The Blackfoot optimist. [volume] (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1907-1918, 1913-02-20
System Of Marketing
Products Of the Farm
Office Of the Secretary. Washington,
D. c., February II, 1918.


Systems Of marketing farm products
and the demand for them at trade
centers are the subjects of a special
report to congress by the Secretary
Of Agriculture, recently published. The
report was made by special direction
Of Congress in order that information
might be at hand concerning the es-
tablishment Of a division Of markets
In the Department Of Agriculture. The
Secretary specifies various items Of
services that could be performed by
such an office, with recommendation
that they be adopted, If It is created.
The report covers 391 pages and is
crowded with information with regard
to the subjects treated.
BY Producers to Consumers
The report treats Of the movement
Of farm products from the farm to
consumer through great variety of
channels. The simplest distribution is
the direct one of delivery by farmer
to consumer, and next after this is
the delivery by individual farmers or
associations Of farmers to individual
consumers or associations of consul
mers. In these direct forms of distribu
ton, the middleman is eliminated, al.
though of course intermediate services
are performed either by producers or
by consumers or by both parties.
Intervention Of MiddIemen
Among the varieties Of middlemen
concerned in the marketing Of farm
products are the travelling hucksters
who go from farm to farm gathering
eggs. butter, poultry, calves, and other
commodities, which they sell to ship
pers, jobbers, or retail dealers. The
country merchant is often the first
receiver of such products as eggs,
farm-made butter, poultry, WOOL hides
cotton, and sometimes grain and hay.
In regions where grain is the staple
product, the tendency has been to dis
place the country merchant by the
grain buyer and the local elevator man
Farmers commonly sell through com
mission merchants and to some ex-
tent directly to wholesale dealers and
also to retail dealers The farmer vic
employs trustworthy commission mel
chant who will handle his products
honestly and honorably will get the
current prices for them within tthe
range of the commission merchant s
business, but the farmer often finds
himself in the hands of commission
merchant who falsely reports that the
products were received In damaged cor
dition or that they were Of grade
lower than they were in fact, or he. re-
ports receiving prices lower than those
actually received by him for the pro.
ducts. Worse than this, it is by no
means rare that the commission mer-
chant has sold the products and failed
to return the net proceeds.
Samples Of transactions in which or
~ one middleman intervenes between
producer and consumer include the
commission man at a large market
who receives consignments of live
stock from farmers and sells to pack.
ers; the actor to whom the planter
conslgns his rice or cotton and from
whom purchases are made by millers
the warehousemen manage the sale of
q Virginia planters tobacco
The Intervention Of two men be-
tween producer and consumer is a
co:nmon occurrence. Fruits and vege
tables are often marked through the
aid Of two middlemen, the city com
mission dealer and a retail merchant
More Than Two Intermediates
A series of three middlemen may in
clude first the local buyer of the ship
per; second, the commission dealer OF
the wholesale merchant; and third, the
retail merchant In the sale of fruit
by auction, which is common in large
cities east Of the Mississippi river, the
auctioneer is an additional middleman
He may sell for commission dealer
been made by a country buyer; and tt
purchaser at such an auction may be
. jobber, who in turn sells to retail
merchant. Five middlemen are thu!
concerned in such transaction.
Onions raised in Kentucky are some
times bought by local merchant ant
shipped to Louisville: here thew ma,
be put into sacks and consigned to
New York wholesaler or a commission
man who in turn sells to a new Yorl
retailer. Eggs and poultry frequent
ly pass through the hands of at leas
four middlemen.
The marketing Of clover seed is a
example Of transfer from one far
mer to another through a number o
middlemen The first middleman ma
be an Indiana jobber, who consigns t.