CHEMISTS HOAXED

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 478, 6 October 1928, Page 27

CHEMISTS HOAXED

: Chemists in Florence are pouring ■ ; maledictions on some practical jokers ! | (or advertising “stunt experts’’) whom i the police have so far failed to arrest. ; states the “Daily Chronicle.’’ ! While causing loss in the retail drug ! | trade, the trick has benefited many j | manufacturers of more or less on- ] ) known patent medicines which seemed ; | lately to spring into popularity. Very many Florentine chemists I placed large orders for them, paying ! cash, and thus precluding the possi- ; bility of having them cancelled. A young couple, well dressed and of charming address, had gone the rounds of Florentine chemists with a long list of patent medicines which they intended to buy. When they feigned disappointment on learning that the medicines they i asked for were not kept in stock, the ; tradesmen naturally offered to procure : the goods. And they did so; but, unfortunately, i they were never called for. Hundreds of shops in Florence have i thus become well stocked with patent I

medicines which have proved, indeed, a drug on the market. Manufacturers of patent medicines which thus lag superfluous on drug gists’ shelves indignantly disavow connection with the young people, wjrt assure the police that they have paid them any commission. It is suspected that the wanted and woman are now booming o§>s--in other provincial towns.