HOW TO MAKE

MORE MONEY
Part Three

By Louis Guenther
with comments by Ken McCarthy
 CHAPTER V

How it Has Effected in a Favorable Manner the Business of Ready-Made

Clothing Manufacturers – Reaching the Consumer Direct – Style
Books and Other Attractive Literature

In a very impressive manner have the influences of mail order methods had a favorable
effect upon the clothing business.
This will be readily apparent to a keen student of modern publicity if he will compare the
extent and character of this kind of advertising fifteen years ago in the leading magazines to what
is done to advertise this business nowadays.
The principal manufacturers of ready-made clothing, those days, made very little effort to
reach the consumers direct; to tell them the kind of clothes they made, the styles or how cheap in
price.
This was left to the retailer, who confined his efforts to advertising over his own name in
the local dailies, while the greatest dependence for trade was placed upon the traveling salesman.
There was very little advertising done by the tailors to secure customers by mail – or by
the retail clothier.

Plans Embracing Mail Order Methods

Now, though, the enterprising maker of clothes, whether a tailor or a manufacturer of

ready-made suits, always includes plans by which he can reach those who are directly in need of
his goods; and these plans invariably embrace mail order methods, as will be pointed out in the
progress of this article.
As a guide to assist me in the preparation of this chapter and to illustrate how the mail
order idea of selling direct to the consumer or reaching him without the help of retailers has
spread until it has fastened its tentacles permanently upon the clothing business, I consulted the
advertising pages of the most recent issues of McClure’s Magazine.
I found that in amount and size the advertisements of clothing makers were as well
represented as was any other line of business; also that if counted individually, there were more
of such advertisers, with the exception of a few other lines.
There were the advertisements of the Snellenburg Clothing Co., Kuppenheimer & Co.,
Kirschbaum & Co., Kohn Bros., Michael Sterns & Co., B. Stern & Sons, and Hart, Schaffner &
Marx – all large makers of ready-made clothing.
In addition, there are others who are using different magazines or who have suspended
their advertising for the summer, to be resumed again, however, in time to call attention of
consumers to fall styles.
Of all the clothing ads there was only one which did not contain, as a part of its plan, a
mail order idea to reach the consumer. This was the announcement of the Atterbury System.

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 2 – Do not consider a 25-cent order too small to acknowledge
– provided of course there is a chance of getting further orders of the same person. Of course if
the nature of your business is such that you can expect to make only one sale to a customer, it
may not pay to write him an acknowledgment of his order. Otherwise, bear in mind that the first
order serves as an introduction to your customer, and may lead to many future orders if properly
handled.

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 Offers to Bring Inquiries Direct

All the others offered the readers of McClure’s Magazine a style book free or a booklet of
some kind on clothes.
The style of all of these advertisements tended towards one common idea: that of
illustrating by pictures how dressy their clothes look when worn.
The effect which it is aimed to have these illustrations make upon readers’ minds is to
impress them with the idea that as knobby clothes, fitting as well and appearing as dressy as a
tailor can make them, can be bought ready made for considerably less money.
Usually the price is included in the advertisement, as a contrast between the character of
the clothes and how cheap they can be bought from a dealer; and there is no question but what the
excellent type of clothing advertisements appearing in the magazines have induced thousands of
people of aesthetic temperaments but of economical inclinations who were formerly of the
opinion that a suit of clothes to look well and fit good must be made by a tailor, to give ready-
made clothing a trial.

Reaching the Consumer Direct

Through this general advertising the ready-made clothing manufacturer reaches the
consumer, educates him as to the style by pictures, and by arguments and prices as to the
character of the clothes, so that the desire to purchase them is already inculcated in his mind when
he comes to the retailer has in stock.
The retailer’s work of making sales is then practically a very easy task.
But of the greatest importance to the manufacturer of ready-made clothing is the
improvement in the security of his patronage which is brought about by this semi-mail order style
of advertising.
The retailer’s place in his business is reduced to secondary importance, where formerly
he was practically the hub upon which the whole selling force revolved.
A change of patronage left the manufacturer to look for another retailer, but there was no
way to carry over to the new dealer the patronage of his customer.

Securing Firmer Control of the Trade

By this advertising there has also been brought under securer control, the trade created by
every traveling man.
All this has come about through advertising over the heads of these two forces necessary
to their business, direct to the consumer, awakening in him a desire for the manufacturer’s
particular clothes. This makes the dealer less anxious to change his line, as he doesn’t want to
lose any patronage, -- which is liable to occur where customers have been very much pleased
with their clothes.
The traveling man does not control his trade as he did formerly, for retailers are not going
to change their line because they like the drummer. A bird in the hand – in the shape of good
business – appeals to them as being worth far more than the two in the bush held out by a
persuasive salesman.
They style books and other free books offered by the advertisements are the means by
which the manufacturers come in personal touch with consumers, and where they have no dealer
in many cases they will sell direct to the consumer. They are also the means by which a
manufacturer can tell what papers are bringing in results.
These names are carefully tabulated. Their inquiries are given as close attention as if a
sale direct to them was the principal motive. Some manufacturers even have a regular follow-up
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system, working in connection with the local dealer to create a sale which does not terminate until
the retailer reports a sale has been made.
The idea is to, first of all, get the party to buy a suit of clothes, depending upon the
satisfaction the purchase gives, for permanent patronage. The ulterior motive of all this
advertising is building up for the future.

How Infusion of Mail Order Idea Helps

The retailer is helped, the salesman’s work is made much easier, the trade of the
manufacturer is more securely established; a trinity of necessities improved by the infusion of
mail order ideas into clothing merchandising.
A noteworthy fact which has also been confirmed, is that the clothing manufacturers who
are doing intelligent and judicious advertising are the ones who are prospering and doing the
largest business.
But, at that, the number who are advertising is insignificant when compared to the
number who could profitably advertise; although a great many who don’t use the magazines
employ trade papers for publicity purposes, and have a systematic plan of reaching their trade by
letters, booklets or by other forms of attractive printed matter.
Often the advertising which is done in the magazines is further fortified by advertising to
announce new styles over the dealer’s name in his local paper, and even on the billboards and in
streetcars – all this incidental to the advertising the dealer does himself throughout the year.
Whenever the advertising brings a request from a person for a style booklet or some other
booklet in a locality where there is no dealer, the manufacturer advises where the clothes can be
bought. Hen then also works on the nearest dealer to get him to handle the line, following the
correspondence up with a visit at an early date from his traveling representative.
It can be readily appreciated by a careful study of the advertising done by clothing
makers, how neatly every cog fits to make a perfect plan for selling goods, and how mail order
ideas, as they have been worked out, complete the plans.

Requirements Summarized

Summarized, the requirements to succeed in creating through the consumer a demand for
the clothes upon the retailer, thus easily influencing dealers to handle the line, are as follows:
The right kind of publicity – which depends upon the character and prices of the goods.
Under this head comes the magazines, secular monthlies and weeklies and the Sunday or
Saturday issues of the leading dailies.
An ad so written as to induce direct inquiries to provide the means with which to induce
retailers to handle the clothes – as it is much easier to induce them to take the line on when proof
is furnished that people in the community are interested than by expectation that an advertising
campaign will create a demand.
The ad should represent or give some idea as to styles by pictures; and the type matter
impress as to character, workmanship and price.
As a help to the traveling salesman a list of magazines or papers should be provided
which will be used in the campaign of publicity, with statements as to how often these ads will
appear and copies of them reproduced, as all this affords him good talking points.
The campaign of publicity ought to be figured upon actual circulation, as for instance: if
ten magazines are used, say, for sake of illustration, ten months, all these publications have a
combined circulation each issue of 4,000,000. The ads then will be read at the minimum by
40,000,000 people during the publicity campaign.

