Saturday news. (Watertown, S.D.) 19??-19??, 1917-03-22
E DIT O rial
OUR MARKET COMMISSIONER

a bill creating the office of commissioner of marketing is said
10 have passed the legislature to become effective July /.
While if is an important ofice-a very important one-we doubt
whether the people of the state will find it to be materially bene
fetal during the ensuing two years.
The best that a market commissioner can do, in our estimation,
is TO lay the foundation for future action lie may accomplish TINS
by accnmulating and collating a mass of data that may serve as a
guide to Legislation.
The direct benefits viii otherwise be inconsequenhal, we think,
although it is possible that the officer in question may discover a
fay by which a few of the leaks in our system of distribution may be
avoided.
cost of distribution. They have done o with only a small measure
of sucess-so small as to be merely pereepible.
The editor of The Saturday News was once a member of such an
association. He was a member of a committee selected by the grow
tion-for evading and avoiding and eliminating some Of the GO
betweens. While he assumes no credit for the investigation that
observer and came in touch with many of the difficulties encountered
For three years in succession this association Experimental:
During one of these years it had a representative n the district OF
load lots.
wholesalers to contend with, Many retailers throughout the coun
try, under financial obligations to the wholesalers, feared to offend
their creditors by buying elsewhere, even II a small SAVING thereby
could be effected.
It found that in order to reach the consumer without the inter
vention of the numerous go-betweens, vast storage houses would be
required within striking distance of the great market eenters. This
would necessitate either the leasing or the building OF warehouses
and would involv. in either case, the employment of immense capital,
particularly if the construction of adequate store houses were I'M
dertaken- ;,
Without the means for storing and preserving, it was ascertaned
be handled with great diafeuny without the services Of commission
men and jobbers-in fact, we may say that it is impossible. under
s1ss,sas F0n''''ns. % ~ s's'A'i' : ignore S''fS' 'Asss mo
The result, after three years of experimentation, was that the
HSGou iNhb&a hs phAiASs N@ANh w N+6 NA1 ANA h1 AoaNL
sobetweens, and stationed IN him IN q large market center s, where he he
utilized. and the cost of distribution for the members of this asso-
ciaion has not been greatly reduced
During one Of these three years the editer OF The Saturday
News was persuaded, against his own judgment and only after the
manager of the association had reasoned with him like a lost
brother, to place twelve hundred boxes of apples in cold storage,
along with thousands belonging to others. When the baIny spring
opened, and the foodstuf gamblers had finished with us, we received
.xteen and 3twothirds cents per box, net latter freight and storge
and selling charges had been dedueted1. for the two carloads of
stored fruit. The plain boxes had cost us fifteen cents each before we
had put the fruit into them.
Another association. With whose business ' had some degree Of
personal knowledge, established a series Of retail stores to sell direct
TO the consumers. Having several thousand carloads annually TO dis
pose Ct. these stores were enabled to handle q mere fraction OF the
sassoc1atons output. To establish and maintain a system of sores
TOT passing the entire crop from the members to the consumers was
found 70 pc 1mpractlcable. Even were 1t practical, the question of
storage would be involved.
Nc fancy that the people of South Dakota will be soreiy dis
appointed in the results accomplished by their commissioner of mar
heting At they are looking for much improvement through him In the
saatter of distribution. He will encounter all the sorts Of obstacles
that confronted the fruit growers In their efforts to- evade the eom-
mission men and the gamblers.
Tine state alone may do d little, il Isl trne. as did the associations
referred to, but that little win be almost insignificant, compared with
the needs Of the people. It will require the cooperation of all the
states Of the nation, including the government itself. 10 find and estab-
tsh and maintain an adequate remedy for the serious defects with
wInshsNe contend IN cur system of distribution
81 The people now aeatch itsboth a-coming and agoing.'f 1T lis
not alone that the discrepancy between THAT the agricultural pro