In due time I received the desired permission, and ordered the labels printed.  The scheme worked.  Every time a package was not delivered on schedule time the customer notified me, and I made complaint to the postmaster at Chicago.

Gradually the service improved until now I have no trouble at all.  If I were to ship two packages today to the same address in Chicago, sending one by parcel post and the other by express, I believe the parcel-post package would be delivered first.  At any rate, it has been done for me.

The weakness in the parcel-post delivery lies in the fact that perishable products—­such as dressed chickens—­cannot be handled in warm weather.  I think that if the Post Office Department would cut some of its red tape and permit the shipment of air-tight packages in air-tight conveyors this particular problem could be solved.

You will, of course, have more or less correspondence with your customers.  By all means use your own letterheads, but do not let your printer embellish them with cuts of roosters, chickens, pigs, or the like.  Not that we are ashamed of them; far be it from such.  You do not, however, need to have a sheet of paper littered up with pictures of imaginary animals in order to convince your customer that you are selling the meats of that animal.  I like a plainly printed letterhead that carries my name, my address and my business.  That’s all.

By all means keep books on your farm-to-table venture, if you undertake it.  Set down on one side of the page what you pay for boxes, labels, postage, and so on, including what you pay yourself for chickens at your huckster’s prices.  On the other side of the page set down what your city customer pays you.  Add up the pages, do a simple sum in subtraction, and you will know just how much you have made.

If I kept only twenty-five hens I should sell my eggs and my chickens direct to the city consumer.  When the farmer learns to sell direct instead of letting the huckster, the poultry house, the commission man, the dresser and the retailer stand between him and the consumer, then poultry raising will become really profitable.

There are too many folks who sell their eggs and “take it out in trade.”

* * * *

(Saturday Evening Post)

One large illustration, a wash drawing, made by a staff artist.

SALES WITHOUT SALESMANSHIP

BY JAMES H. COLLINS

“Say, you’re a funny salesman!” exclaimed the business man.  “Here I make up my own mind that I need two motor trucks and decide to buy ’em from your company.  Then I send for a salesman.  You come down and spend a week looking into my horse delivery, and now you tell me to keep my horses.  What kind of a salesman do you call yourself anyway?”

“What made you think you needed motor trucks?” was the counterquestion of the serious, thick-spectacled young chap.