White Bluffs spokesman. [volume] (White Bluffs, Wash.) 1907-1938, 1927-03-18
WORKING FOR BETTER
MARKETING SYSTEM

stabilizing OF the fruit industry in the
Northwest has been underway ir
Washington and Oregon sor the last
few months, will culminate in a gener.
al meeting to bd held in Seattle to-
day, Friday. While fundamentally the
law of supply and demand is the
principal controlling element in fix
ing the price of fruit, it is believed
that through the organization of the
various selling agencies better dis
tribution could be given and more
even selling rrice maintained.
To bring about such an organiza-
tion,. R. H. Kipp of the Portland
Chamber of Commerce has proposed
plan which he has discussed at
meetings held in, all of the larger
fruit sections of Washington, Oregon
and Idaho and the plan has the general
endorecment If most of the marketing
agencies, including the cooperatives.
The Kipp plan is an adaptation of
the old coordinating bureau plan
which was considered in 1924. The
central idea of the plan is to bring
the private shipping concerns and the
cooperative concerns together on a
working basis and to utilize the pre-
sent marketing machinery to the full
est extent.
As means of stabilizing quotations
the concerns which sign the agree
ment for coordination of sales efforts
are to report their sales daily to
government representative who will
compile the various reports and furnish
them to the individual members of the
two groups.
The shippers are to be organized
into central exchange and the CO.
operative association similarly into a
central exchange. The shippers units
are to be members of the shippers
exchange and the cooperative associa-
tions will constitute sub-exchanges of
the central growers exchange.
The growers who are affiliated with
private shipping concerns may con-
tinue to sell their fruit to these as
before at their. option and present
corrections of growers with shippers
will not be disturbedl Independent
growers not affiliated with any ship
ping concern, will be urged to join
cooperative concerns or, in districts
where this is not possible and the
warehousing and packing service is
not availble, to form new units, for
assembling, hacking, pooling and
warehousing fruit.
Independent growers may come in
under the plan by signing an agree
ment not to sell to any other con-
Germ except those which have gone
into the shippers central exchange
The growers in such case will be free
to sell to any shipper that he may
choose. The market information will
be'savailabfe to the growers through
growers committee.
1t is expected that this plan will
cut out the occasional buyer who Sc
cures control of tonnage and then
undersells the shippers who have large
investments in warehouses;.
It is further contemplated under
the plan for the central exchange to
maintain sales organization in the
markets of the world. The concerns
which come in .as ..sub-exchanges
whether of shippers or of cooperative
associations, will maintain their sales
offices and will continue to supervise
the sal, of their fruit, retaining.
their old customers with whom their
brands are favorite.
It is contemplated under the plan
to standardise the grade and pack,
to develop greater preceding and cold
and abroad, to reduce the cost of ma
terials for which the grower pays and
to develop greater pecooling and cold
storage facilities where necessary. All
these things are calculated to stabilize
the industry with consequently great
er and more uniform profits to both
growers and shippers.
We do not want any horse play
in the Seattle conference" said Mr..
Kipp,in the Yakima Herald. Like the
boy in the fable. we do not want to
cry Wolf. Wolf! unless there is a
wolf. We don't want to go
ahead with this plan unless IS per
cent of the growers want it and will
sign up under it. Unless there is a
serious enough situation and the grow
ers are ready to back up the plan, we
cannot go before the chambers of
commerce in the large coast cities
and ask for an organization fund. Let
Us not fool the business men. Three
years ago the cooperative movement
cost the business men $4,000. We can
not afford to cry wolf once more.
1--WE are not going ahead with the
unless the whole in
dustry goes into it. If Is men from
the Yakima valley do not come to
Seattle, I shall consider that the valley
is not back of the movement AS far
as / am concerned, those who do not
have representation in the Seattle con-
ference are against the plan"
Referring to the assertion that the
growers would not organize, Erie J.
Barnes, director of agriculture, said:
They will organize or they will go
broke in five years. I am convinced
that the growers must organize. If
rs per cent of the growers can be
brought together, the problem lis
solved. If the growers can't trust
themselves to organize, they will have
to go out Of business"