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 Much can be made of such facts by a clever advertising man in the advertising done to
reach the trade by booklets, other printed matter or correspondence which forms the follow-up
systems.
Other ads should be prepared and plates made of them to be furnished the retailer to use
in his local advertising; also style books and other literature, and even form letters for the dealers.
A strong follow-up system is also essential.
A manufacturer who will engage in such an intelligent campaign as suggested by modern
clothing advertising, incorporating into it the mail order idea, in coming in direct contact with the
consumer cannot fail to increase his business every year.
This fact has been too substantially proven to be now open to any arguments.
But it must be borne in mind that nowhere else so much as in clothing advertising must
the publicity be artistic enough to create a favorable impression.
My next chapter I shall devote to the mail order clothing business as done by tailors to
the consumer direct or to the trade, and the retailer to the consumer.

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 CHAPTER VI

Selling Clothing by Mail Direct to Customer. Ready Made – Tailor

Made – Even the Cloth. Through Agents. Fancy Vests
Should Also Prove A Good Specialty

A traveler nowadays finds taste in dress as well developed in the remote backwoods
village of a few shacks as it is in our large metropolitan cities. The city man has, however,
advantages which his country cousin does not possess. He is surrounded on all sides by the best
of facilities for being well dressed, while the man in the small town must give his instructions and
measurements by mail, or place his order with an agent who calls upon him and takes his
measurements.
The desire to dress well prevailing throughout the country owes its inception to several
causes. Prosperity has been the most effective factor in creating an ambition to be well groomed.
The cheapness with which good clothes can now be made, and the remarkable facilities with
which they can be obtained at places remote from the business centers, have also been prime
factors of appeal to country people. Furthermore, the pioneers in the mail order clothing
business, who through their advertising started people in country towns to ordering their ready or
tailor made clothing by mail, and then immensely pleased them with their purchase, have instilled
the necessary confidence in the public mind that clothing which will satisfy can be ordered from a
distance; for every one of the customers of these pioneers has been a walking exhibit of what they
promised in their advertisements.
These different causes have created a demand upon the big cities to supply country
people direct with good clothes which has grown with remarkable rapidity, until now there is not
a large center anywhere in the United States that has not some concern, or a number of them,
doing an exclusive mail order business in this particular line. Chicago, for example, has a large
number. The Royal Tailors occupy a big building on Michigan Ave. and devote themselves
exclusively to making clothes on orders sent in by agents, of whom they employ hundreds
throughout the country. The American Woolen Co., a subsidiary branch of Sears, Roebuck &
Co., is another large business of this kind. There are also many others whose names I cannot
mention on account of the brief scope of this chapter.
A few years ago a small clothing firm, Meyer Livingston & Co., started out, at South
Bend, to sell a suit of clothes by mail at an inviting figure. The business has grown so much, I
understand, that it has become necessary to move the offices to Chicago. This fact proves that,
with proper ability and judicious advertising, which of course must be backed up with articles
giving satisfaction, location is far from a handicap. The success of this company also furnishes
an illustration of how a clever idea will win business. A suitcase was offered with every suit of
clothes. The extensive advertising of this idea suggests that it must have proved very profitable.

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 3 – If you are losing money and someone else with practically
the same goods is making money this ought to get you to thinking. Don’t say then that
“advertising doesn’t pay.” Whether it is in the following up of your scheme, or the way your
literature has gotten out, or in the manner of handling your inquiries and orders, it is something
that can be easily rectified. If you do not know how to do it yourself, better consult someone who
does know.
TABLOID ADVICE – No. 4 – Indications are that the coming fall season will be one of
the best for the mail order business in its history. Get ready for it now. Lay out your plans,

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prepare the necessary literature, and arrange for the placing of your advertising. Don’t lose the
cream of the business awaiting you!
Another clever plan, adopted by a couple of Chicago concerns, was to sell for a certain
amount a complete gentleman’s outfit, consisting of shirt, collars, cuffs, neckties, etc. Their
extensive advertising provides ample evidence that thousands of such outfits must have been sold
by them.
A Boston firm advertises cloth direct from the mill, and in order to induce people to buy
their cloth, and also let them cut and make up the goods, advances strong arguments and gives
effective illustration through its printed matter and advertisements, of how money can be saved
by buying the cloth direct from the mill, thus cutting out the wholesaler’s jobber’s and tailor’s
profits on the goods.
To do a business in clothing by mail the literature must be just right. The retail clothing
man cannot afford to send samples. He must show in his catalogue attractive half-tones of his
ready-made clothes, worn by living models. He must have some easy method by which out-of-
town people can measure themselves accurately; for the success of the business depends upon
well-fitting clothes and satisfied purchasers.
In nearly every city there are tailors who could extend their business into the contiguous
territory by going after this trade intelligently. They should advertise in the papers whose
circulation is confined to their territory. Samples on little cards, or in a book, to send in answer to
inquiries, an effective follow-up system, and trade-winning printed literature, should also be used
liberally. Or tailors could develop a business in their adjoining territory by securing through
advertisements, agents to take orders for clothes, supplying them with an elaborate line of
samples and attractive literature, and allowing them a good commission. In this way a large and
permanent mail order business could be developed.
Some concerns in this particular line have made a big success of some specialty, as, for
instance, making only trousers. There is a tailor in the East who makes trousers for $3. He has
worked up a big mail trade in them, and while the return on one pair of trousers is small, the
aggregate profits on a large number of orders is $4 and that on a pair of trousers sold for $3 is
only 25 cents, yet if for every order for a suit of clothes twenty orders for trousers are received,
the result is in favor of the trouser business.
There is plenty of room for more men in this business. Merchants engaged in the retail
clothing business or tailors dealing direct with the consumer can profitably devote their attention
to working up an out-of-town patronage.
While writing this chapter on the Spread of the Mail Order Idea, the thought suggests
itself that there is a field open for the sale of fancy vests at a reasonable price to out-of-town
people. I don’t see any advertised in the periodicals. If city people wear them, country people
can be induced to do so.

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 CHAPTER VII

Employing the Labor of Others to Secure Business, as for Instance,

Through Agents, Canvassers or Representatives. Why it is
Profitable. Good Workers are Hard to Secure.

To get people to work for you seems outwardly to be comparatively an easy matter, and
the number of inquiries a test ad in the classified columns of a widely circulated daily newspaper
usually brings, tends to confirm this idea.
But when these inquiries are minnowed out by constant circularizing in an attempt to
enlist the enquirer’s labors to solicit orders for the advertiser, the conviction is soon formed that it
is easy to secure answers to an ad but very difficult to obtain good workers.
There are many good reasons which will satisfactorily explain the difficulty of turning
inquiries into actual helpers. For one, it must always be borne in mind that the papers are filled
with a large number of ads of a similar nature, and it is invariably the case that a person who is
looking for some means to earn money will address a number of them.
The very nature and construction of the ads very often in themselves contain another
good reason for the failure to secure the help the advertiser is after. Three out of four ads are so
worded as to give forth the idea that the work is so easy that a child would experience no
difficulty in carrying it out and make money easily. Other ads are ambiguous in their nature, as
they are so constructed as to make the readers of them believe they hold out offers for a salaried
position when the real proposition confines itself to a commission arrangement exclusively.
Of course, such appeals will always bring a large mail, the bulk of which comes from
curiosity seekers and people who have no capital but are looking for snaps.
It is better to have the ad state clearly and truthfully the real nature of the proposition it
represents. There will be, it is true, fewer inquiries, but they all will come from persons who
know what will be expected from them, and since they realize this beforehand, it becomes much
easier to induce them to go to work.
It is an exceedingly profitable business where an advertiser can enlist a large number of
people to solicit business for him, as has been already discovered by any number of advertisers
throughout the country.
In Cincinnati, the owner of the World Mfg. Co. has made a fortune through the orders
which have been secured for the company’s different specialties by thousands upon thousands of
agents.
The extensive medicine business of the Theo, Noel Co. has been principally built up upon
the labor of an army of agents; and his success is but an example of countless other makers of
proprietary remedies.
In Parsons, Kansas, in Bloomington, Ill., in Indianapolis and other interior cities are
advertisers who have created for themselves a large business in poultry and cattle foods by
enlisting farmers or their boys to canvass for orders in their neighborhood.

