154 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



We have used news items and we have used plate material, and handled 

 both through the newspaper press and the Western Newspaper Union. 

 We have found that the plate material, in order to secure the best results, 

 ought to be accompanied by a great many picture cuts; and if any of 

 you gentlemen use the plate material, I would suggest that right on the 

 picture itself you put the name of your fair, the dates of your fair, and 

 the place it is to be held, and use that as part of the cut rather than 

 to let the subject of the cut go in the printed matter only, because in 

 many instances where this is used they will cut off the heading and the 

 picture will be there, but the name of the fair dates or the place of the 

 fair will not appear. 



We have also found that it is good business to use an advertisement In 

 a paper about thirty days before the show starts. That is simply to show 

 the newspapers that we are not asking too much of them; that we are 

 willing to pay them for a part of the work, and we have found after we 

 have sent the ad out to the newspapers about thirty days before the 

 show opens that they are more willing to print the news items that are 

 sent later, and I believe that is a very good idea to send out an advertise- 

 ment about thirty days ahead of the show. 



We have divided up our advertising in newspapers, in agricultural 

 papers, on bill-boards and road-signs, and every one of those have given 

 us good service. I believe I would class them for the dairy show, as 

 follows: 



1. The agricultural papers, 



2. The newspapers, 



3. The bill-boards, 



4. The road-signs. 



By road-signs I mean all the road-signs you men use; the automobile 

 banners, the pennants, and all those things. We have found this, in 

 the case of bill-board advertising: I have noticed it and I have a notion 

 to tell Mr. Corey about it. If we use 8-sheet posters, we usually get an 

 awfully poor place for them. I have seen State Fair advertising that 

 Mr. Corey had sent to men that he thought would place them in good 

 positions, out in the alley. I have seen other fair advertising in out of 

 the way places, and simply because it must have been 8-sheets and they 

 simply placed it any old place. But in sending out these billboard pos- 

 ters, we have found that the 24-sheet stands get much better places. They 

 can't stick them off behind the other bills, and 24-sheets have given us 

 much better service in fewer numbers than a large number of 8-sheets, 

 and we have consequently used that class of bill-board advertising. We 

 have also used the depots in the railroad stations. We have found that 

 every one of the agents of the railroads are more than anxious to help us 

 in advertising our shows, and we have sent them attractive posters, which 

 they have placed for us without charge. 



With regard to the cost of this advertising to us in relation to our gate 

 receipts, I might say that our advertising during the past year (and I 

 am not in a position to know how it compares with fair advertising, be- 

 cause I don't know very much about handling fairs, so I don't know 

 whether this is high or low), but it has been 10 per cent of our gate re- 



