A Map Salesman Learns How to Raise and Sell Broilers

MKP June 25, 2022

THOUSANDS of people have started poultry farms. But not everyone has been successful. One who did succeed was Howard Whitely, a salesman for a map publishing company. During the years he had been a special representative for the publisher, he had made a good salary and had saved his money. The doctor told him he had to give up his job and get outdoors in the sunshine as much as possible. So he decided to buy a 15-acre farm near Indianapolis. The former owner had tried to make a living by growing produce, but Whitely decided to raise chickens. Not knowing a great deal about raising chickens, he sent to the U. S. Department of Agriculture for bulletins and studied them carefully. Then he visited a farmer in the neighborhood who had been raising poultry with indifferent success. Here he learned what not to do if he wanted to make money. Inquiry revealed that the farmer had little or no idea how to feed his chickens and practically no ideas on marketing them. His poultry house was filthy, and it was obvious that the chickens had little or no attention from one day to another. The farmer thought government bulletins and poultry magazines were a lot of nonsense. “As if,” he growled, “you can learn to raise chickens from a book or a magazine.” However, Howard Whitely had his own ideas on this subject which he discreetly kept to himself. On his little farm there was a poultry house which he thoroughly cleaned and fumigated. He built a poultry run and then purchased a second-hand incubator and a brooder from a dealer in town. From another dealer he bought ten dozen eggs and then he started his poultry business. Some of the eggs, of course, did not hatch. Of those that did, he kept about half for breeding, and the rest were raised for the market. In raising the chickens, he followed the government bulletins religiously. He found that cleanliness was the most important thing in keeping the chickens free from disease. By preventing all possible contamination, he not only saved himself a load of trouble but considerable expense. Naturally, he made a few mistakes, but none of them serious. He found, too, that he liked raising poultry. In the meantime, Whitely had been thinking about his marketing problem. Having been a salesman he realized it was one thing to raise a good product, but unless you got busy and sold it, there would be little profit to bank. By the time he had his poultry ready for market, he had secured orders from a number of old customers in Indianapolis as well as from two hotels and three restaurants. When his customers saw the plump, milk-fed broilers he had raised, they were sold to the hilt and he had no difficulty in getting reorders. He and his wife made a great effort to pack the birds attractively. Each capon was wrapped separately in white, moisture-proof wrapping paper, and packaged four to a box. His prices were slightly above the store price, but not a kick was received. He was supplying the market with what he knew the market wanted—a superior product. And the market was willing to pay for it. The hotels and restaurants gave him regular orders for poultry which he delivered every two or three days. His customers telephoned him when they wanted a broiler and often drove out for it. He kept a card record of all his orders and when he failed to hear from a customer in a reasonable period of time, he followed him up by phone. Several friends of his old time customers telephoned him orders and he also added a fancy food shop to his list. This shop, which catered to Indianapolis’ “400,” took only the very best of his broilers—and at very nice prices, too. Another good order he got was from the country club which was situated about half way between his farm and Indianapolis. He had heard that the club was planning a gala affair one week-end so he interviewed the club manager, sold him a nice order of capons, and made a regular customer of him. Howard Whitely made no attempt to market eggs as he realized that he could not develop a good egg-breed as well as meat-breed type and do justice to both. Whenever he had a surplus of eggs, he endeavored to sell them along with his poultry, but he never made any effort to secure a market for them.

Mrs. Fox’s Mink Ranch

GERTRUDE FOX , the wife of a busy doctor, tried to settle down to a peaceful, quiet life among the Westchester hills. But like so many energetic, enthusiastic people, an inactive life was impossible for her. She began looking around for a hobby and having previously raised domestic animals, decided that raising fur-bearing animals might be interesting. Her first idea was to develop a fox farm, but it had features that did not appeal to her. Somebody suggested mink ranching and she decided to give it a “whirl.” Knowing nothing about raising minks, she spent a whole year studying the subject, reading every available book published and every government pamphlet on it. She also visited the few mink ranches scattered throughout the East and the Middle West. Most of these ranches, she found, were stocked with Mississippi minks, whereas, the finest type of mink comes from the north shore of Labrador. The pelts of these animals are as dark and glossy as sable. A coat made of an inferior grade of mink may bring only from $500 to $800, whereas, a coat made of Labrador skins brings from $6,000 to $12,000. She reasoned that she might as well raise the best as long as she was going to risk her time and money into the venture. She purchased her breeding stock, consisting of 11 males and 19 females, from a rancher in northeastern Quebec. These animals were pure Labradors just one generation removed from the wild. She set up her pens on the South Salem estate and began experimenting, becoming so far as is known the first woman in this particular work. This was in 1929. In 1930 she was asked to exhibit her pets at the Woman’s Exposition of Arts and Industries, and it was this event which marked the turning point in her career. Not one visitor in ten at this exposition had ever heard of a mink ranch and interest ran high. From that time on, she was kept busy supplying breeding stock to people who wanted to start their own mink farms. As a matter of fact, while she started mink raising to sell the pelts, she has never been able to pelt any of her animals. They have all been sold as breeding stock to amateur mink ranchers. From raising minks she has drifted naturally into teaching others how to raise them. The beginners are instructed in methods of constructing pens and runways and in proper ways of handling and feeding the animals. Her interest in her customers, or students, as she terms them, extends a year after they have purchased their herds. During this time they may write to her about their problems and she will advise them on points of feeding and handling. As keeping the minks free from vermin is one difficulty in raising them, Mrs. Fox emphasizes the importance of building pens so that they are raised from the ground. With the exception of death from pneumonia, there are almost no fatalities from disease and if their bedding is always dry minks are not likely to have even this disease. The minks are fed a varied diet of beef, horse meat, ground bone, eggs, milk, cereals, tomatoes, cod liver oil, and fish. Each animal must be segregated from his fellows as the mink is a vicious little beast and will attack any other mink that comes near him. Fighting must be prevented at all costs, as in addition to possible deaths which may occur, the pelts may be severely damaged. The mink mates once a year, in the spring, and the litter consists of about five or six young. The young are born about fifty days after mating and are hidden by the mother in her nest until they are about four weeks old. When an excessive litter occurs, the young are raised by another mother mink or by a cat. Besides managing two ranches of her own, providing breeding stock for amateur ranchers and publishing a monthly bulletin on fur trade conditions, Mrs. Fox owns and edits The Black Fox Magazine and has published a very practical book by the title of Raising Minks in Captivity.