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 5 – The time to get ready for the fall season is right now. It
takes time to get your “scheme” thought out or your literature and follow-up letters written and
printed. These things sometimes take longer than you figure on – before you know it you have
lost a month or two of the best mail order season.

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 TABLOID ADVICE – No. 6 – Have your follow-up letters printed by some good imitation
typewriting concern. It pays. A letter just printed – and not in facsimile of a typewritten letter,
even though printed in typewrite type, is likely to be treated as a circular usually is treated.

And so it is throughout all lines of business – there are always to be found some who,
instead of soliciting business direct, do it through others to whom they pay a commission.
Any patented labor saving device can be sold much easier through agents than direct; also
books. Then there are such articles of utility as paints, medicines, household articles, clothing –
which was referred to in the foregoing chapter – patented kitchen utensils, subscriptions for
periodicals, jewelry, novelties, hardware specialties, cutlery, seeds and in fact it pays to get agents
for almost everything since, if anything can be sold by mail through printed descriptions of the
goods, an agent can sell them as easily; only, he has a greater advantage by being on the ground,
ready with additional arguments to overcome any objections which might arise.
A good working force of agents, in a year’s time, can drum up a very big business: and it
is the idea of first getting a good agent and then keeping him that should be the key-note of the
plans behind every advertiser who is attempting to conduct his business by employing this force.
But some advertisers overlook this underlying principle – they try to sell the agent a big
bill of goods right from the start. Others compel him to take out a certain outfit before they have
had a chance to find out if they are going to succeed, while others, again, will make all sorts of
promises to secure an order from an agent, preferring to make the temporary profit from him
rather than the permanent profit from the business he will secure.
An agent will only remain with the advertiser as long as he can make more money by
doing so than by anything else; and it is the idea of keeping him with you which ought to
determine the character of all the negotiations with him at the beginning.
It is far more profitable to induce an agent to start out, with a sample only – if he can’t
afford to purchase any stock – thus inducing him to canvass for business, than to confront him
with obstacles before he can begin that his purse cannot overcome. It is better to reason that if a
person was making a nice income he would not be seeking additional employment and that
consequently the applicant’s resources must be limited and that what is primarily sought in the
beginning is to get him to go to work.
If the proposition appeals to an agent and he has any ability at all it won’t take him long
to make sales, earn money for himself and for those whose goods he is selling; and the only way
to get him started is to meet him on a basis where he can start.
A good agent is as hard to get as it is for a competitor to induce him to make a change
when he has begun to make a good living.
There are agents who are earning incomes – any number of them in our different states –
of from $3,000 to $5,000 a year for themselves – and the concerns or individuals for whom they
are working must be making as much, if not more.
Figure, as an illustration, that if you could secure only five agents making such money, it
would mean a net profit of not less than $15,000 to $25,000 per annum.
No wonder then that the mail order business transacted through agents is one of the most
attractive branches of the business.

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 CHAPTER VIII

The Extent and Character of This Form of Business as Judged by the

Advertising Columns of the Leading Publications is The Best
Evidence of the Universal Application of The Idea.

Often the question is asked, what should we handle by mail? There are a number of
things that should be borne in mind when considering that question. One of these things is to take
hold of an article with which you are familiar – something that you have handled in the course of
your business experience, because this article you know thoroughly, you can judge its points of
merit, and, when corresponding with distant parties, can talk intelligently about it. Then also you
should possess the initiative ability acquired through training – that is the other thing.
Few people succeed in the mail order business who are not capable, when crucial matters
arise, of relying upon their own initiative and acumen.
The man who has sold gents’ furnishing goods knows that business better than he does
the jewelry business. This is also true of the man who has sold hardware; he knows that business
more intimately than he does the grocery business. Knowing a business is necessary to success in
the mail order business as well as in selling over the counter.
To get an accurate indication of the scope of the mail order idea today, I took occasion to
look through a leading farm publication, a leading mail order paper and a leading magazine.
Among the things that I found sold by mail were all sorts of animals, from pets to livestock,
agricultural machinery of all kinds, stock foods, veterinary remedies, household utensils, heavy
hardware, expensive machinery, wagons, carriages, lanterns, cutlery of all character and
description, harness, scales, poultry, from the ordinary barnyard fowl to high class stock,
sprayers, fences and fence machinery, paints, roofings, publications, hitching posts, hay presses,
wall paper, shingles, fanning mills, igniters for gasoline for automobiles and stationary engines,
telephone systems, real estate, seeds of all character, legal services in obtaining patents, securing
pensions, etc., household furniture, mill wheel, guns, revolvers, patent appliances, all kinds of
proprietary remedies, cider mills, saw mills, insurance of all kinds, household furnishings,
furnaces, buggy and other kinds of robes, fertilizers, crates for shipping all kinds of fruits, latest
fads in agriculture, such as ginseng growing, lumber, countless different agencies and other
opportunities to make a good living, shoes, woolens, washers, carpet stretchers, ranges, soap,
bluings, the trust scheme idea of selling goods is still advertised to a great extent, working gloves,
cements, glues, mucilages, offers to start people in all kinds of businesses, instructions by
correspondence in all trades and professions, bathtubs, rubber collars, rubber heels, dresses,
musical instruments, corsets, dress forms to enable the woman in the country to make and fit her
own dresses just a swell as if a tailor made them. There are to be found also advertisements of
different kinds of cloth. Dealers advertise to make ready-made clothes, and clothing
manufacturers advertise to sell direct to the consumer. Furniture is offered for sale for cash and

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 7 – Be sure that your follow-up system is bringing you the
maximum results. During the dull season you have time to study over the vitally important end of
your business. Maybe you can make changes in your letters – possibly you could add a letter or
two making different propositions, etc. – that would make your follow-up letters more effective.

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 TABLOID ADVICE – No. 8 – Your follow-up letters should not merely serve as
reminders. Each letter should talk your proposition from a different standpoint or emphasize
some feature or features not so strongly emphasized in the other letters.

On the installment plan; so are pianos and organs. There are different cookers sold either direct
to the consumer or through agents, bicycles, boats, phonographs, razors, fruit jars, talcum
powders, coffees, toilet articles, different kinds of lamps, all sorts of investment offers, floor wax,
stereopticons, playing cards, athletic goods, all kinds of hair goods, tooth brushes, groceries,
trunks, diamonds on credit, as well as all kinds of jewelry; architects offer to draw plans for
homes; varnishes, fountain pens, underwear. To the young are offered instructions on how to
build boats, houses and other things in which they are interested. Bonds of all kinds are offered.
There are companies who will insure you against all forms of accidents; calculating machines,
shaving soaps, cigarettes, cigars, and tobacco for pipes, suspenders, automobiles, office
appliances; personally conducted tours, in season, in our own country as well as to foreign
countries are extensively advertised; shopping excursions in which a number of people club
together and enjoy themselves while shopping. Instructors in physical culture advertise
extensively. Many schools secure most of their students by mail; banks solicit deposits in this
manner; fire extinguishers are advertised, tapestry, exquisite silverware, and all over similar
articles that appeal to the luxurious tastes of the rich and refined, precious stones peculiar to
certain sections of the country, all kinds of office furniture, refrigerators, bookcases, appliances
for massaging, patent dress fasteners, mattresses, rubber shoes, and baking powders. Even
railroads now request direct communication in regard to transportation.
I thought it advisable to go into such minute detail and mention all these things in one
article, in order that the merchant, no matter what his business may be, may realize that at present
almost anything can be sold by mail.
Selling by mail does not mean that the article itself must be shipped by mail; it merely
means that the article can be so well described in the literature and the points of merit brought out
so forcefully as to bring about a sale. The goods can be shipped either through the mails, by
express, or by freight; or can be distributed from branch depots where the business warrants.

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 CHAPTER IX

Why the Luxuries of Life are Good Mail Order Sellers. Such as Good
Cigars and Tobacco, Liquors, Jewelry, Automobiles, Find
Confectionery and Many Other Articles that People
Don’t Exactly Need But Will Buy
When They Have the Money.

