CO-OPERATION IN ADVERTISING.

Press, Volume LVIII, Issue 17391, 28 February 1922, Page 4

CO-OPERATION IN ADVERTISING.

RICH WITH POSSIBILITIES. Among the addresses delivered at the annual conference of the New Zealand Federation of Master Painters, Decorators, and Signwriters' Association of Employers, held at Wanganui last week, was one by Mr Frank Goldberg, of. the Goldberg Advertising Agency, Ltd., on co-operative advertising. The president, Mr D. Lee, introduced the speaker. "Anyone who has been watching the trend of advertising throughout the world during the past year or so cannot help but have been impressed with the steadily increasing volume of cooperative or collective advertising," Mr Goldberg said, in opening his address. He quoted the opinion of Sir Charles Higham, M.P., one of the world's leading exponents of advertising, who said:—The most important advertising of the future will be co-operative rather than competitive. Ido not mean any distant future. I look for far-reaching advances in this dine. mi. during the decade immediately before us. Every day more and more advertisers are coming to see that the major part of their activities ought to - be directed to the erection and extension of business and only a minor portion towards pulling business away from the other fellow. They are becoming more persuaded that each individual trader must benefit from such common efforts, always provided lie has soitnd goods and fair value to offlr. Cooperative advertising, properly conducted, can be made a powerful means of steadying as well as increasing demand and in doing away with everrecurrent periods of depression in what are regarded as seasonal trades. In these and in other ways it will improve the quality or reduce the cost of goods, or both, because it will enable them to be produced and distributed under more favourable economic conditions. The buyer no less than the seller should be advantaged. It is beginning to be realised generally that the points in which advertisers of a similar kind of commodity may profitably work together outnumber those in which they must necessarily operate independently, and the result, unless I, am much mistaken, will shortly be forthcoming in a revolutionary change in the greater bulk of advertising practice. _ The co-operative movement in advertising has until lately been so slow that its far-reaching importance has often failed to impress observers. It is now - gathering momentum, and may easily progress more during'tho coming twelve months than in the preceding twelve years, especially as the buyer, as well as the seller, is benefited. Proceeding, Mr Goldberg referred to well-planned/publicity campaigns during the war organised by Government Departments such as recruiting for Kitchener's first army, the war loans, thrift campaigns, Y.M.C.A., and other funds. Even the success of certain political campaigns had been due in a vory large measure to the adoption or modern advertising methods. In a sense all the publicity schemes mentioned above have been co-operatiyo, and their success had been an incentive to associations of various trades to got together and advertise their products or service collectively For instance, manufacturers of knitted gc-ods, bricks, motor-cars, and gas stoves, proprietors of garages, dairies, laundries, and grocery stores, as well as electric light, gas, railway, and bank corporations have all joined in co-operative advertising schemes to create a general demand for their particular products or services. " , , Perhaps no industry or trade lont itself better' to co-operative advertisiha than the paint trade. In the United States there has-been a sue-, cessful collective campaign by the. paint firms, and a . similar campaign here would create a boom in painting. A vigorous publicity campaign on behalf of the trade as a whole would result in incalculable benefit to everyone interested in the paint industry. It would relieve unemployment among painters, and would be the solution of their particular task in getting over the slump. • . "The advertising lessons of the .past year or so have taught us that in slump periods even more so than in times of prosperity, it pays to keep on advertising," said Mr Goldberg m conclusion. "Remember that advertising • creates the demand for your products. This is not mere, theory, but a fact, just as much as our knowledge that paint improves the sul'iace 01 a house is a fact." . , . At the conclusion of the address the president, Mr D. Lee, moved a hearty vote of thanks to Mr Goldberg, and on , the motion being warmly seconded by Mr W. A. Poison, and many other supporters, the speaker was accorded an enthusiastic round of applause.