences that are preventing full re-
turns from his skill and industry.
The chief of these influences is
the shipment of inferior fruit and
when the scheme of OBTAINING this
class of fruit by compulsion was
it caught his immediate
attention and he called it standard
ization. There are other elements
that enter largely into the elment
of better fruit packing. 1t is fact
that no calling is SO burdened with
unfair competition as that of the
fruit grower. For this the orchard
list has himself largely to blame. He
has looked too much upon horticul-
ture as an occupation and not a
business. The idea that anyone can
plant tress and grow fruit has fool
ed thousands of novices. profession
al men, artisans, merchants and lab
orers into the occupation who know
nothing about the business and they
produce an immense tonnage of
fruit from fair to Indifferent, with
out the ability. time or inclination
to follow out its disposal in bust
nesslike way. With an income from
another quarter, the banker. the
motorman, the merchant. dabble In
horticulture.
but concurrent with this
The shipment of a heavy tonnage
with the hope of speculation In
realty values, ar with the idea that
anyone can be a farmer even by
proxy or because real estate agents
have filled them with roseate stor-
les of profits, or with view OF re
firing to the country where they
have a competency. No business is
so handicapped by unfair rivalry
Should this class of farmers be de-
MED the right to invest in the le-
ultimate pursuit, even If 1t results
in unfair competition? Not at all.
Their privilege to engage is fund
amental but concurrent with hits
right is the right of those engaged
in fruit drowning as a business TO
protect their investments in every
legitimate way.
The shipment of a heavy tongnae
of low grade fruits every year en-
dangers the prosperity and possibly
the very life of the fruit industry
itself and those who make their live
lihood from the orchard should take
public measures. II necessary, to
protect their capital and do every
thing to eliminate unfit fruit such
as we see today overwhelming the
Denvdr market, so far as they can
do 1t without interfering with the
prerogatives of others. Here inter
venes the question: Does a fruit
shipper have the right to refuse
to handle the fruit of that part OF
the public whose products do not
conform to an arbitrary standard?
The shippers have this right. both
moral and legal, and herein lies the
most powerful feature of the plan
called Standardization. except that
of the education of the growers,
which is the most potent and last
ing element concerned with the
scheme-J. w. JEFFERAY.