Some Western communities in which ice is strictly a manufactured product are interesting themselves publicly in the subject of ice manufacture. There is a type of small district or city which justifies the establishment of one local ice plant, but does not contain room for two, says The Scientific American. The operator of the one ice manufactory enjoys the nature of a monopoly. Of course, ice can be shipped in, but ice is a very bulky and heavy commodity, and its free flow between communities, in commerce, is never apt to be very great.
Many communities have protested and complained a great deal about ice prices. One community, Lindsay, in California, has acted. A local plant was on the market, and last spring the local Chamber of Commerce got an option on it, organized the Lindsay Community Ice Company, sold stock to some 300 local people, and took over the plant.
The first season’s record of this company is illuminating. It is in the center of a district where retail ice prices, platform basis, have been up around $1 a hundred. At Vislia, ice was 80 cents at retail, at Exeter 90 cents, at Portersville and Lemon Cove, $1 a hundred. At Lindsay, the community company sold ice at 50 cents a hundred.
The plant manufactured 1,000 tons of ice the past summer. Granting consumers would otherwise have paid 85 or 90 cents, the company saved them something like $7,500. At this rate, the replacement value of the plant being $20,000 to $25,000, the plant would pay for itself in less than four years.
The plant has a capacity of 1,000 tons a year, and storage space for 100 tons. The low prices have stimulated demand, and the coming year the capacity will be increased to 2,000 tons, which the management says can be easily sold. Storage room for 1,000 tons will be put in. Farmers on trading visits to Lindsay are good customers.
The past season, Lindsay community plant manufactured ice and put it on the platform for about $3.80 a ton. Retailing ice, however, it figured it must sell for 50 cents the cwt. in order to break even.
An ice plant requires considerable initial investment. The competition of private enterprise in local ice manufacture is not keen, and retail prices naturally are high. The community ice plant seems an obvious remedy for the situation, under some circumstances.
From the front page of The Mount Airy News, Thursday, May 26, 1921
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