GRAPHIC NOTINGS

Otago Witness, Issue 3853, 17 January 1928, Page 5

GRAPHIC NOTINGS

By

LENS.

(Spbciallx Written fob tub Otago Witness.)

I have an idea that 1928 is going to be a strenuous year between Great Britain and the United States in regard to motor sales abroad. As we all want to see the Old Country prevail we might do worse than ask the question, Is she cultivating her markets abroad as well as she might? Mr Ford’s slightest word is broadcasted as though from an oracle. As good a way to put things as another is to say that they held an automobile exhibition in England the other day and that the cars shown were declared to be the last word in construction and beauty, and that while the Empire learned little the New York press was able to feature the exhibition as a hint to Detroit to “ get busy.”

Both countries require to ‘do a large business abroad, but for somewhat different reasons, Great Britain wanting it for the economic value, but the United States because of an overwhelmed domestic field. What the United States would be up against in Great Britain as a competitor abroad would be perfection, but what Great Britain is up against in the United States is a productive power that has outstripped the local demand.

The sketch is not merely to illustrate an extravagant view, but also to ask why that view has been taken. Broadly speaking the United States population divides into about 25,000,000 families, and the cars in present use exceed 20,000,000. We may wonder how a sufficient volume of domestic business has been secured up to now. I draw but one. conclusion from the repeated changes i’ the pattern when the automobile section of the newspapers teems with “ discards ” at a give-away price. Even if there were no feeling over this there would be the growing problem of time payment. If you sell an article on terms then you cannot safely outdate it until enough has been paid off to prevent the contract from being repudiated. The American rule is to try and have the car paid for in a year, but. then there are so many cars, and the years finish on every day of the 365.

The Ford vision of a car for each member of the family, literally read, is ridiculous. Certainly the already large number of American families owning two or more can always be added to, but generally speaking it would be impossible to stand the cost. Moreover, how would the cars be housed?

The latest figures show that the motor car fatalities are simply soaring. The

extravagant view simply reveals the position. It is like the one taken by a wellknown motor car publicist when addressing a number of salesmen in Philadelphia th” other day. He as good as said that the proper way to preach “Safety first” was to add to it these words: “ Yon run less risk in a ear than when in' its way.” He practically advised the salesmen to drive this in at all costs, and said that if it were done there would soon be no pedestrians left: they would be too frightened to go about unless on wheels. The motor car manufacturers of the United States are excellent advertisers, but they have indeed a champion in Henry Ford. Much of what he says is like much of what Edison does. It goes out as news, and is circulated as news, even to the extent of being cabled. The like captains of industry in Great Britain have no figure to match with him, and that is one of their troubles. The United States will be obliged to push her sales abroad as never before for the sake of the industry. Considered with its ramifications it is easily the most important she has. The mere work of making is a prodigious thing in itself, but then there are the countless occupations that either contribute to, or result, from it. Such employ ever so many thousands of hands, and, of course, allow of others. Then there are the agencies to be considered and the carrying trade, this having reference to export. It would, from the United States standpoint, be a national catastrophe to reach a position where further expansion would be impossible. This is at the back of the great struggle abroad. In such the American manufacturers are' tremendously assisted by their clever publicists. Truly they understand the value of constant, vivid advertising, and, alove all, the advantage of complexioning the phrasing to the market. Can we overlook the fact that it tells even in Great Britain . The American advertiser talks there and gains the ear, but the British talks in America largely in vain.

This cable from London to New York, November 12, makes thoughtful reading: “The British automobile industry is launching an intensive campaign to hold its own against an expected new offensive from American automobile manufacturers.”

It goes on to speak of the 20,000 American cars sold since January 1, irrespective of the Fords. It says that

it has been, in spite of the 33 1-3 per cent, duty and the annual tax of £1 per h.p. -There is magic in a brand when an Englishman in England will pay a third on to the Customs, and a tax of something like 10s a week or more. The cable is confined to the British market. It concludes with: “Rumours persist of a price-cutting war.” Inspired by curiosity because of this I turned over a number of American newspapers to see which market is esteemed the United States best. I firjd that Australia and New Zealand taken together lead the entire procession. If A and B being in business in the same line start advertising, and A does it less well, he will sell B’s goods, and vice versa. Advertising is an art, and a very fine art at that. There is a tremendous lot to be said under the heading of complexioning. In this I am not going to refer to the motor car at aIL Take some other line, oversea, of course. A publicist knowing his business will not be too anxious to give it a foreign touch. This remark is to emphasise a principle. I return to the opening sentence. The United States has to sell motor cars aa never before, and 1928 will prove it. The Ford vision of a car for each member of the family suggests likening rubbered wheels to shoes—father’s one kind, mother’s another, brother’s another again, and sister’s different from all. And yet it serves: suppose we read it as “equivalent thereto.” Thus the United Statef will continue to provide father with hit car, and he will be an American father, and mother with hers, but she will be 4 mother somewhere else. Brother will b« in yet another place, and sister in a different one still. In a word, there will be a car for each member of the family, but all cars but one will be exported. The fight to motorise the world will b< a great one, with all things to count. Great Britain is up against the United States, and the United States against Great Britain. Friends as ever, and destined to remain such, they are friends who view business as something in which there can be only one winner. Seeing that the United States flies the outside flag it is she who must be considered the challenger. The driving force is her necessity, because she has over 20,000,000 cars in domestic use, and “ saturation point ” is somewhere or other despite th# many denials of it.