A city-bred man, accustomed to the luxuries usually indulged in by people of moderate

means, can transplant himself now to the homes of most prosperous farmers without fear that he
may have to forego, because he is not able to get them, the things which, while not absolutely
necessary to existence, make life more pleasant.
If a city-bred man could make a visit of but a few days only to such farm house he would
see that which would open his eyes with wonder; he would be surprised at the many visible signs
of how the farmer provides himself and his family with luxuries that a man of moderate means
can purchase.
The city man will find that instead of the cabbage-filled weed which until a few years ago
served as an inspiration for our joke makers and cartoonists, the farmer, if he smokes, has in his
library a box of fragrant cigars on which will be found the label of a manufacturer who is making
a specialty of selling cigars by mail, and also pipe tobacco sold in the same manner direct to him
from New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, or another big city.
If the farmer is not averse to having in the house liquor with which to regale his guests he
usually has on hand good whisky, wine or cordials, bought by mail.
In the parlor, standing in a cozy corner, the city man will see a fine piano or an organ; on
a stand near by a phonograph, and all about him will be things that will make him think of the
parlor in his own house back in the city, for the furniture is sold and costly; on the walls are oil
paintings or engravings, which have replaced the chromos, while from the bookcases the latest
subscription books greet his eyes.
In many homes the girls of the household will bring for him to munch a box of Huyler’s,
Lowney’s, Gunther’s, Allegretti’s, or some other mail order confectionery maker’s candies or
chocolates.
On Sundays or fete days, if the city man remains long enough to pass through one with
the farmer’s family, he will have an opportunity to realize that the country people, as well as he,
appreciate good clothes and other ornaments of dress.
The girls do not wear calicos any longer, nor the boys cotton clothes – they have acquired
the habit of dressing well during these days of prosperity; and on their fingers can be detected
rings in which are imbedded precious stones.
At some farm homes on roads over which travel is easy, an automobile will be brought
from the barn for a spin to the city, and at most houses are vehicles, hitched to horse flesh, that
would do credit to our city boulevards.

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 9 – Every business – no matter how good a thing you have –
must do more or less experimenting at the start. Therefore, don’t spend all your advertising
money in one month – “try it out” first.

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 TABLOID ADVICE – No. 10 – Don’t get it into your head that no “outsider” can
possibly understand your business sufficiently to advise you as to how to improve your methods
and increase your profits. It is barely possible that thinking and working along a certain line and
following certain ideas has gotten you into a rut. It may be the other fellow could get you out of
that rut.

And so it is throughout the country – our money-making farmers, who are as plentiful as
prosperous businessmen, do not deny themselves any of the luxuries of life that are within their
means.
I might be charged with presenting an exaggerated word picture, but I am not; I am
simply recounting an experience I had while on a recent visit to the home of a farmer of moderate
means.
That I am but telling the truth is further demonstrated by the success which has attended
those persons who within the last ten years have made a specialty of selling by mail the luxuries
which have been mentioned.
Wing & Co., who sell pianos, must find it pays them, otherwise this company would not
persist in spending money so freely to reach the farmers; nor would Cornish & Co. keep as
everlastingly at it advertising their organs as they are doing were there no profits in the business.
Loftis & Co., and Chas. Marshall, together with others who sell diamonds and other
precious stones, besides all kinds of jewelry, have found the business of prosperous farmers a
valuable addition to their city patronage.
As for liquors of all kinds, the remarkable success of Casper & Co., of Winston-Salem,
N.C.; The Detrick Distilling Co., Hayner of Dayton, and the Kansas City and St. Louis houses
give the best proof that farmers, when they want such goods, know where to get them.
John Wanamaker, as well as his competitors in the book business, is reaching out for the
farmer, to induce him to purchase books on the installment plan. They all find the farmer as good
a customer as the city patron, and much prompter pay.
The big mail order cigar-and-other-forms-of-tobacco dealers like Rogers, of
Binghampton, and the United Cigar Stores Co., are doing an immense business with farmers.
Each year brings forth visible indications that the taste of the rural people for the finer,
more costly articles is improving, and it will not be long before there will be no difference
between them and the city dwellers.

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 CHAPTER X

The Popularity of Selling Costlier Merchandise on the Installment Plan

By Mail, Growing. Jewelry, Books and Furniture Now Being
Sold in This Manner. Other Good Openings.

It was only a few years ago that merchants who dealt in articles selling at a price not
every one could readily spare in one lump sum, would decry the feasibility of doing a successful
mail order business on the ground that people living at a distance could not be induced to buy
their goods for cash on purely a description of them in their catalogue, possibly backed up with an
illustration of the article itself, which, at its best, could not do the justice that a personal
inspection could.
There were merchants who did a strictly cash mail order business with costlier
merchandise, but only a few, the greater number holding aloof because of the objections cited in
the foregoing paragraph.
In the meantime a new idea in connection with such articles had engrafted itself on the
mail order business and the popularity of it has spread quite rapidly. This was the feasibility of
selling higher priced merchandise to country people upon the installment plan, -- a small amount
of cash down, the balance in easy payments on specified dates covering a certain period of time.
We now find advertised from different cities many articles which are sold upon the
installment plan. Wanamaker’s as an example, sell books; in Chicago, Loftia & Co., and other
jewelers and sellers of precious stones, dispose of their principal output on easy monthly
payments; and there are similar concerns in other cities. The 20th Century Washer Co., of
Binghampton, N.Y., make it a comparatively easy task for the housewives to purchase washing
machines without feeling any drag on their pocketbooks – and there are others who, seeing the
big success of this concern, have since entered the list.
But the most advanced step which has been taken in this direction, although the
feasibility of the method had already been exploited some years back in the Mail Order Journal,
was the appearance in most all of the prominent mail order periodicals of an advertisement of
Spiegel & Co., a Chicago furniture concern, offering to sell furniture by mail on installment
payments.
Nor is Spiegel going to preempt this particular field long, as I understand others are
planning to engage in the same business, the Peoples’ Outfitting Co. being one concern which it
is rumored is arranging to add a mail order branch to its already large local business and plans,
which, it is asserted, have reached the point where an advertising agency is figuring with papers
on a large amount of this publicity.
Up to the present period this particular branch of the mail order business must still be
regarded in its infancy. But, because it is, there opens before merchants with enough capital to
safely handle the large volume of credit involved in it, some splendid opportunities.

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 TABLOID ADVICE – No. 11 – Don’t ask readers of your advertisements to send for
something that they won’t get – you won’t get their money; you may get a job making money for
the government.

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 12 – Maybe you have worked the local field to death – why not
spread out and cover the entire country, if you have a good thing? Think it over!

Inasmuch as the installment business has proven very successful in local retail
merchandising (some very large fortunes having been created by it), there is every reason for
merchants to feel certain that the plan can safely be extended to country people and considerable
money made, provided care is exercised regarding proper credits.
In this connection it is easier to open credit accounts with country people, for they, as a
rule, are more honest in their business relations than city folks. Furthermore, they cannot as
readily conceal themselves from a searching investigation as to their standing in their community;
nor facts, such as being dead beats or slow pay – which is not a difficult matter in the big cities.
It is not amiss here to call attention to the purchasing ability of country people.
According tour latest census report the per capita wealth for each man, woman and child now in
the United States is $35. Eliminate the paupers and tramps of the teeming metropolitan centers
and it can be safely estimated that the individual wealth of country people is nearer $70 per
person.
To do a mail order installment business it is necessary that the plans be complete. A
good credit man will be an indispensable adjunct. Strong printed matter will have to be used and
good advertising in the proper mediums will have to be done.
It will be necessary to offer attractive prices on the articles, although a margin of profit
must be allowed to cover a certain percent of loss which cannot be avoided where a credit
business is being done.
Merchants already established in this business are possibly best qualified to engage in the
mail order branch of it as they have the experience acquired from their local business which will
be of great help in this new department.
For clothing, furniture, jewelry, furs, automobiles, carriages, farming implements, pianos
and organs, which are already being sold on installment payments and many other articles which
it is hardly necessary to mention – for their prices will align them in the class that sell more
quickly if people are given an opportunity to buy them on small payments – this new idea of
selling them to country people now, on the same terms city folks can buy them, opens a limitless
field in which to do a big and prosperous business.

