THE ECONOMIC OUTLOOK

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXIV, 29 March 1930, Page 9

THE ECONOMIC OUTLOOK

"NO ROOM FOR PESSIMISM"

“I have novel' felt greater confidence in business conditions in New Zealand and I beiiovo llit! present time nltords us exceptional opportunities for a great forward inoveincnt,” said -Mr Will Appleton, managing-director of the Charles Haines Advertising Agency, in •in addition lo members ol tuo Aueld<uicl Advertising Club on his impressions .rained on a world lour. Mr Appleton said New Zealand manufacturers were at present in a very favourable position, as llicv had wonderful opportunities before‘them, and the public had already begun to acquire a spirit of cooperation in the purehaso of New Zea-land-made goods. .Mi' Appleton said he visited the offices of the leading advertising firms in all of the more important centres, and was j particularly impressed with some of the I concerns in Germany. Regarding the technique of advertising he was pleased 1 lo notice, not only in America and Canada, hut in England and Germany as well, that the tendency was to return to ‘saner methods in illustration and layiout. The bizarre effects which had been ‘prevalent in magazines and newspapers j during the last year or so were giving way io more sensible treatment in the representations of picture and story. The ;keynote at the present time was simplic- ' it v and directness of appeal. \ The most outstanding lessons to be learned from a close personal study o! conditions overseas, Mr Appleton said, were that in the manufacturing field there must he mass production and i ass selling. Tremendous developments were ! now in progress in the Old Country, and within the next few years there would bo a. boid bid for more overseas trade on the part_ of British concerns. Mr Appleton said he did not feel at all pessimistic as to. the outcome, nor as to the ultimate position of 1 ho English manufacture- r. As in the case of mass production, so with mass selling, the Ampricans had j led the field in many lines, hut the manufacturer had Leer [assisted to a great extent in his dmnesI tie market by a policy of high prclecI 1 lion. This enabled him to foster and i build up ia large foreign connexion, > j oven if, for a time, the actual trade • did not warrant the expenditure made I upon it. 4 ’ Summing up the situation, Mr Apple- ! lon said there was no necessity for people in the Dominions lo become un- : duly pessimistic. Contrasting tin* lot j of people here with those in other countries, lie remembered buit waking 1 conditions generally were much n ore satisfactory in this Dominion. Wealth, in the main, was very evenly distributed, and while perhaps it was not t possible to build up fortunes so rapidly in New Zealand* as it was in other parts of the globe, the great of * the people were much better off. New \ Zealand, in common with the rest of the ’ world, would have to produce more. -but he was satisfied that witli greater . ! attention to topdressing the Dominion [ j would make up in production what it

lost iii value, so that ultimately, from tho producing point of view, it should come out just about as well as it has done in the past. Wages might have to como down, but tha*, would not bo a great hardship because world prices for practically every commodity had now receded almost to the 1914 level. 'What we. have to fight in New Zealand," said Mr Appleton, "is this wave of pessimism. It is true that we have a certain amount of reemployment in New Zealand, but this is nothing compared to what is prevailing in other parts of the globe. Generally speaking, wo are a happy, contented people."