VITAL AGENCY OF PROGRESS

Taranaki Daily News, 29 January 1931, Page 6

VITAL AGENCY OF PROGRESS

IMPORTANCE OF ADVERTISING.

TRIBUTE OF PRESIDENT HOOVER.

Advertising as a. vital agency of economic and social progress was visualised by President Hoover in a •brief address to the Association of National Advertisers, meeting at Washington in its twenty-first annual convention, says the Christian Science Monitor. Speaking in a happy vein, the Chief Executive pictured for the representatives of industries which spend upward of 500,000,000 dollars annually in furthering the sales of their commodities the innumerable services that advertising has rendered mankind, as educator, distributor of good cheer, and promoter of goodwill. And because of this great role, advertising, the president warned, must not forget its responsibilities. Sound advertising, he declared, rests solely on public goodwill, and that requires truthfulness and the fulfilment of promises. In carefully adhering to sound ethics as they have done, the president assured his hearers that they were contributing to sound self-government “by curing abuse without the interference of government.” The president addressed the annual banquet of the association, and his. remarks were broadcast over a national radio hookup. Bernard Lichtenberg, president of the association, presided at the dinner. “It gives me great pleasure to extend greetings to you upon your assembly in Washington,” said Mr. Hoover. “Advertising is one of the vital organs of our entire economic and social system. It certainly is the vocal organ by which industry sings its songs of beguilement. The purpose of advertising is to create desire, and from the torments of desire there at once emerges additional demand, and from demand you pull upon increasing production and distribution.

“By the stimulants of advertising which you administer you have stirred the lethargy of the old law of supply and demand until you have transformed cottage industries into mass production. From enlarged diffusion of articles and services you cheapen costs and thereby you are a part of the dynamic force which creates higher standards of living.

“You also contribute to quicken the general use of every discovery in science and every invention in industry. It probably required 1000 years to spread the knowledge and aplieation of that great • human invention, / the wheeled cart, and it has taken . you only 20 years to make the automobile the universal tool of man. Moreover, your constant exploitation of every ■ improvement in every article and service spreads a restless pillow for every competitor and drives the producer to feverish exertions in new new service, and still more. improvement. ■ ’ ' ' .

“Incidentally, you make possible fhe vast {distribution of information). of good cheer and tribulation which- comes with the morning paper,, the periodical, and the radio. And your contributions to them aid to sustain a great army of authors and artists who could not otherwise join in. the standards of living you create. “Your latest contribution to constructive joy is to make possible the hourly spread of music, entertainment, and political assertion to the radio sets in 12,000,060 homes.'. ' • ' “At one time advertising was perhaps looked upon as an intrusion, a clamour to the credulous. But your subtlety and beguilding methods have long since overcome this resentment. From all of which the public lias ceased to deny the usefulness qf advertising and has come to include ypu in the things we bear in life. “But in more serious turn, the. very importance of the position which advertising has risen to occupy in the economic system is in direct proportion to the ability of the people to depend upon the probity of the statements you present. The advertising executive gnd the medium through which he advertises must see to it that the desire you create is satisfied by the article recommended. “The goodwill of the public' toward the producer, the goods, or the service is the essential of sound advertising—for 'no business succeeds upon the sale of an article once. And to maintain this confidence of the public you and the mediums which you patronise have an interest that others do not violate confidence and thereby discredit the whole of advertising. “You have recognised that responsibility. The Better Business Bureau and the vigilance agencies which. you have sot up to safeguard the general reputation of advertising are not only sound ethics but sound business. /In

the policing of your own business you are contributing soundly to self-govern-ment by curing abuse without the interference of government. ,1 wish you success in your convention and in the purposes for., which you are assembled.”