How Bulk Assembly Changes Milk Marketing Costs

Excerpts from the report Introduction: The practice of handling milk in bulk for cooling on farms and for hauling farm to plant has grown rapidly since about 1953. By December, 1956 there were an estimated 57,000 bulk milk cooling tanks on farms, nearly double the 30,000 a year earlier; early in 1953 tanks on farms numbered only 6,000. The assembly of milk, farm to plant, including the combined tasks of cooling, collecting, hauling and receiving the milk, is changed in many ways when bulk replaces can equipment and methods. The rapid spread of milk assembly farm to plant by bulk tank has been marked in many areas by such problems as availability of farm tanks and tank trucks, availability of funds to finance installations, changing market outlets, prospective changes in costs of cooling, receiving and hauling milk whether by tank or can, meeting sanitary requirements, and maintaining milk quality. This report presents a detailed analysis of changes in costs and practices that have occurred and that may reasonably be expected to occur with the growth of bulk assembly of milk farm-to-plant. It contains data and other information heretofore available only in widely scattered sources, but it represents more than a summary compilation of available data