374 



December, 1912. 



American Hae Journal 



tate to tell that it is made of corn, 

 wheat, rye, etc., ground, made into 

 cakes, baked, then broken up and. 

 roasted. There is a little sugar in it, a 

 little salt, but if you try to eat it with- 

 out the sugar and cream recommended 

 — well, don't. 



The manufacturers of this dope 

 make great claims for it. and that, 

 among others, it improves the nerves. 

 I believe it, and that the manufacturers 

 eat largely of it, else they could never 

 make the claims they do. Let us ana- 

 lyze it. The average cost of the cere- 

 als, as they b>iy. is far below o>ie cent a 

 pound. But let us allow that small 

 sum, then another to cook it and put it 

 into the cartons. It sells, or used to, 

 for IJ cents a package, or about 10 to 

 1.5 times the first cost without the ad- 

 vertising. 



Let us take something with which I 

 am even more familiar — patent medi- 

 cines. I assert positively, and I can 

 prove that the average patent medicine 

 which costs the customer $1.00 does 

 not cost the manufacturer 10 cents, ad- 

 vertising and all after the business is 

 established, and there are some medi- 

 cines which allow a still larger mar- 

 gin, as pills and some of the dry "teas." 

 How much, think you, do these firms 

 pay for advertising ? I was once in- 

 formed that a now famous patent medi- 

 cine concern had paid out half a mil- 

 lion dollars in advertising before the 

 f^n-ottnd 2cas broken for IJteir buildings, 

 and I believed it, for the papers were 

 full of their pictures long before I had 

 a bottle of the stuff on my shelves. 



Where is the margin of profits to en- 

 able the bee-man to pay out much for 

 advertising in his own locality, let 

 alone joining in a national scheme? 

 " Corn syrup " is possible, because they 

 can sell it for something like $2.75 the 

 hundred pounds, and make a clear 

 profit that would make a bee-keeper 

 dizzy with envy; but the amount of 

 money necessary to erect and equip a 

 "corn-swindle" plant would buy every 

 hive of bees in the State of Iowa at a 

 fair valuation. It takes money to make 

 money. A profit of a cent a pound on 

 millions of pounds is big business, 

 while a profit of 5 cents a pound on 

 the amount of honey per colony pro- 

 duced by the average bee-man will 

 alTord him a slim living unless he has 

 several hundred colonies, knows how 

 to liandle them, and has good luck in 

 having profitable seasons. 



We have many things to overcome 

 besides swarming, bad seasons and 

 disease among bees. In the mind of 

 the average person not a honey-pro- 

 ducer honey is u luxury, and — call me 

 traitor if you will — with section honey 

 at W/z to '2.") cents a pound it would be 

 to me, with my income. It is a luxury 

 to the very large majority of the people 

 of the United States, especially where 

 there are children in the family. De- 

 claring in an ad that "honey is cheap," 

 does not make it so. 



There are seasons when the honey 

 crop is an almost total failure over a 

 large area, and when the supply of an 

 article is exhausted, one may as well 

 pull down his advertising. No mer- 

 chant would for a minute listen to any 

 proposition in advertising where the 

 supply was held up for 18 months at a 

 time. In this connection, did you ever 



stop to think that the supply of corn 

 iniquity, be it glucose or booze, is con- 

 stant and unlimited ? 



There is, however, a way to bring 

 our product to the attention of the 

 world, and that is for each and every 

 bee-keeper in the country to study ad- 

 vertising and become an ad writer, 

 and it is not necessary for him to take 

 a mail course, either. Let him briefly 

 and plainly tell his customers what he 

 has to sell. 



1. Don't quote prices unless you are 

 obliged to, or unless you are offering a 

 bargain. 



2. Don't lie, for your mendacious 

 chickens will come home to roost to 

 your sorrow and shame. 



3. Don't forget that brevity is the 

 soul of wit in nothing more than adver- 

 tising. 



4. Don't brag about your output, for 

 some one may not believe you, and 

 every one despises a liar. 



These are a few negative hints about 

 advertising, and here follow a few sug- 

 gestions. Shall I commence with 



musi be oi'er a liis/'/ay of FINE honey in 

 a store window. I have advertised here 

 in that way for a long time, making 

 and giving to the store-keeper a case 

 with a glass front to hold 100 pounds 

 (sections), and the word HONEY in 

 black letters 4 inches high on a board 

 and 6 inches wide on top of the case. 

 Later I got up some postal cards which 

 I sent to the farmers adjacent to town, 

 making them myself. 



A cut of some kind adds to the at- 

 tractiveness of an ad, and there is 

 nothing more appropriate to a bee than 

 a bee or a hive, or both, and in the way 

 of a hive nothing is better than a skep. 

 It is more poetical, but other pictures 



; PURE HO.VEY : 



It should be enough to the average 

 person that honey is in the comb; but 

 while that o'd canard about artificial 

 comb honey is perhaps exploded, there 

 is a hereditary distrust in the minds of 

 the present generation that there is a 

 possibility of adulteration in even the 

 snowy comb. Fortunately we have an 

 irrefutable argument in the Pure Food 

 Law, and it should be worked to a 

 finish. So let us add to our ad 



: PUKE noxEY : 



; Guaranteed Uyidcr Pure Eood Laiu : 



from the ; 



: Italian Hee-Apiary, Beetoiun, loiva '. 



Do I hear some one say: "That is 

 nothing but a label!" Well, what is a 

 label but an ad ? Admitting the im- 

 peachment, let us see what we can add 

 to the ad to make it more attractive, 

 more enticing, more fu/ting. 



Most persons, in writing an ad, think 

 that they must use up every available 

 inch of space for words. If you will 

 observe advertisements in expensive 

 mediums, you will see that there is 

 vastly more white paper than reading 

 matter, possibly one part of black to 10 

 of white, and they are paying probably 

 $.500 for the page. Why is this? Be- 

 cause very few persons will read a long 

 ad unless they are mightily interested, 

 and, let me grieve, it is hard to get peo- 

 ple intensely interested in so common 

 a thing as honey. They know what it 

 is, where it may be bought, the price, 

 and if their appetite craves it they will 

 buy ; all we can hope to do is call their 

 attention to it at a time when we can 

 supply a demand. 



As the bees in the United States are 

 credited with an output of $2r),000,000 an- 

 nually, which is but about 25 cents per 

 capita, the Xatioiia/ i/emand must surely 

 exceed the su/'/'ly. With a commodity 

 so well known the feicer 7corils you 

 use in advertising the belter. That is a 

 cold /VriY. In many cases you need but 

 the one zuord HONEY, but, that one word 



Advertise Your Honey 



into which bees come are all right, and 

 I will add some outline suggestions. I 

 have lost my skill with the pencil from 

 30 years of idleness. 



I recently read that farmers should 

 be expected to buy by the 60-pound 

 can ! There is not one man in a hun- 

 dred who will, the country over, buy in 

 such large quantities any more than 

 they will buy sugar by the sack. Not 

 as much so, for honey is a luxury. 

 Here, in one of the richest portions of 

 the United States, my customers buy 

 almost entirely in 10-pound pails. 



WE WILL PAY 



$1.00 A DROP FOR 



Ei'ery Drop of Adidterated 



HONEY 

 Offered for Sale in this Store 



In this ad the words, " We will pay 

 $1.00 a drop for honey," to be in large 

 letters; the other, "Every drop of 

 adulterated,'' in small. "Know what 

 you want to say, then say it," is a good 

 rule in literature, and a good one in 

 ailvertisiiig. 



I here append a hint for a good, 

 short, circular letter. I should have it 

 in type imitation, and paper the size of 



