THE VALUE OF ADVERTISING

Press, Volume LXXV, Issue 22636, 15 February 1939, Page 5

THE VALUE OF ADVERTISING

VIEWS OF EXPERT

“LIFE-BLOOD OF COMMERCE”

The growth of advertising in Australia has been really wonderful in the last year, and prospects for. 1939 are distinctly good. This opinion was spoken by Mr Frank Goldberg, governing director of the Goldberg Advertising Agency, Ltd., on his arrival at Christchurch yesterday. “There is in Australia,” he added, “a distinct tendency towards the advertising methods of the American magazines, which in some spheres undoubtedly lead the world, and I see the same trend in New Zealand. The one factor that still astonishes me is that the business leaders in so many walks of life have not awakened fully to the fact

that advertising, and newspaper advertising especially, is one of the mam arteries that make the life-blood of our commerce and industry. ■

“Looking back over more than 25 years in every field of publicity, I note so many changes that I am still surprised at the apathy so many display towards the power and the service that advertising wields in the service of mankind. People 20 years ago would probably have held up their hands in horror at the thought of a church using advertising, pages to draw a congregation to worship. To-day church advertising occupies a big place in newspaper space. The uses of advertising to sell concrete, bread, milk, and fruit have made enormous strides in recent years. Once, living in a world of yesterdays, we were content to think that if anyone needed bread it would be bought automatically. We also fondly believed that one went and bought half a dozen oranges and that was the end of it. The United Bakers of England started a campaign to boost bread sales. People bought, in six months, twice as much bread as they had done before. In California the fruitgrowers combined in an ‘eat more fruit* campaign. In a year the sales of grapefruit doubled and those of dried fruits trebled.

“Nothing educates the general public ' to better and higher standards of liv- - irig inoi-e than advertising properly applied, and ■ gradually everyone is' learning its value to th'e humaxi race. , Even politicians find use for it to-day. ■ and, scientific bodies,-chambers of commerce, and other organisations are availing themselves of its obvious ad-' vantages. And in the field of public relationship there is much that advertising can still apcomplish-’*

To guide rescuers to the spot where a missing aeroplane has fallen, an automatic radio distress signal begins broadcasting calls at the moment of a crash. Enclosed in' a fireproof case, the' miniature battery-operated ■ transmitter is • designed to be mounted on coil springs within the tail of ah aeroplane—the part that usually is least damaged in an accident. -■ A severe jolt closes a switch that sets the “little black box" in operation. For four days, the length of time that the batteries will last, the set will continue to, send out* short-wave signals without interruption. This allows far more than an ample margin of time, the inventors maintain,' since searching- aeroplanes with direction-finding equipment should be able to speed directly to the scene.