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 CHAPTER XI

An Inviting Field for Women With Business Ability – A Congenial

Employment for Such Talents – A suggestion as to What
Lines to Embark In.

I am going to devote this chapter on “The Spread of the Mail Order Idea” exclusively to
telling what excellent prospects this twentieth century form of trading offers to bright women
anxious to engage in business.
But before I embark upon my subject I wish to say to those women readers who happen
to read this installment that the business is far from a bed of roses. To succeed in it requires tact,
energy, and a possession to a high degree of business ability. Then there is the necessary capital,
the talent for writing interesting business letters and literature; finally, handling the right kind of
articles, and also advertising the business properly.
Now, having in a general manner sketched the necessary qualifications, let us touch upon
each in detail: then if a woman really believes she possesses them all, it is worth her while to try
to win success in this particular field of business endeavor.
Of course tact is an abstract proposition in business; it can be described as doing the right
things at the right time, and it is an inherent talent recognized by the possessor herself.
Energy is to work, and, work hard. To forget her sex. To be prepared to labor as
ceaselessly in building up a business as would be expected of a man, and not to expect that just
because she is a woman success ought to be more impartial to her.
Business ability is indispensable. If a woman does not possess this talent my earnest
advice to her is not to enter any business as she has too great a handicap to overcome to succeed.
The ability to run a business economically, thoroughly and smoothly, creates trade almost
as much as selling the right articles. Don’t forget this injunction.
As for the capital, that will depend entirely upon what article or articles are to be sold.
Yet, broadly speaking, whatever the capital may be, its disposition should be arranged so that it
will carry a business for over six months, at least, allowing the proceeds to accumulate as a
source for additional capital. By that time a woman ought to be able to safely judge as to whether
her venture is going to succeed in bringing about her independence.
While a woman is readily able to get others to prepare for her business all the necessary
literature and follow-up letters, it is still necessary for her to be able, where individual
correspondence requires answering, to dictate good interesting letters. These are needed to hold
customers after they have been secured, for the biggest profits come from reorders, since the
initial expense always attached to the introductory order – as advertising, cost of literature,
correspondence to a great degree, etc. – are eliminated.
We come now to the crux of the plan a woman must carry out to succeed in the mail
order business.

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 TABLOID ADVICE – No. 13 – Have your literature talk to your possible customers just
as you would talk to them in person. Have it answer the questions that one would naturally ask
you about your goods. Have it talk interestingly, truthfully, convincingly.

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 14 – If your business is lame, advertising may be the remedy –
but be sure you get the right medicine – enough of it – and yet not an overdose.

In this respect my advice to the sterner sex, sell something about which you are familiar,
the merits of which you can clearly point out, is also offered to women.
In this regard there are many things a woman can handle about which she is thoroughly
familiar, and she has the advantage, when dilating upon their merits, of being able to talk upon
them or write about them only as one woman can to another, for they are subjects that are often
touched upon when women converse together.
Those subjects are dress, household cares, their health, their pleasures and their children.
To cater to any of these suggests to women what they should handle.
They likewise offer a wide range from which to select, from so extensive a business as
conducting a large woman’s outfitting establishment, to selling a waist holding attachment.
In the way of dress every woman knows what her sex needs. There are kitchen utensils
which should possess some labor-saving merits.
Novelties that delight women’s hearts and make their homes more pleasant.
Cosmetics, complexion remedies, as well as other medicines for the ordinary or serious
woman’s ills.
Games or pastimes they like to indulge in. For their children, outfits for the different
ages.
All these things can be successfully handled by women – and many more which space
prevents mentioning.
To advertise their business essentially, as it will be conducted between women, papers
that are read exclusively by women are the ones that should be exclusively used.
My last word is that where a woman does succeed she gets a greater measure of success
than would a man, for she gets closer, on account of her sex, to her customers.

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 CHAPTER XII

City and Suburban Real Estate and Good Farm Lands are as Good a
Mail Order Business for Men Who Know It as Any –
Some Suggestions Regarding It.

The last two years have developed quite an extensive patronage for all kinds of real estate
business, likewise, for those ventures allied with it, as good farm and city real estate mortgages
for the investment of idle funds, and even teaching by correspondence how to conduct such
ventures.
However, the business along these lines is still in its infancy, and there is much room for
enterprising men to spread out.
Good real estate in growing cities, especially suburban lots which will improve in value
with time, are attractive propositions to present to people living in other sections.
How profitable such a venture can be made is illustrated by what such concerns as Wood,
Harmon & Co., and the Westminster Heights Real Estate Co., both handling New York suburban
property, have done within the last few years. Similar examples can be cited in other Eastern
cities, but the idea of selling suburban real estate in other equally fast growing metropolitan
centers has not yet taken deep root.
In such centers as Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Louis, Cleveland, Denver and Boston,
successes referred to could, with proper management, be easily repeated.
Real estate, as an investment, appeals to the majority of people more than possibly any
other security and more strongly when times are so propitious as they are now, so that if good
property is offered for sale on easy monthly installment payments its disposal to out-of-town
buyers resolves itself into a question of good management, judicious advertising, and a proper
system of correspondence. If people from all over this broad country will buy Manhattan and
Atlantic City real estate they will as quickly invest in similar properties in other growing cities.
The same is true of good farm and city real estate mortgages. Of this kind there is a
much larger volume done by mail than it is generally thought, but at that there is not enough,
when it is taken into consideration what a great deal of idle money will be seeking investment in
1906.
A country as large as the United States, and so well populated, has more or less of a
migratory population. People will travel from one city to another, get tired of one place, suffer
reverses, want a change of environment, while, besides, for locations where they can make their
way in the world. Some are city men; other reared on the farm. Between them an active,
growing mail order real estate or farm business can be created.
This brings to mind the openings there are also for the specialist in the sale of business or
trading in them on a commission basis. A Philadelphia advertiser has built up a fortune in this
particular business, but by a scheme which soon exhausted itself. Asking for a big fee in advance
to list property, paid while it was a novelty, but inasmuch as he seldom sold anything or bought

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 TABLOID ADVICE – No. 15 – If you are selling goods locally over your counter and
pushing your business for all it’s worth, you will still find a limit to its development. Maybe you
have some one thing, or maybe several things, that you could profitably do more than a local
business on and have almost a limitless field for the same. Have you ever thought of it?

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 16 – Perhaps you have a “catchy advertisement,” but it does
not catch the dollars. Catchiness is one desideratum, but it isn’t all.

property he soon created the suspicion that he was operating a skin game. Those who follow in
his footsteps will find it hard to get any money in advance. The very fact that this party has lately
gone into the investment brokerage branch, dropping gradually the real estate branch of his work,
should indicate that he realizes he has got all he can out of the latter.
However, a man ought to make a very good thing selling and buying by mail, either
businesses or parcels of real estate on commissions, if he exercises good judgment in his
selection.
Then there is the good chance of selling real estate in some particularly favored portion
of our country, like orange groves in southern California or in Florida.
For men already in the business a little experimenting in the way of advertising does not
cost very much and may open additional avenues for business.

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 CHAPTER XIII

A Business Little Thought of, but which, however, offers unusual opportunities.
Managing tours for select parties. How to go about it to get members.

