Palmer, Alaska
V UIIU ww
■ Editor. Dorothy M. Bell
Advertising. June Knoff
Published once a week at Palmer, Alaska, for the Matanuska Valley Farmers' Cooper
ating,'A'ssoclatlon for the purpose of giving news of the Associations' work, prob
lems, and accomplishments.
SUBSCRIPTION RATE 31»?5 $1.00 for six months 10d a copy
JUST WHAT THE DOCTOR ORDERED
Taken from the Cooperative Digest
Are government subsidy purchases of dairy products necessary? Dairy and coopera
tive leaders say no. And to prove It, they will undertake the largest advertising
and promotion campaign In the history of the Industry during June Dairy Month.'
At that time, a million .dollars worth.of advertising and publicity paid for by pro
ducers and dealers alike will be lumped in a concentrated drive to put the surplus
milk on the dining room tables of the nation.
With dairy producers, co-ops and dealers faced with Instable markets and a growing
volume of "homeless milk", they have Joined’together this year as never before to
do something about it.
Owen M. Richard,, general manager of the American Dairy Association of Chicago
blames Increased production and the less of our temporary foreign markets for the
seven billion pound milk surplus In the U.S.A. This surplus has crumbled the
price structure In the major dairy markets of the nation.
He points cut that nil the "homeless" milk—some six per cent of total production
--could be absorbed If each family used an extra pint of milk per week and. an extra
quarter pound of butter, an extra quarter pound of cheese, one more pint of ice
cream and an extra can of evaporated mllk^per i^cnth. That's the sales quota for
the dairy Industry.
At the 11th annual rally of the Anarlean.Dairy Association In Chicago recently,
delegates designed a "do-it—ourselves" business-building program to become eff
ective In January 1951 when, the- ADA advertising Set Aside will bo placed on the
year around basis at the rate of a.quarter cent a pound of butterfat or one cent
per hundred pounds of nllk. Meantime, ADA hopes to raise 1.6 million in their
June drive for funds.
It has be;n termed "the greatest advertising and merchandising crusade In the his
tory of dairying." This year's campaign Is built around the theme, "Enjoy Delici
ous Dairy Foods—Your Best Food Buy." The Sponsor Comm ttee is headed by National
Chairman E.W. Tledeman, general manager of the Central Dairy Sales Co-op, Chicago.
While all of the dairy industry's promotion guns are now aimed at next month's
campaign, food editors, dairy councils and associations, Individual co-ops and
dealers are planning a sustained promotional program for the balance of the year.
For, when the flo ,d of publicity and advertising eases off with the coming of July,
sales could backslide unless fresh verbs and blurbs are kept before the public.
Like many ether states, Connecticut people interested In dairying have solved this
problem of a permanent educational and publicity campaign. They founded the Conn
ecticut Dairy and Food Council, Inc. some 30 years ago. It has been supported ever
since by the milk, dealers and milk producers of the state.
Today, after three decades of uninterrupted progress, the Connecticut Dairy and
Food Council, Inc., can point with pride to the achlvements of its sustained, state
wide program promoting milk consumption. In January of this year, Dr. Stewart
Johnson of the Department cf Agricultural Economics at the Unlvaralty of Connecticut
compared December consumption of fluid milk for a decade and found that the people
In his state were drinking 47 per cent more milk than they were ten years ago. The
figure was more than twice as high as New Ycrk City's gain for the sane period.
New York has no council. From 1938 to ald-1949, Connecticut per-ccplta consump
tion soared 32 per cent.
"It's something like trying to tell whether the doctor's medicine cured the dis
ease," said A.C. Fisher, president of the organization and general manager cf Bryait
& Chapman Dairy. "If you didn't take his prescription, you might be worse off.
"We think It's better to take s nothing we knew helps the cure al ng."_