ADYERTISING AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS. 



HENRY KING HANNAH, NEW YORK CITY. 



Somebody has reminded us that the first advertising of which 

 we have any record occurred in the Garden of Eden, when the 

 serpent held forth to Mother Eve about the great benefits to 

 be derived from eating a certain fruit which grew there. 



Thus when we come to talk about advertising farm products 

 we can well claim that farm products were among the very first 

 things to be advertised. Somebody has been unkind enough to 

 suggest that if this is the first authentic piece of advertising, 

 then the devil was the first advertising man, and that all the 

 evils which came from this Eden episode can be laid at the door 

 of the susceptibility of woman to the wiles of the advertising 

 man. 



But let me remind you that new theology has come to our 

 rescue, and, in claiming that the fall was in reality a fall up- 

 ward, provides for us advertising men a convenient way of 

 escape. It says that to eat bread in the sweat of one's brow is 

 the only dignified way to eat it. I rather think so myself. 



But there is one question which can be introduced here, and 

 one' on which I want to venture an opinion. It is now some- 

 what the fashion for advertising men to argue that advertising 

 lessens the amount of sweat which the consumer must exude in 

 order to get the necessary money to pay for his living, and 

 that advertising lowers the price of goods. The theory is that 

 advertising creates demand and demand increases the output, 

 making it possible for the manufacturer to reduce cost, and 

 this he passes on to the consumer. If business was a phil- 

 anthropy and the average business man a philanthropist this 

 might happen, but, as a matter of fact, it does not happen. 

 Now there are certain advantages which the purchaser of 

 trade-marked goods does get. The quality of advertised goods 