Recently on going over the advertising pages of a number of high-class periodicals I was
forcibly impressed with the paucity of announcements offering opportunities to travelers to join
touring parties to certain points of scenic or historic interest.
Naturally I was struck at once with the chance which was here afforded for bright men
and women who love to travel to combine business with their taste for pleasure and be able to do
this all upon the outlay of small capital which, of course, would be necessary for circular matter
descriptive of the tour, for advertising and for correspondence.
Among our enormous population there are so many people who continuously travel for
pleasure it would be difficult to estimate their number, but, however, there are enough among
whom one could develop a nice little business.
To begin with, it would be necessary to secure rates from the railroads or steamship
companies along the lines of a certain itinerary for a certain number, who it is proposed will
comprise the touring party. The railroads and steamboat lines, ever desirous of increasing their
business, seemingly would be glad to quote a special rate if the party which is going warrants it.
Then take up the question of accommodations per person with the hotels. After that
allow a certain sum per number per diem for incidental expenses such as is necessary for guides
and either streetcars or carriage fees.
Computing the expense per person for fare, hotel bills and incidentals it is not difficult to
figure the actual cost, and then adding a certain price per person for your fee. The profits may not
be very large, but by the frequency of tours will average up satisfactorily. Moreover, if
successful, the railroads, steamship companies and the hotels should be only too glad to carry and
house the manager of a touring party without cost and as a matter of business.
To start a genteel business of this character there is no need of having these tours include
continental countries or the Orient. There are plenty of places of interest to visit in this country,
tours that but a very small part of our population has ever taken, as for example, to Washington,
to the Rocky Mountains, through the South, to California, or the far Northwest.
A neat brochure outlining the tour, telling the points which will be visited, how many
days out, the hotels the party will stop at, side trips, and other incidentals, ending with the cost, is
about all that is needed for literature.
All this, with whatever other stationery will be used to carry on the business, should be
elegantly printed, for it is always necessary to make a good impression on a proposition like this
especially.
The advertising for these tours does not have to be elaborate. A half-inch ad suffices to
tell the story. An ad reading somewhat as follows is about what would be suggested:

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 TABLOID ADVICE – No. 17 – Don’t believe that the fellows who advertise “Be your
own boss” are going to put you in the way of making a fortune in two or three months out of the
mail order business. The mail order way, as well as any other, requires time, money and ability
to get you to the profit point.

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 18 – A good advertisement is one that brings results. All the
theories in the world as to the appearance of the ad, what it says, etc., are absolutely valueless if
the ad doesn’t pull. Theory isn’t worth a continental unless it’s backed by experience.

10 Day Tour Through California

Competent Guide. An interesting trip.
Pleasant company. San Francisco,
Yosemite Valley, Orange Groves,
Pasadena, the Redlands, etc., Best hotels
Send for descriptive brochure.
Chicago, Illinois

This advertisement should be inserted only in the best class of papers like the Ladies’
Home Journal, Saturday Evening Post, Review of Reviews, Century, Harper’s, Everybody’s
Magazine, Munsey’s, and papers of this character, as they are read by people who if interested at
all have the means to go along.
The plans have been outlined in the rough. The details can be easily filled in.
However, the success of these tours depends largely upon the guide, and therefore it is
highly necessary that this party, whether a woman or a man, must have already visited the places
on the tours, knowing the ground well and the principal places of interest and last, but not least in
the qualifications, he or she should have good ability as a conversationalist, and as a
correspondent, and should prove a pleasant companion, as then when the members disband they
will leave with kind impressions, and this will make it easier to get members for succeeding tours
by the latter recommending them to their friends.
It is a well known fact that people like company when traveling around for pleasure.
Often persons are deterred from making such trips for fear of being alone and do not wish to
appear as strangers. Tours appeal to this class. There are also a great many young men and girls
whose parents cannot go on trips and who hesitate to let their children make them without escorts.
A great deal of business can be gathered from this source.
Another popular idea would be Bohemian tours for young men where they go it alone, or
for girls accompanied by a chaperone.
As the members are all secured by mail such an enterprise comes essentially within this
series of articles on “The Spread of the Mail Order Idea.” There are others, of course, in this
business, yet in comparison with different lines not many have made a success of it, so it seems
quite within all probabilities, considering the field and the chances, that others can establish
themselves in this genteel business offering both profit and pleasure.

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 CHAPTER XIV

How Druggists Drift Into the Business – The Great Success Some of Them
Have Had – A Few Examples – Still Plenty of Good Opportunities
For Them.

Among the small tradesmen, druggists have been unusually successful establishing
profitable mail order businesses. The trade’s history clearly proves this, so it is by no means a
theoretical conclusion.
Their showing in this regard is due largely to the peculiar character of their business.
Many of our popular medicines, for instance, originally passed through druggists’ hands as
prescriptions from physicians. Not all might have had their origin in this manner, of course, but
very many of them did.
A druggist, if he is keen at all, soon detects by repeated calls from his customers for a
certain prescription, its great efficacy as a specific. He watches what the prescription
accomplishes, as he is aware any remedy with unusual merits is easily sold where people can be
convinced of its exceptional curative properties.
A good remedy always has a good market, and this is a very sound basis on which to
establish a mail order business – or, for that matter, to create a local patronage for it.
Or a druggist may hit upon some specialty, or a particular article he is carrying in his line
of sundries which, if properly placed before the people, can be sold by mail all over the country.
The best proof of the pudding is in its eating, so likewise the best evidence that a
druggist, if he strikes it right, can make a big success is to mention as examples a few of those
who already have made fortunes in just this way.
Nearly every druggist carries Bromo Seltzer in his stock, an article which has made
Emerson, a Baltimore druggist, a multi-millionaire. It is a simple remedy, sells at a small price,
but there is not a proprietary article which ahs so many users as it has. Before Emerson placed
Bromo Seltzer on the market he was in no different position than are thousands of enterprising
druggists today eking out indifferent existences from their stores.
Nearly every one of us is aware of how Gerhard Mennen, the Newark druggist, struggled
along to make a living out of a small drug store before he hit upon his talcum powder. Before his
time every druggist carried this preparation in bulk form, but it was for Mennen to discover that
an enormous business could be secured for a talcum powder put up in an individual package and
given a distinguishing name, and then to make an active campaign for this business on the theory
that in this shape it was purer than the talcum powder sold by druggists from the stock they
always had on hand.
The fortunes made by Hood’s and Ayer’s Sarsaparillas are but other examples, and the
list of proprietary medicines that have all made money for their owners could be extended into a
very lengthy list.
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 It was a druggist who hit upon putting up Sachet Powders in neat small packages and
selling them in the unique manner out of which the popular mail order “trust” business was
created.

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 19 – Don’t get discouraged if your business doesn’t show on
the right side of the ledger in a month or two. It takes time to build up a successful mail order
enterprise, just as it takes time to establish a grocery store, or a milk route, or any local business.
Takes time to get your ads out, time to write back and forth, time to consider your proposition –
and, anyway, your biggest business should come through the future orders form those who have
sent in initial orders.
As there may be some who may not know exactly the nature of this last named business,
we shall explain it. These powders were shipped to boys and girls throughout the country “on
trust” to sell to their friends. When they sold them they could either keep part of the money as
commission or send the money back and in return get some article as a premium.
The originator of this idea, who was a druggist in a village, made a fortune, and made it
very quickly, so novel did the scheme prove itself.
Another druggist, also from the East, did the same thing with Blueing, putting up the
article in dry from. Others with Corn Plasters and other specialties made large incomes out of
this “trust” business.
Of course all these small articles necessarily, on account of their being shipped out free,
were inexpensive, and while they sold for nominal sums, there was an enormous profit in the
goods.
There are many druggists who have made large successes also from taking up different
remedies and handling them themselves in a mail order way, selling either to “consumers” direct,
or through agents – ignoring the drug store trade. Among this class a notable success is that of
D.J. Lane, of St. Mary’s, Kansas, who has been advertising an Asthma cure with very good
results, and who shows his own faith in his remedy by sending out a trial treatment gratis. There
are many others, who have made big money through handling businesses in a similar way.
Many druggists have made money also through handling remedies for animals, as well as
for humans – for horses, poultry, dogs, etc. Among this class one of the greatest successes has
been that of the Polk Miller Drug Co., of Richmond, Va. This concern has had a really
remarkable success in introducing “Sergeant’s Dog Remedies.” These remedies are intended
principally for sale through druggists, but where the latter do not handle them do owners are
supplied direct. This business, with a proper scheme back of it, has been built up to very large
proportions – the scheme of a druggist and of a dog owner.
Any druggist anywhere, who has an iota of originality about him, and from $50 to $100 a
month to spend in advertising, will soon find a greater avenue for money making than could
possibly exist in a purely local business. No matter how much merit his remedy possesses, or
how good the scheme back of it all, of course he – as a businessman in any other line – would
have to do more or less experimenting at the start, but if a druggist who believes he has “a good
thing” will put out some of his surplus earnings in this way in nine cases out of ten the money
will be well invested.
It makes no difference where the druggist is located, or just what remedy or line of
remedies he has so long as the same possess real merit and the literature is properly gotten out,
the advertising is right, and the inquiries and orders are handled as should be.
One thing to bear in mind in this connection, however, is that the greatest successes are
built upon remedies for chronic cases. When one has a toothache, or neuralgia, or any acute
trouble, he must have immediate relief, and naturally will not take the time to send off to a
distance for any remedy for his trouble, but would go rather to the nearest drug store for

