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Show WILLHELP Not long ago we overheard a merchant mer-chant the fact that the automobile and good roads were taking business to other towns some distance away. At the time we are inclined to sympathize sympa-thize with him and thought that surely sure-ly his lot must be hard, but recently we had the opportunity of visiting that man's town and to our sUrrpise found that this good, had-surfaced road that he spoke of passed directly in front of his store. A little investigation investi-gation showed that the retailers in those distant towns were beckoning to prospective customers in a wider trade area through consistent advertising, advert-ising, while the local merchant was so busy counting the automobiles that passed on their way to spend their dollars with some neighboring city, that he forgot to put a stop sign in front of his store in the form of good advertising. We put it up to this retailed who decided immediately to try out some well written, well laid out, well illustrated illus-trated advertising telling the folks of his community how they could secure the r,ome' merchandise right at home stores and save dollars in gasoline, tires r.nd general wear and tear on their cars, to say nothing of lime. Letters ah o were planned to go of, ironi time fo rim", telling of special merchandise or some unusual selling event and in some cases tolling of merchandise to be had at the neighboring neigh-boring store or grocery or meat market. mar-ket. It took on the appearance .!- most of a community advertising plan with all the stores combining their efforts in one great boost for their town and for keeping local money at home where it would do the most good. A retail merchant from one of our nearby cities gave a pretty good answer ans-wer to this whole situattion. He said. "The time a merchont spends in watching to see who goes into his competitor's store could better be spent In advertising to Induce the trade to bring their dollars to his counters." RolHns News. |