# Consumers cntlon*. But the retailor who
(Continued from Page 26) writes them is the man who
will "buy, and will like, and will meets me every time I go shop
come back for more. ping. .He watches what I do.
His specifications are not nr- Then he writes specifications for
bltrary. because the competition what ho thinks I will find most
of other stores won’t let them be. acceptable. And he had better be
In fact, the specifications arc right —or 1 shall go to another
dictated by competition. They store.
are designed solely to get sue- And farmers and processors
ccssful products into his store so had better give him what he
ho can win against the compcti- needs or how is he going to sell
tion. me?
Some processors and some lam fickle. You who handle
farmers complain bitterly about food—who grow it, process It. re
having to deliver to the spccifi- tail it—you can get my dollar.
START NOW!...
Storl your spring fertilizing program
• Top dress small grains with 30 • 60 lbs. of Nitrogen,
NOW!
# Top dress pastures with 60 - 100 lbs. of Nitrogen,
NOW!
• Prepare alfalfa seedbeds by plowing down
phosphorus and potash, NOW!
• Plan your corn program around
ANHYDROUS AMMONIA,
the most economical nitrogen,
and Master Farmer BULK BLENDS.
■ For Complete Field Service
Call Your FULL SERVICE COMPANY
ORGANIC PLANT FOOD CO.
Grofftown Road P. O. Box 132
Lancaster, Pa. 392-4963 or 392-0374
- C HR ' S nUCTS ca
• PRODUCTS 215-59 3 ' 5181
0 -
petvn a "
. -Lane. Co. 19 08
Spring^ 6 ’ La
. foV can
lrand new ana
’They are
Dear ** iend:
of
prices.
Von
Benches »»*.
•nbelooWi^g iall a^
W® located at CWi
out new store
Co.
but you can get it only by play*
tag my game.
I am spoiled and demanding—
but you have made me that way.
You have done so by the compe
tition of one food against other
foods—of one processor against
other processors—of one retailer
against other retailers.
If any of you are tired of the
rat race, why don't you Just quit!
There will be lots of you left, and
lots of new faces for me to take
up with.
You will agree with me that
this is a fictitious homemaker
and food shopper. But since of
necessity, as agricultural bank
ers, you have to know a good bit
about the food business, I think
you might agree that this sounds
ah too much the way our food
shopper behaves.
No group of consumers in this
world ever before had it so good
in terms of the abundance, the
variety, the quality, and the
build-in services in their food
supply. And no other consumers
ever obtained their food so inex
pensively.
In terms of cheapness, I am
not talking about the dollar-and
ccnts prices at the store, but ra
ther in the only really meaning
ful measure of food costs—and
that is Hie percentage of after
tax income that is required to
buy the typical family’s food
This figure is now less than 20
percent of typical family income.
What it means is that the typi
cal family in this country obtains
its food for a little less tnan one
day of work from a five-day
v/ork week. This leaves the in
come from four days of work
available for the other things—
housing, schooling, medical care,
vacations, and all the rest that
make up our “American way of
life.”
I never truly grasped the sig
nificance of this figure until some
Lancaster Farming. Saturday, May 18,1968
years ago when I had the privil
ege of working for a short time
In a country where food cost the
average family two-thirds of
their total Income. That meant
four days of work out of a six
day work week—and they had
only one-third of Income left for
everything else.
In a rather obscure way
American families. I believe,
understand and appreciate their
blessing. But this does not mean
they are any less demanding as
food consumers.
Affluence' & the Family Budget
We are said to be the most af
fluent population in the world.
There is not much question that
this is true. And yet. has afflu
ence made the problem of fam
ily budgeting any less difficult?
Aspirations have a way of out
running income at almost any
level of affluence. There is the
problem of college education for
the kids; and Johnny needs
glasses: and little Mary’s teeth
need straightening; and they
really need a second car; and
last year they had to skip a va
cation! I suspect that greater af
fluence has made family budget
ing problems only more difficult
And then again about food. Al
most everything else is bought
on time or on monthly billings
But food is bought every day or
at least every week, and for cash
at the supermarket. One home
maker said to me that if she
spent too much for food she had
nothing left for getting her hair
fixed! All these are the kinds of
pressures that are on food budg
ets, regardless of affluence or
the small percentage of income
required in the typical family to
buy food.
So homemakers keep pressure
on the food industry So the farm
er who raises chickens, and the
No comparison
Shofzberger's KMN
Elm 665-3141
Wenger Implement Co.
Buck 284-4467
A. B. C. Groff, Inc. M. S. Yeorsley & Sons
New Holland 354-4191 ’ West Chester 609-2990
processor who dresses and packs
his birds, do everything In their
power to make chicken an at
tractive buy compared to the al
ternatives. The cattle feeder,
working with the meat packers,
does the same. And so docs the
swine grower, and the pork
pecker who works with him.
If American agriculture ever
was a unity, a single entity. a
brotherhood with a single inter
est—it has ceased to be that any
longer. It is instead an aggregate
ot hard-driving special-interest
groups, each one working its
head off to make its specialized
product more popular with the
spoiled and demanding consum
er whom we discussed abo\e._
USDA To Subsidize
Poultry Exports
Sec’y Freeman has announced
USDA will subsidize poultry
exports to Switzerland as a first
step in a new drive to regain
world export markets lost in re
cent years to other countries
(mostly European Common
Market countries) that do. “This
step is being taken with great
reluctance,” Freeman said, “and
only after extensive efforts have
been made to reach agreement
among the exporting countries
to discontinue their subsidiza
tion of poultry meat. We much
prefer to compete in world
markets on the basis of effi
cient production.”
Mouth Cancer Test Easy
A simple cell smear test can
help detect mouth concer in its
beginning stages when it is most
curable. The American Dental
Association is urging all dentists
to make such tests anytime a
questionable mouth sore is
found.
John Deere 34 Forage
Harvester sets the standard
for low-cost
silage-makers
It's understandable when you add up
the facts that the open-end hay pickup
sweeps in windrows that would escape
others; that changing attachments is
the fastest and easiest around; that
there's a cylinder cutterhead and
built-in knife sharpener. See why it's
the leader. Look one over. See
us soon. Credit? You bet.
Landis Bros. Inc.
Lancaster 393-3906
27