THE VALUE OF ADVERTISING

Shannon News, 20 April 1926, Page 2

THE VALUE OF ADVERTISING

Though we live in an age of advertisement, most people do not understand oven now how much , the public depend upon advertisements, says the London Spectator. Advertisements simplify life for everyone. They make buying- easier because readers of advertisements have in their memories a ready-made catalogue of what there is to buy. If advertisements suddenly stopped people would , we think, be almost staggered by the difference which the absence would make. In trade we should seem to have taken a step back into the Dark Ages. The old-fashioned idea that advertisements—within which category we include circulars —were, at least in the casio of newspapers, a that desperate remedies . were needed to .save an expiring business is out of date. Advertisements are no longer regarded as a kind of insult when they arc directed to intelligent people. J.i; is understood well enough not merely that prosperity may be turned into greater prosperity by advertisements, but that greater prosperity can probably qnly be obtained in that way. Finally, advertisements are an enormous benefit to the public for this reason. By continually making the goods advertised better known they increase the sales of those [ goods, and it thus becomes possible to produce rhem more cheaply. The greater amount produced the lower the cost of individual production. In brief, from the point of view of the readerj of a paper advertisements ought to be eagerly encouraged. They provide the wherewithal" for a larger and bettor paper. A larger and better paper brings more readers; and the more readers there are the more are advertisers willing to advertise. This brings in still more revenue, whicli in its turn makes possible further im- ' provements in the paper. Here indeed is a beneficial circle.