The Sauk Centre herald. (Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn.) 1886-current, 1923-09-20
Sapiro, Cooperative Mar
keting Expert, Delivered
Fine Address friday Night

and compllmented the gentlemen up
on the splendid facilities they had for
handling, weighing, and grading po-
tatoes. - -
A representative of the Minnesota
Farm Bureau attending the Sapiro
meeting secured the following state
ment from Sank Centre farmers and
businessmen relative to their attitude
toward the cooperative creamery
which was later published in the
Minneapolis Journal:
81 refuse to sell a pound of my
cream to the private company" de-
clared Emil Ripka, farmer. "The
company can't break the market for
the co-operatives. By paying few
cents more pound for butterfat
they can't get the farmers to sell to
them, After the break the co-opera-
tive organization. by winning its
trade, the company could have its
own way and pay what it pleased for
all our, butterfat."
| provided the farmers who are
| members of the cooperative cream
cry remain loyal, there is plenty of
! business for both creameries and the
competition created between the two
creameries is wholesome influence
on the price of butterfat," said Theo-
dore Dock, a merchant.
! August Dahlem, another Sank Cen
ter merchant, declared that "the
farmers who are members of the
cooperative creamery always have
been treated right by it and I have
| no fear that they will be influenced
| by any private company"
Tho foil ic a c,1p,y,o Of M.
Sapiro's address in this city Friday
! evening:
] Cooperative Spirit Good
You farmers UP here have the best
| CO.. operative spirit in the world" he
declared. II know you have because
you have stuck for two generations
| with co-operatives that won't work"
Mr. Sapiro was referring to the CO.
operative elevator movements in the
northwest, which he declared We're
organized on the Rochdale plan,
| evolved in England for consumers
| and not for producers.
and for many other states in this
| country when leaders attempted to
take the RochdaAe system Of coop
GRAFTON and adapt it to the needs of
| farmers-Who are sellers.
! On 'WrOng Track" Here
I'm your cooperative efforts you
| have ignored the experiments and the
practical results that have been OBJ
particularly in Denmark and in Ger
many and Switzerland. There, CO.
operation has been develoed to serve
the needs of selling people. And SO
1 say, you have been on the wrong
track in Midwest states.
"Out in California, as long as 20
menting with the Danish system of
cooperation and they have carried
| on their work to such an extent that
| we now have a system that has
l ifcnl in, ortiz 10 RI.
we are able to give you a very def
mite set Of rules for real cooperative
marketing, These rules have been
based on long experience and it has
taken many failures to bring out the
factors that are right and those that
are wrong.
There are certain essentials which
every cooperative effort must have
| if it is to succeed.
Outlines Rules
First, 1t must aim Fight, and by
out to remedy the fundamental evil
in the present marketing system.
ut must stop individual selling
dumping-and substitute therefore
plan of orderly marketing or mer
lchandising the commodity with which
| it is concerned.
individual dumping of potatoes is
| the greatest single damaging factor
modify. What happens every crop
year? You growers worry along un-
til just before digging season and
then you begin to get anxious about
prices. You rush your potatoes on
the market because you know that
someone is going to get stuck when
you figure that it will be better for
you, if it is your neighbor who is
stuck. than if it is yourself.
And so it goes, you dump Your
other. You dump here and down the
line dump, AMI you find yourself at
the mercy of the buyer. Prices are
marketing system for season and
| then the whole rotten business begins
over again.
~, And i, SO. I say a potato o : o,opera,
Minnesota must aim right; it must
stop dumping and provide for mer-
chandising the crop-seling it as the
SIX fundamentals
Then, when we have aimed right,
we must embody in the plan six fun
damentals: leave one out and we
"First-We must provide for grad
ing. Grading is the reason that. on
Aug. g., on the Minneapolis market,
selling for IS cents a hundred and
graded potatoes, after they had been
hauled all the way froom Colorado.
we're bringing s2sS hundred lr1ina The the
| those from Minnesota remained un=
sold. The potatoes were no better.
but they were in a condition that in
vited the consuming public Why,
| folks, there is only one state in the
Union that placed on the market an
| egg that is comparable with the Cali
| fornia egg, and that is Minnesota;
| yet the California farmer. through his
cooperative, is able to haul eggs
clear across the continent to New
York and get premium of two cents
a dozen over Minnesota eggs, simply
because when buyer purchases
car of California eggs he knows that
every eggs in that car is of uniform
size, color and grade and he knows
moreover; that it is an infertile egg
lpackaging. What happens to your
| fine Minnesota creamery butter when
/, it reaches the New York market? Is
| it sold as first class. sweet cream,
Minnesota made butter? No. 1t is
sold to broker, who in turn sells it
ot-Oh. maybe chain store owner.
who takes it from the tubs in which
you pack it, puts in into prints and
sells it under his own trade name A
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