The Marketing of Market Milk

The dairy ow has well earned the title of "foster mother of the human race," for no other animal has done so much to nourish the human family as she has» Her product is milk, a food intended by nature for promoting growth in the young. "Market milk" is a term applied to milk consumed in its fluid state as contrasted to milk used for manufacturing products such as condensed or evaporated milk, butter, cheese, ice cream, etc.Although the marketing of milk has certain peculiarities as compared with the marketing of other agricultural products, which will he discussed later, the above general statements apply to the marketing of this product as well as to practically all agricultural products. As will be shown in chapters following, the milk-marketing system has grown up under the competitive system; in former times many cows were kept within the city limits and the milk supply of those families who did not own a cow was usually secured from neighbors. With the growth of population the producer and consumer of market milk have become widely separated and the middleman or milk distributor has stepped in to fill the gap, and the milk marketing or distributing problem has thus gradually arisen. Both the producer and the consumer of market milk have believed that the middleman was making an exorbitant profit and was getting more than his share. In order to know whether or not this is true, it is necessary to first know what is involved in the marketing of this product. The purpose of this paper is to bring out certain pertinent facts in regard to market milk as a commodity said to the various factors that are involved in marketing this product.