Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 104, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 May 1918 — BUYER PROTECTED BY ADVERTISING [ARTICLE]

BUYER PROTECTED BY ADVERTISING

Manufacturer Must Maintain? / Quality of Goods Bearing His Name. / • ' HIS REFUTATION AT STAKE Man Who Buys Standard Brand* From Local Merchants Knows That He Is Getting Full Value for His Money. (Copyright, 1817, Weatern Newspaper Union.) Time was when advertising did not occupy the place in the world of trade that it does today. It has not been so very many years ago that the people were suspicious of advertising. They were inclined to believe that the merchant was trying* to “fool” them with his advertising, that he exaggerated the value of the merchandise he advertised and took that method of trying to get them to buy goods that he could not sell by the-old established methods of merchandising. Those, days are gone. The public now realizes that it is the greatest beneficiary of advertising. Advertising has done more in a decade to establish certain standards in merchandise than could have been accomplished in a hundred years by any other agency. The manufacturer whe a few years ago merely made and sold clothes now makes and sells the Blank brand of clothes. The man who formerly just made hats now make* Blank’s hats. And so It Is with everything that one buys today. The manufacturer, by his advertising, has built up his business around a trade name and if he is to continue In business he must protect that trade name by maintaining such a high standard ol quality that people, when they buy hl* products will know just what they are getting. The consumer, when he goe* into a store today, does not buy merchandise blindly, with the HOPE that it will prove to be worth the money He buys standard goods that bear the trade-mark of the manufacturer anc that are backed by the reputation nol only of the merchant who sells them but the manufacturer who makes them This has been brought about by advertising. No Reputation to Protect All this applies to the retail merchants as a class but it does not ap ply to the mail order business. The man or woman who buys goods from a .catalogue houfje-ls not protected bj the manufacturing of the goods for the reason that most manufacturers who sell goods to the mall order houses do not place their names upon the goods and therefore have no reputation to protect. The great majority of articles listed and illustrated in the mail order catalogues are included in what is knowr among manufacturers as “stencil* stuff. These articles bear the name ol - the mail order house which sells them instead of that of the manufacture! who makes them. It can readily bt understood that any manufacturing concern which turns out goods that do not bear its name or trade-mark is likely to be a very unreliable institution. It is not building up any repu tatlon on the quality of its goods for its products have nothing to distinguish them from the products of any other concern. With no reputation to sustain and no chance of creating a general demand for its goods the only concern of a manufacturing Instltutlon of this kind Is to make stuff as cheaply as possible in order to obtain the largest possible profit on its products. “ 1

Same Price World Over. These facts are chiefly responsible! for the generally prevailing idea that the home merchants do not sell goods as cheaply as the mail order house. They do sell the same quality of goods that the mail order house sells as cheaply as the mall order house sells it but they cannot sell the standard, guaranteed products of responsible manufacturers at the same price at which the mall order house sells its nameless, unbranded merchandise. Standard goods bearing a registered trade-mark sell for the same price the world over and the manufacturer’s guarantee stands back of them when they are sold in the smallest village in the country just the same as when they are sold in the stores of the largest dries. . This is what the national advertising of the manufacturers has done for the consumers of the country. It has enabled them to go into their home stores and buy merchandise which they know from past experience -or from the reputation and guarantee of the manufacturer will give them satisfaction. They are hot buying blindly and hopefully when they buy from the merchants in their home towns. They are buying with the knowledge that they are getting their money’s worth. When they buy advertised brands they are getting double protection, that which is afforded by the responsibility of the' retail merchant and that which is given by the reputation and guarantee of the manufacturer. When they buy the unknown brands of goods that are offered by the mall order houses they are getting neither of protection.