The Yakima herald. [volume] (North Yakima, W.T. [Wash.]) 1889-1914, 1911-08-09
POOR PACKING
RESULTS LOSS
w. P. Sawyer, Of Wapato, Large
Grower of Pears, Tells of
Proper Packing Methods
HONESTY IN PACKING
THE BEST POLICY
Says That Fruit Must Be Packed
Honestly to Get the Best Price
and That No Man With a Grain
of Sense Would Do Otherwise

ct would nightly like to be able
to impress every packer of fruit, and
especially of pears, with one fact and
that is that nothing but loss can ever
come from packing inferior fruit in
a package represented to contain SUI
perior fruit" said w. P. Sawyer, of
Wapato. one OF the largest growers of
pears in the valley in a talk on pack
ing pears. '"rhe reason is that no
unknown fruit is ever bought with
out inspection. Our boxes are the
easiest things in the world to exam
inc, and they are always opened on
the side, and dug into clear to the
center. nothing being hidden. A
whole shipment will be rated down
to the grade of the poorest stuff that
they contain.
''It is not necessary that one should
to be honest to make him pack his
fruit honestly, because it is the only
way that he can get price for it;
and If he will but use a grain of
sense he will grade and pack his fruit
the very best that he knows, or can
learn, how. The only ones harmed
by slovenly and dishonest packing are
those who do it, and indirectly all
others in the community who are in
the same line of business. A bad
pack Of pears bearing yakima"
stamp Injuries every pack OF pears
made in Yakima.
"Mr. Gilberts article the other day
expresses what most Of us are mighty
sorry to know contains too much
truth. Better fruit than Yakima
raises does not grow and the name
Yakima should be synonym of
highest quality, and it behooves us to
make it so. 1t can be done, however,
only by honest effort and care.
'The branding of fruit packages be-
longs legitimately to this subject and
! may as we'll speak a few words
about it.
1.-The great commercial companies
know as well the value of words in
branding goods as any one on earth.
I was in the mercantile business for
twenty-five years of my life and so
am somewhat familiar with the
methods employed by the trades IN
branding their products, and / think
you will find this universal: Ambig-
uous words. that is, words like Eek
ira" AL" superior quality" etc.
are used only upon inferior goods.
When the article is of good quality
If the quality is described at all it is
done in plain, definite English that
every one can understand. For in
stance in silver plated fat ware, the
cheapest grade that any reputable
maker will allow his firm name to
appear upon Is marked Extra AL"
This is single plate, and "single plate
does not sound very attractive. so they
say Extra AL" If the goods are
better than that they tell in plain
words just what they are-"double
plate triple plate" "quadruple
plate" etc, and generally the best
makers will give the number of pen
nyweights of silver used to the set
or dozen. But you will never find this
class of business men relying upon ex-
treme adjectives in describing the
quality of their goods; If they did,
the last man to enter a field would
brand, and they would have the ridic-
ulous experience we see in the fruit
business sometimes.
Not long since the word prime
described the best quality of fruit;
that finally became tame, and the
best was called Choice; then when
that began to show signs of wear they
called it fancy" and that should
have been the limit, but it was not
for last fall a neighbor of mine sold
some beautiful D'Anjou pears to a
New York firm and he was instructed
to pack the pears in three grades and
to mark them Fancy" Extra
Fancy" Extra Fancy, Select" re-
spectively. To my mind such meth
DDS of branding are utterly ridiculous
and are OF no avail.
Men never pay a high price for
the marks upon a package. 1t is the
goods inside the package that de-
termines what buyer will pay, and
no brand will ever be of any practical
value to anybody until the buyers
have learned that that brand always
covers exactly what ii claims to cover
then the brand becomes valuable and
constantly increases in value. Fol
this reason men who put out goods
of superior quality endeavor to hit
upon something unique, so that theii
brand can always be easily distin-
guished from others In the same line
of business. and these brands are u.s.
ually copyrighted to prevent Others
from making use of them, and I think
that fruit growers who are trying t.
excel III the quality of their pack OF
fruit should be governed in exactly
the same way. If we say anything
about what is in the package let il
be something that any one can un'
derstand For instance, the label thai
l place upon my finest Bartlett pear:
contains this statement: This boz
contains 1876 perfect pears, the choic
est quality grown and perfectly pack
n he 1f TON. . ,.s