W

ITHOUT any undue acclaim on the part of either press or public there has been quietly develoing in this country an agricultural activity that bids fair to ultimately take rank as one of the chief sources of wealth as derived from the tilling of the soil. This rapidly expanding enterprise is grape growing, the vineyard industry-and it is possible that it has remained virtually unheralded because it is, in a sense, so familiar to a large share of the population. The growing of grapes on a small scale is so common in practice that close associa

tion with

the subject

has robbed

many of us of that perspective which would enable

appreciation of the significance of the latterday larger movement in this field.

Yet it is as certain as that night fol

lows day that

present

should not assume in America a position relatively as important as that held for years past in France, Spain, Italy and other European countries.

Even as the vineyard industry has, as Topsy said, "just growed" without attracting much attention from the public at large, so in only slightly less proportion has this agricultural sphere attained its new dignity without arousing many interests to the merchandising possibilities involved in the supplying of this industry with its essential equipment and sup

the proportions of the American vineyard industry represent but a beginning. Throughout practically the entire area of the United States the soil, climatic and other conditions are well adapted to grape culture. In some especially favored regions, such as California and on the shores of the Great Lakes, conditions are seemingly more auspicious than almost anywhere else in the world but there is practically no locality which is not adapted to the cultivation of certain varieties of grapes. Moreover, no country in the world is comparable with our own in the number of native species of grapes provided by nature or in the high average of excellence found in these respective varieties, so that there would appear to be no reason why the grape growing industry

plies. A significant circumstance for the distributor of merchandise is that this industry is to so large an extent in the hands of small operators. Το be sure, the large vineyards are increasing in number and may be expected to go on increasing industry is in every promoter

but the bulwark of the the small holdings and, as of sales realizes, the chief hope of trade in any given line is to be found in a wide and even distribution of purchasing power.

And while on the score of purchasing power it may be noted that the grape growers as a class are highly prosperous which renders it all the more surprising that more vigorous advertising and sales campaigns have not been projected to market products which would especially appeal to this section of our national community. There is, to be sure, an occasional poor year when prices for grapes are low but it is almost unheard of for quotations to fall to the point where the industry is unprofitable. A growth in the popular taste for grapes and

the banding together of small growers in cooperative selling associations are two of a number of factors that are combining to bring about more uniformly stable and prosperous conditions in the "grape belts" and with profits ranging in many instances from $200 to $350 per acre in an ordinary season it goes without saying that the successful grape grower is in a position to purchase everything that is required for the development of his business.

Scene in an American Vineyard.

The very conditions which obtain in the grape industry make the growers excellent "prospects" for the purveyors of all commodities calculated to appeal to them. As has been said there is a tremendous number of individuals engaged. Some dependable statistics just compiled by the United States government indicate that there are upward of one million farmers engaged in grape culture-that is one farmer in every seven in the entire country--and whereas grape growing is, with many of these men merely a "side line" there is an increasing disposition to concentrate attention on this product and to indulge in intensive cultivation -the more so because as scientific methods are introduced it has come to be realized that there is almost no limit to the amount of care which can profitably be bestowed upon a vineyard.

And, while considering the vineyard community as a market for manufactured products, etc., it should, perhaps, be noted that grape culture seems to be attracting a very considerable portion of those persons who have been moved by the "back to the soil" spirit. Nor is it an unwise choice either for the man of limited experience but with some capital and a due fund of determination. His initial outlay may be considerable, for good bearing vineyards command prices that average from $200 to $500 per acre and good land in a "grape belt" will bring from $100 to $250 per acre,

with the implied necessity for spending at least $100 per acre to bring it to the bearing stage, but insect pests are not the menace they are in some agricultural fields and the labor problem is not acute because the harvest season in the late autumn is the only time when a large force is necessary, and girls and women are preferred for this work. The grower has an annual crop that comes pretty near being as sure as the proverbial death and taxes and even the man who plants a new vineyard has the advantage that his vines come into bearing at about one-fourth the age of an apple orchard and yet produce well for a long term of years.

Possibly the fact that grape growers as a class are responsive to advertising is due in no small measure to the extent to which the consumption of grapes and grape products has been stimulated in recent years by advertising campaigns. The growers have seen their own interests furthered tremendously by publicity, combined with more careful grading and packing, and they are accordingly keen for anything that will contribute to the quantity or quality of the vineyard yield or widen the market for the fruit of the vine. It is a sore point with your progressive American grape grower that our people are yet spending thousands of

other construction which are now deemed essential in the proper training of grape vines.

It is suspected that there are some manufacturers and advertisers who may be said to have neglected the opportunities of the grape-producing community because they do not realize how varied are vineyard products and how diverse the equipment and supplies essential to production. For example, it might be emphasized that the American wine and unfermented grape juice industry, which is directly dependent upon our vineyards, is quite as important, from the standpoint of dollars and cents, as the trade in table grapes and raisins. No student of advertising conditions in this country cf late years can have failed to note the growth in the trade in grape juice. Why, in the Chautauqua district of New York State, merely one of the centers of this industry, the production of grape juice jumped in one year from 325,000 to 605,000 gallons. And yet I venture the prediction that the average business man who has

not specifically investigated the situation

has a misty idea that

the grape juice industry and likewise the American wine industry is concentrated in a few hands - the hands in question being the firms that have so assiduously advertised their products in recent years. As a matter of fact there are upward of seventy thousand producers of grape juice

grape growers have already demonstrated their ability to enter into direct competition with Europe in the production of the choicest wines on the globe. As a matter of fact, California leads the world in rate of production, for, whereas in Europe there is produced from 150 to 400 gallons of wine to the acre the common rate of production in the Golden Gate State is five times the Old World standard. The American wine trade can only attain its proper development, however, when all products are put out under American labels instead of being sold, as has too often been the case in the past, under foreign labels, and when there is specialization in the production of a due proportion of the high grade wines that require

the growing of the choicer, less productive varieties of grapes, but which establish for their producers that prestige and reputation that is essential in the field.

That the American vineyard industry has quietly assumed its present proportions and presents the almost unlimited promise that it does for the future is the more remarkable when we take into consideration that this growth is a development of little more than half a century. At the outset the showing made was unfavorable because the pioreers in the Atlantic coast region made the mistake of attempting to introduce European varieties. It was only when attention was turned to our native grapes that the industry was placed on a firm footing and latterly the up-to-date vineyard owners have fortified their position in every possible way as is attested by the sums they now spend annually for fertilizer and for insecticides, spray motor outfits, and the other (sentials of a systematic crganized campaign against pests.

and wine in the United States. They range all the way from the operator of a big plant to the modest vineyard owner who sells his product direct to the consumer, but what a market this represents in the aggregate for wine presses and other machinery, bottles, corks, labels and all the other paraphernalia of the industry.

The future of the American wine industry would seem to be very bright inasmuch as our

For all that grapes are cultivated in every