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something that will “fix him up.” So, get hold of some remedy or remedies for chronic troubles –
for your “leader,” at least, or your “leaders,” that if you have any good remedies for acute
troubles or “quick” pains, handle them only incidentally; advertise them in your booklet or
follow-up letters, so that whatever orders you get for them will come in without any expense for
advertising – don’t’ put out any advertising money on remedies for acute ailments.

CHAPTER XV

Opportunities for Farmers – Money in the Seed Business – How to Start –

Just What Kinds of Products to Make Most Money On – Profitable
Sold Direct to Consumers and Through Agents.

The farmer has just as great opportunities for making money in the mail order business as
has his city brother. He has greater opportunities, of course, in the matter of handling things
raised on the farm with which he is familiar.
There are many successes, which most of us are familiar with that have been built up on
businesses started “down on the farm,” notably among the big seedsmen, none of whom had
much capital to start with. Some of these have since been able to erect large buildings from the
proceeds of their businesses; a number of them have started farm papers and others have
branched out into other profitable auxiliary lines upon the capital acquired within a comparatively
short time. While competition has increased in this line, at the same time the demand for seeds
has also increased, and is increasing year by year, as statistics prove. There is a far greater area in
the United States devoted to farming than there was twenty years ago, and the rural free delivery
and other conveniences make it easier for one to do business in this line than was possible when
the pioneer seed dealers started.
AS to just what kind of seeds can be most profitably sold, the farmer himself is probably
better able to determine, knowing more about the demands for the different varieties, etc. It is
vitally important, of course, that whatever the variety the seeds must be good, and not the kind
that won’t sprout. There have been a few in the past who have attempted to pass off inferior
products of this nature on the farmers, but their careers were short-lived. If one who
contemplates going into a business of this kind will try to get a grade of seeds that is just a little
better than those sold by others he will certainly have an advantage over the latter, and while it
may take him some time to convenience one as to the fact that he really is selling the best, after
that fact becomes known the business naturally will grow to large proportions; and it is on
“repeat” orders in a business like this, as in most others, that one must look for his greatest
profits.
Almost any farmer, if he will give a little attention to the cultivation of different species
of vegetables, grains or flowers, should in time be able to produce, through crossing varieties or
otherwise, a better article of a certain kind, whether it is a fatter wheat kernel or a new brand of
carnations, or what. If he is able to originate something out of the ordinary and then attach his
name to it, he may, besides making a fortune out of it, be able to make a name that will become
famous. Think of the reputation and selling value, for instance, in the name Bartlett, as applied to
pears and Burbank, to potatoes.
If Burbank, by the way, were as good a businessman as he is a wonder worker in the
production of new varieties of different products and of new products themselves, he ought to be
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worth several millions by this time – though, I understand, he is by not means a poor man as it is.
A man who can make the soil produce white blackberries and thornless edible cacti, many fruits,
vegetables and flowers of extraordinary size or unusual flavor or fragrance, as the case may be,

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 20 – Experimenting is usually expensive. What’s the use –

when you can have the experience of all the other fellows who have experimented? Some
experiments win out. Most of them lose. There’s a clearing house for all these experiences.

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 21 – If you have a good article for which there is general need,
why don’t people buy it? Better give some study to the principles underlying the “creating of the
demand.”
can certainly have his hands full supplying the demand for such products and securing fancy or
even “outrageous” prices for the same. Besides, a man that accomplishes such wonders secures
thousands of dollars of free publicity, as Burbank has.
Of course, every farmer or horticulturist cannot be a Burbank, but the point I wish to
make is this: When you run across either a freak among any of the things you are cultivating, or
any plant in your garden patch that appears to possess better qualities than the rest of them,
cultivate it and when you get seeds or cuttings or roots from it in sufficient quantity, place them
on the market, advertise them properly, and you can make a lot more money out of the business in
time than by running a farm. Or you may hear of some neighbor who raises better crops of this or
that than other farmers in the community. Make some inquiries in this direction and doubtless
you can find something in this line for which there should be a real demand.
As in most other businesses it is advisable that you have a “leader” or “leaders,” and so if
you will get something out of the ordinary in this way to put out as your main article, then you
can also add the more common varieties of seeds which, while the purchaser can secure them
elsewhere, he would order of you for convenience while ordering the particular seed or seeds for
which you are trying specially to create a demand. Spend your advertising money on the latter,
and the common varieties you can pick up orders for incidentally through your catalogue.
As to the catalogue itself, of course, this should give more space to your leaders than to
the other seeds, and such a catalogue should be very explicit in the matter of descriptions and
pointing out the advantages of your seeds over those of others, besides the advantages in doing
business with you in preference to other seedsmen. Illustrations are of great importance also in
such a booklet and these should be well executed and should be faithful representations of the
products of your seeds, some of them shown preferably in colors. A page or two of testimonials
will strengthen the pulling power of such a catalogue.
As to how to advertise such a business, of course mediums appealing to the classes most
likely to be interested in the particular thing you advertise should be selected. For farm seeds, of
course, good agricultural mediums should be used. For flower seeds, roots and bulbs there are a
number of good journals devoted to amateur gardening that doubtless could be used to advantage,
as well as such publications as Country Life in America, Suburban Life, House Beautiful, 20th
Century Home, etc., read by those interested in beautifying their homes and grounds, many of
whom own country residences; then if the appropriation will spread far enough the regular high
class magazines and women’s publications might be added.
The follow-up scheme in connection with this advertising might be made to include an
agent’s proposition, and in time dealers will themselves put the seeds in stock after a sufficient
demand has been created for them. To attempt to create a demand through the trade, however,
right at the start would not be advisable unless you have large capital at your disposal.
It will be seen from the above brief outline that a business of this nature can be started on
very small capital and without requiring much of one’s time before the business gets to the paying

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point. You have sun, rain and air to aid you, and the making of seeds goes on while you sleep.
You can store your first supply in your attic, or some other out-of-the-way place and conduct the
business at home without paying out any money for rent until the business reaches such
proportions as to warrant your giving your entire time to it.
Opportunities for farmers – the raising of hogs and cattle, squabs, etc. – will be discussed
in my next article.

CHAPTER XVI

Other Opportunities for Those in the Rural Districts – The Raising and
Selling of Cattle, Horses, Sheep, Hogs, Etc. – Also of Pets
Of Different Kinds – Better Breeds Bring Better Prices.

