The Donaldsonville chief., 1914-03-14
HOW COOPERATION PAYS.
Reasons Why St. Elmo Eggs Com
mand Top o. Market Prices
Value of Organized Selling sys-
tenn Effectively Demonstrated.

pISned by means OF community CO.
operation and organized effort, we
reproduce herewith the following
paragraphs from the last monthly
letter issued by President Brady
of the Alluvial Land Purchase Com
pany, recounting some of the re-
suits achieved in the poultry busi-
ness by the enterprising members
of the st. Elmo Poultry Association:
What do you reckon we ran up
against last week? Why, Mr.. Reese
was swamped with orders for eggs!
At 80 cents per dozen, delivered to
the houses in New Orleans, Mr..
Reese couldn't fill the orders. To-
day it is not a question with US of
getting orders, but OF getting the
eggs, and I am not afraid to say we
could handle 100 or 1000 dozen eggs
day, just as easily as We can han
die 25 dozen. / met gentleman the
other day who told me he could buy
all the eggs he wanted in the coun-
try for from II 1-2 to 20 cents
dozen, and would never dream OF
paying 80 cents a dozen for eggs. l
agreed with him that he could. That
is perhaps the very best argument in
favor of the St. Elmo Poultry Asso-
citation. Eggs can be bought any
where from II IL to 20 cents per
dozen today, yet We cannot supply
enough eggs to our customers at IS
cents a dozen.
"There is reason for this. Now,
let us see what the reason is. That
reason is the difference between
success and failure.
Almost everybody has thought
some time in his life about the chick
EN- and egg business, and has taken
a pencil and figured how he could
get rich. Some Of them have then
tried it and almost invariably have
failed. Why? Did it ever occur to
you, when buying from corner gro
Gerry store, how many changes
take place in the average corner
grocery store? It is a fact that
more than nine out of every ten who
go into the grocery business fail.
The reasons why they fail are many.
The two greatest reasons are lack
of money to carry on their business
and lack of experience in knowing
how to handle their business. Yet, out
Of ten people who run grocery stores,
the rule shows that at least one man
succeeds because he does things a
little different from the other nine.
Now, that is the way it is with the
chicken business. Nine out of ten
people fail because they haven't the
money to carry on a business and
because they have no experience in
handling the problems that come up.
That is why St. Elmo is the place
to raise chickens rather than where
you are staying now. You might say
that if you can raise chickens at
St. Elmo, you can raise them any
where else just as easily; that if the
St. Elmo Poultry Association can sell
eggs for IS cents a dozen, you can
sell them at IS cents a dozen, too.
The reason why you can't do it, is
this. At St. Elmo We are studying
every day how to properly raise
chickens. There is a meeting every
sunday- of-Iha s tt Elmo Poultry As
sociation, where talks are made and
where the methods that other people
have succeeded in are discussed and
studied. At st. Elmo We have from
time to time lecturers from the LOU
isiana State University to teach the
people how to raise chickens and
how to care for them. Better than
that, as fast as one person learns
something new, he passes it on to
the next person, so that everybody
at St. Elmo is learning the right
way raise chickens; how to make
| them healthy and good layers by
feeding the right kind of food; how
to teed little chickens; how to han
die the drinking water; what kind
need; and, how to select the good
laying hens from the bad. 1t is al
most impossible for one person Off
by himself to learn how to do these
llany things. In a community where
everybody is doing it, it is very
easy to learn. When a person gets
that tired feeling and says, whats
the use, it is too much trouble to
keep up and then looks around and
sees somebody else who has kept up
and who is raising fine, healthy,
laying chickens, he gets fresh cour-
age and goes back to work again.
That's the way st. Elmo people are
helping each other in the chicken
business.
"NoW, when it comes to selling the
eggs, the ST. Elmo Poultry Associa,
tion's secretary, Mr.. Martinez, goes
to his office every evening at four
o'clock when he returns from school,
Che is a Donaldsonville High School
boy, by the Way), and the eggs laid
that day must be brought to him
and he will give a receipt for the
number OF eggs turned in. These
eggs must be dated the day they are
laid and the name of the member of
the association who turns them in
must be stamped on the eggs. In
this way it is very easy to keep
track of the eggs and see that they
are pure and fresh and sold every
day. Mr. Martinez takes these
eggs and puts them in packages and
sends them by parcel post to the
customers at once. These custo-
mers are furnished him by Mr..
Reese and the office force, and in
this way the St. Elmo poultry raiser
gets the benefit Of the highest mar
ket price in New Orleans and re-
ceives his money promptly without
any worry, because the association
handles the work. Because the as
sociation won't let anything go out
but fresh eggs he gets the highest