“We Are British”

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 296, 6 March 1928, Page 13

“We Are British”

Straight Talk to Advertisers Mr. Hogben Again Outspoken THOUGH Mr. Julius Hogben did not take members of the Auckland Advertising Club entirely unawares in his address to-day, he was none the less caustic in the criticism he proffered in regard to modern advertising. Nevertheless, the advertising men could not claim the excuse of the Rotarians to whom Mr. Hogben last spoke. They were certainly not unprepared.

DO that there should be no misunderstanding, as in the case of the Rotarians who refused to take Mr. Hogden seriously despite his protests, the speaker insisted that he was no humorist.

“It has been suggested that because I have been honest enough to speak the truth that I am a humorist,” Mr. Hogben announced amidst much laughter. “But such, I assure you, is certainly not the case.”! A member of the profession that could not and did not advertise —Mr. Hogben is a barrister-at-law —he assured his audience that he was “a positive ignoramus where advertising was concerned.” Merely to express the view of the average man on advertising was his sole object in speaking. Art, imagination and science all played a part, he declared, in modern advertising. Yet he had one serious bone of contention with Auckland advertisers. “There are far too many Americanisms in advertising in New Zealand,” said Mr. Hogben most emphatically, and several advertisers were heard to murmur: “Hear, Hear.” “Their methods of salesmanship are foreign to us. Why, even the better class American magazines condemn those very methods. . . . There are far too many poor American imitations in this country.” A picture was drawn of an American youth clad in what Mr. Hogben termed “ridiculous garments,” to create a demand for a breakfast food. The boy was obviously American. To New Zealanders his style of clothing was impossible. Yet he appeared in New Zealand newspapers advertising this particular food. “We do not understand that sort of thing,” said the speaker. “It is obviously wrong.” Mr. Hogben also drew attention to a verse which had appeared in the centre of a large advertisement in another Auckland journal. It was headed: “A Pome for Little Chillens.” “I turned over the page in disgust,” he said.

The verse beneath the title, declared Mr. Hogben, had been written by R. L. Stevenson. Yet there was no acknowledgment whatsoever of that fact.

As the news columns of our newspapers were written in “good workaday English,” he saw no reason why the advertisements could not be written in the same way.

Too many advertisements reeked far too much altogether of Americanisms. In the Auckland shops at Christ-mas-time Mr. Hogben had found German toys, but no English. Yet he felt that if English toys had been advertised by at least one firm the proprietor would have been surprised at the result. (Hear, hear.) “We are not American. We are not German. We are British! (Applause.) Anthony Trollope, who, he assured club members, was a something much lower in the social scale than an advertiser —he was an author —had many years ago directed attention to “the iniquitous system of time payment.” : Inasmuch as he protested against the cost of an article being unnecessarily enhanced by its advertising. “Time payment is one of the greatest dangers to the country's prosperity," said Mr. Hogben. “The 1924 legislation which made this so easy to-day is one of the most iniquitous pieces of legislation we have on our statute books!" Though vendors obtained an immediate increase in turnover, Mr. Hogben claimed that there was an extraordinary shrinkage in purchasing power. It was wrong, therefore, to create a demand for goods which people could do without and never miss. Mr. Hogben added: Merchants and advertisers should get together and say: “We are going to create a cash trade You should stop this squandering of future earnings!” The only article that could not be purchased on time payment, he declared, was a coffin! (Laughter.) A blacksmith’s assistant had appeared in an Auckland court for debt. The article purchased by this method which he could not pay for was a manicure Auckland posters “repelled rather than attracted” him. Newspaper advertising and window displays should follow each other. “Invariably one sees nothing in the windows dealing with the advertisements,” he advised. “Follow up your advertising with window displays, and —put the price on the goods!” Generally speaking there were far too many goods displayed in the windows. There was still one field, however, yet unexplored for advertising. Mr. Hogben called attention to the epitaph on a Parisian grave which stated that “The inconsolable w r idow” was still carrying on her husband’s business at a certain address in the city. _ “Therefore, what acres of advertising space there still is for you at Waikumete!” he concluded.