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COLD CASH AND 



LIVING FLOWERS 



Something more than statistics is needed for a successful bank — the 



sentiment that is human plays a more im,portant role in winning depositors. 



^^f Flowers, nothing hut a beautiful display of flowers, have won accounts for 



savings institutions. This has been exhibited to F. T. D. conventions twice. 



['u^M^lli^^mma 





HERE ia always something 

 to learn, even for that 

 most astute individual, 

 the banker. Not so many 

 II ^ ^ years ago, he believed 

 1^*-" that hard facts and cold 

 y'*\ figures were the sole sup- 



P^ 9^ ports of his success. Of 

 =:=^=» shrewd, calculating boai- 

 ness men, the banker ifM 

 supposed to be the keenest thinking and 

 coldest hearted. The forecloser of the 

 mortgage on the old homestead, the 

 jailer of the penniless youth, the in- 

 exorable Nemesis of the industrious 

 but indigent, proud but poor, and such 

 ill-fated beings — these were the roles of 

 the banker in the highly colored — in 

 contents and cover — tales of bygone 

 years. How could one believe that he 

 could ever come to acknowledge a 

 power, a real business asset, in so sen- 

 timental a thing as flowers f 



Granite vs. Garden. 



Dignity and formality were always 

 the banker's main supports. In those 

 olden days a sprig or blossom in his 

 buttonhole would have caused his con- 

 temporaries to doubt his stability — 

 financial even if not mental. Granite 

 buildings and iron-barred doors were 

 his element, not a garden. Statistical 

 tables and financial balances were his 

 material, far removed from sentiment. 



The years are not 

 many since the banker 

 considered it beneath 

 his dignity to adver- 

 tise. Youngsters can 

 remember the grey- 

 beards' first attempts. 

 And some of their pub- 

 licity is of the same 

 sort today — statements 

 of assets and liabilities 

 and resources, which 

 no one, by the way, 

 but a banker can read. 



A few of them 

 found, however, that 

 advertising, instead of 

 driving patrons away, 

 actually attracted 

 them, that the loss of 

 a little much-prized 

 conservatism and dig- 

 nity was the gain of a 

 respectable amount of 

 business. So, after 

 they had tried the 

 water with their toe 

 and found it not so 

 cold after all, the staid 

 financial dignitaries 

 have stepped more 

 boldly into deeper 



places. They have yielded to the per- 

 suasion, of advertising men and paid 

 high newspaper rates for what once 

 they would have scoffed at, if not worse. 

 Nob long ago these columns carried 

 report\of a bank which actually ad- 

 vertisecV the fact that its entrance was 

 decorateOsWith plants and flower boxes. 

 Flowers in^ business! When they had 

 reached the doorway of the financial 

 sanctum, formerly entered only by hard 

 coin, or cold cash, they had surely pene- 

 trated strongly into business. 



Wliat r. T. D. Saw. 



Now, however, it is not uncommon 

 to find the blooms themselves within 

 the granite walls, lined along the mar- 

 ble pillars — and the bankers glad to 

 have them there. On the opening day 

 of the F. T. D. convention at Buffalo, 

 Vice-president Breitmeyer announced 

 from the platform: "When the F. T. 

 D. met at Detroit the visitors to the 

 convention had the opportunity to in- 

 spect a fine array of flowers at a bank 

 opening. Today we have another such 

 occasion here. Everyone who can 

 should visit the Lafayette National 

 Bank, to see the wonderful display of 

 flowers. ' ' 



He did not overemphasize its merit. 

 Those who went to see it talked so much 

 of it in the lobby of the Hotel Iroquois 

 that others went over to gaze and ad- 



Flowers that Brought Dozens of Accounts to this Buffafo Bank. 



mire. They found there 105 baskets 

 of blooms, the gifts of friends on the 

 occasion of the bank's opening. They 

 included arrays of chrysanthemums, tall 

 vases of American Beauties, baskets of 

 dahlias and a great variety of other 

 arrangements. The baskets stood along 

 the walls; they lined the ledges along 

 the cages and before the desks; they 

 were so thick upstairs the clerks could 

 scarcely get about, and, as Mr. Tuttle 

 stated, fine vases of American Beauties 

 were almost out of sight for lack of 

 place to put them. 



Next day Dell Tuttle, a director of 

 the bank, was brought before the con- 

 vention, after being seized by S. A. 

 Anderson in the hotel lobby, to give the 

 florists the banker's viewpoint on the 

 flowers. His remarks were greeted with 

 much ' enthusiasm and applause, ac- 

 knowledging, as they did, the tribute 

 of cold cash to living flowers. He said: 



Tuttle Tells Tale. 



"When we opened up the bank yes- 

 terday, the good people of Buffalo were 

 impelled to send us a few flowers. 

 Those of you who have been over there 

 have seen them. They kept coming all 

 day and we did not know where to put 

 them. I showed the gentlemen over 

 there some American Beauties in the 

 back of the bank, as we had no other 

 place for them. 



"The result of it 

 was that everybody 

 yesterday was talking 

 flowers. I telephoned 

 Mrs. Tuttle to come 

 down and to call the 

 neighbors and bring 

 them down to see the 

 flowers. The flowers 

 have brought hundreds 

 and hundreds of peo- 

 ple into the bank and 

 resulted in dozens and 

 dozens of accounts. 



"That was not what 

 they were sent for. 

 They were expressions 

 of friendship and 

 wishes for success and 

 all that; but don't you 

 see that it is like a 

 double-edged ax that 

 we used in the coun- 

 try when I was a boyf 

 You could chop both 

 ways with it. 



"Let me tell yeu 

 what one of the florists 

 did. I went over to 

 see the deputy treas- 

 urer and I saw a check 

 which S. A. Anderson, 



