Page:The Golden Hamster Manual.djvu/73

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imals for their trial usage may depend upon the size of your hamstery, the size of the institution, and any other local considerations of consequence.

Write biological, hobby, novelty, outdoor, specialty and school supply firms, importers and all other hamster sellers except the commercial hamsteries, and offer to ship hamsters direct to their customers. Most of the foregoing neither raise nor carry hamsters in stock. Such outlets represent a wide, steady market in which even the hobbyist with 3 to 6 producing females may profitably dispose of his output.

57. Displaying Hamster Stock

Lose no opportunity to display some of your best hamsters. Local grade schools and science departments in high schools are usually glad to have a neatly made cage containing, hamsters placed in the school room for a week, month, or a semester. A group of young males are ideal for such display. In advance of your courtesy offer of such stock display, or of your call to sell stock, place suitable literature in the hands of the proper teacher or superintendent. A pet shop at first slow to buy hamsters to sell as pets may gladly show a cage of them in their window or display department and take orders from their customers. Some stores take a pen of males, and another pen of females, on trial, and sell them to their pet customers. As soon as the store sees that they sell, the hamster producer has a regular dealer outlet for production. Many producers have permanent pet store outlets for their production. One need not advertise if he has local laboratory and pet store outlets and produces accordingly. Parks like to display odd and strange animals, provided they are healthy and easily cared for such as the hamsters. Park managers may be approached on the basis of accepting a group of males as a gift, which my bring your name into the local paper as donor of the animals and thereby bring you customers from the readers of the paper. Displays at pet shows, fairs, etc., with your name attached to display cage, may bring an amazingly large volume of business. A feed store selling pellet feeds of any kinds that hamsters eat may be delighted to place a nice cage of hamsters in the window, your name as producer attached to the cage, provided they may also place a card nearby telling that hamsters eat pellet foods sold there. Displayed animals in such cages do well for considerable periods fed nothing but green vegetables and pellet food daily.

Aside from sales outlets just mentioned, one may sell preserved or pickled hamster fish baits advertised as such, as per Chap. 37.

It is profitable to look up the nearest successful taxidermists and let them know that you have hamsters for their use when desired. Curio and novelty shops, and gift departments in large stores may sell well-mounted hamsters, newly weaned to mature adulthood, especially during the holiday seasons. Sales are stimulated by some reference to the Holy Land, such as "Holy Land Hamsters," "Syrian Golden Hamsters, Domesticated In Palestine," etc.

Magazine advertising interests unexpected sales prospects impossible to find as readily in any other way. One's selling prices will be governed somewhat by figures quoted by other fair price producer-sellers.

A convenient manner of getting one's name before a

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