ADVERTISING.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVII, 26 September 1927, Page 8

ADVERTISING.

IS IT ECONOMIC WASTE? AN EXPERT ADDRESSES BUSINESS MEN. “While most people liad the common misconception that the advertising was included in the cost of the goods and consequently increased prices, the fact remains that the man in the street buys advertised goods and continues to buy them. Why? Because, taking all factors into account, advertised goods are cheaper in the long _ run, more convenient, and more reliable. Advertising, properly conducted, operates to reduce other costs out of all proportion to its own cost, and so long as it continues to make possible economies in production and distribution, so will the public purchase the advertised articles.”

This statement was made by Mr. Will Appleton in the course of an address on the subject “Is Advertising Economic Waste?” delivered to an assembly of Christchurch business men last week. Because of the vast sums spent on advertising, people, said the speaker, were apt to get quite a wrong impression. Mr. Edward Bok, the wellknown American, had estimated that last year there was spent in U.S.A. somewhere in the vicinity of £321,000,000, while iMr. Hartley Withers, the prominent British financial writer, estimated that the advertising bill for Great Britain was well over one hundred millions.

“One of the best instances of the economical value of advertising,’ said Mr. Appleton, “is in connection with the motor industry. Advertising has created a demand which made volume production volume selling, and standardisation of parts possible. The result is that we can now get an immeasurably better car for considerably less money than we could a few years ago. As a piece of high-grade machinery, wherein highly technical. skill and costly materials were blended, it would be impossible to obtain the same relative value in anything else. Not only had the cost of production been reduced, but advertising had presold the output to a very great extent, thus reducing selling expenses. In this case all parties had benefited, and there was no more striking example of the benefits of publicity. 'IMPROVED SERVICES.

“Most of us remember what housekeeping was to our mothers. The house without running water, hot water when available from a boiler oil the fire, often a pump out-of-doors, sometimes frozen; the bathroom a wooden or tin tub beside the kitchen fire; laundry work done with a washboard; cooking with heavy black iron pots and pans, clumsy and’ unhandy; light from candles and kerosene lamps; no light porcelain and aluminium ware, no gas or electric range. Advertising has- changed all this. Although men would have evolved better ways and better - tools, it would not have been so fast without advertising. These improved things and services have been brought within the reach of the masses because of volume production, volume selling, and, in a. sense, volume education per medium of the advertising pages.

“Smaller profits are necessary on advertised goods because quicker turnover means reduced selling expenses,” said Mr. Appleton. “It was on the private brand that the retailer bad to make a good margin. The manufacturer, again, who invests a considerable sum of money on advertising dare not take liberties with his product. He has to maintain quality to protect his investment, and, in a sense, confers a bond on bis product. This was not the case with the nondescript unadvertised line. The argument against advertising that it makes people foolishly want things that they would be just as well off without, is more or less an ethical question, and is purely a matter of opinion.”

NEWSPAPER ADVERTISING MOST ECONOMICAL.

In concluding, Mr. Appleton drew attention to the advantages of Press advertising. The daily newspaper had become so interwoven with our daily existence that it would be almost inconceivable to imagine our living without it. The Press offered the finest possible vehicle for the dissemination of an advertiser’s message. People are in a receptive frame of mind when they read the newspapers. There is conscious desire on their part to absorb the contents, and quite subconsciously they also take in the advertiser’ sstorj-, if it is attractively presented. One of the great advantages, too, of daily Press advertising is the time factor. In a matter of a few hours a national advertiser can reach 90 per cent, of the people of this country with his message per medium of the Press, whereas to try to get a personal message across in any other way would take weeks of labour in preparation, quite apart from Hie extra cost. Then, too, it would not carry the same conviction as if it were carried in the newspapers Of all forms of advertising, Press publicity had been proved to be the most economical.