In my last chapter I told of some of the opportunities that farmers and boys on the farm
have for making money out of the mail order business, dealing particularly with the raising and
selling of seeds. There are just as great opportunities in other lines. The best way to find this out
for yourself is to study the advertising columns of the regular agricultural mediums and then the
class publications devoted more to stock raising, horse breeding, the fanciers’ journals, etc.
There are many who have made fortunes in the breeding and selling of livestock, for
instance. One thing to bear in mind in this connection, as in the starting of any other business, is
that if you will sell something that not every other man in your line is selling, you will have an
advantage over the many, and there will be reasons for buying your stock in preference to that of
others. Just the ordinary scrub stock, bear in mind, is easy to secure in most localities, and
usually right in one’s own neighborhood, so there would be no need of sending off to one at a
distance. Therefore, advertise something that for some reason or other is better than the ordinary
– for instance, a breed of cows that will give more milk than the average. Specializing in this
line, as in others, usually gives you your talking points and your advantages.
Devote some attention to crossing of breeds, either of cattle, horses, hogs, goats, sheep, or
some other animal for which there is a good demand, and when you succeed in raising some
breed that will excel in some point or points, then it should not be difficult to sell the same, if you
employ proper selling methods – and, of course, for a superior animal, as for a superior grade of
anything, you should secure fancy prices, and make larger profits, than where you are handling
just the ordinary product, or a staple.
Many have made big money raising animals that are purchased only as pets, not having
any particular selling qualities otherwise. For instance, Angora Cats, Belgium Hares and fancy
breeds of Squabs have all proved highly profitable sources of income. There are species of the
animal kingdom that can be raised, in fact, on barren western plains or prairies where the land
would be of little value otherwise.
The first thing, of course, is to obtain some idea as to the demands for different animals –
though, of course, if you had plenty of money you could probably create a demand for even an
animal entirely new to this country; I am talking, of course, particularly to those who have little
capital to employ in starting in any such business. One way to gain some idea as to “what is
going on,” or what the demand is for any particular kind of animal is to secure all of the leading
publications that would advertise the class you are particularly interested in, and then cut out all
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of the advertisements on the subject and paste these in a scrapbook. This will show you to some
extent the number of people engaged in the business, the size of space they use in advertising the
products and the advertisers who use the largest space or the most number of publications, all of
which should help you in determining for what there is the largest demand. In the same way by

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 22 – If your business needs, and is capable of, further
development, it is foolish not to take advantage of your opportunity. If you do not know how to
proceed yourself it is wisdom, and economy, to go to someone who can put you on the right track.

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 23 – “Creating Demand” for your product – oh, there’s the
rub! Bear in mind that the dealer will not be able to sell anything for which there is no demand –
go after the consumer and make him want what you have.
Getting hold of their literature and studying the size of the same, the arguments they use, their
testimonials, etc., you will learn considerable as to the possibilities in any one line.
Another thing that will help you considerably is, after raising some breed for which in
your opinion there should be a good field, to exhibit your best specimens at the leading stock
shows, state fairs, etc., where the same are likely to attract attention and interest. Then, if you
will be able to win a blue ribbon or two for your exhibits, this will doubtless assist you
wonderfully in popularizing your particular breeds and in securing orders for the same.
Beyond this general talk it would be difficult to state just how to go ahead at this time, as
each proposition, no matter what you have, must be handled differently – in the matter of the way
you advertise, the literature you get out, your follow-up system, etc. What I have told you above,
however, will probably assist somewhat in enabling you to make the proper selections of the
product or products you will handle, etc.

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 CHAPTER XVII

Selling Legal Services by Mail – Much Larger Field than in Local

Practice – Many Advantages to both Attorney and Client
--Branches of Law Business Most Profitable to Push.

When any man in any business or any profession has something that he knows other
people want, and need, why should he not tell them about it? To tell them of course means
advertising, and there are professions, like the medical and the legal, that have codes of ethics
which prevent or, rather denounce, those who tell others abut the good that they can do in their
respective lines. This is an age of progress, however, and many of the best in these different
professions are breaking away from these ethics, so-called, and are doing a lot more good on this
account than they otherwise could, besides increasing their own incomes. In the legal profession,
for instance, where one has certain abilities, or certain facilities, that would warrant a client’s
employing his services, or securing his advice, there is no reason under the sun why he should not
ask for such client’s patronage. There is no reason, either, why he should not increase his income
many fold by going after business, instead of simply waiting for it to come to him.
In advertising legal services by mail there are many advantages which can be set forth.
For instance, a client in a small town where everybody knows everybody else, does not always
want his or her personal affairs made known to anyone in the same town, be he lawyer or
otherwise. Therefore, if you take up the business of advertising your legal service by mail you
can make a point of such fact. When one comes to you, an entirely disinterested person, and one
not interested in local conditions or local matters, he will surely get unprejudiced advice. You
can add that you would give advice regarding the employment of a local attorney where the latter
is necessary, or where cases are to be tried in court. Of course in court matters, doing a mail
business, it would be difficult for you to handle such cases unless it be in the matter of cases of
business houses having interests in your own city and therefore requiring you to handle in court
suits and other matters which you could advantageously take care of on account of being right on
the ground, and better than could any attorney residing at a distance.
The matter of collections, if you have a good collection department, can always be
handled to advantage, particularly where you are in a large city, and through this department you
can handle claims outside of your locality as well as those right in your own town.
Then in the matter of drawing up legal papers of every description: you can handle this
as well at a distance as though you were in your client’s own town. There are so many legal
instruments that are drawn up by attorneys that this branch of your business should give you a
very large field – including the drawing up of incorporation papers under the laws of different
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states, preparation of deeds, contracts, bonds, bills of sale, mortgages, leases, declarations of
homesteads, wills and petitions, etc.
Of course it is difficult to give a schedule of your fees in advance, but you can give these
approximately, and then ask that certain blanks which you will enclose in your letters be filled out
giving you the necessary information upon which you will be able to quote definite fees before

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 24 – Nothing’s “good enough” if there’s something better.

When you start in any mail order business, especially, only the best advice – that of the man who
has done things – is good enough to follow. It’s “cheapest in the end.”

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 25 – Don’t bank too much on the amount of business you do –
look to your profits. A business running into hundreds of thousands, if it loses money, is less
desirable than a business of $10,000 a year that brings a net income of $1,500.
you go ahead. Still, in the matter of giving advice, which probably would prove your best source
of income in doing a legal business by mail, you can make a definite fee for the same in your
advertisements and in your literature, this fee to cover letters of advice only where investigations
are not required. Under this heading you know you can give advice to anyone contemplating any
move that will involve, or that has involved, him in any obligation, advice concerning partnership
difficulties, advice to one about to build a house, to one contemplating making an investment, or
one in trouble of any kind. You can advise regarding property rights, real or personal, titles,
domestic relations, divorces, inheritance, contracts, insolvency proceedings, mechanic’s liens,
slander, libel, salary loans, goods in pawn, etc.
From these few suggestions it will be seen that the three principal departments of work in
a mail order legal business will be the giving of advice, drawing up of legal instruments, and the
collection agency branch. All of these should prove profitable sources of income, and of course
where you are doing business by mail you can handle many times the amount of business that you
could in doing a lo9cal business.
In placing your advertising, of course, the ad should be put into publications most likely
to interest those in need of the legal services advertised. An ad appealing to the farmer, for
instance, should be placed in agricultural mediums; one dealing with the businessman, in the
mediums reaching businessmen, etc. As before intimated, in such an ad you might make a price
for advisory services, and where services in other departments are required, ask one to write you,
sending full particulars, on receipt of which you will make a definite proposition as to what you
can do and what your services will cost, and also stating that you will send booklet explaining in
detail your methods, etc.
In the booklet you can take up in detail the different departments of your work under
separate headings and show the advantages in dealing with an attorney like you, as, for instance,
the advantage in consulting one at a distance, the advantages that one doing a mail order business
– which should be many times the size of that of a local lawyer – has, that you will be able to
employ different specialists in different branches of law, and you can handle so much more
business and thus reduce the cost of your services, etc.
In your different follow-up letters you might also in individual letters emphasize
particular branches of your service and thus reach more specifically those interested in one or
another of the various branches referred to, so if one letter does not just hit the mark, the next one
may, and so on.
If, in starting, you wish to stick to the ethics of the profession until you have made a
sufficient success of the same to warrant your breaking away from them you might give some
name to your service or your company instead of using your own name as, for instance, calling
yourself the “Philadelphia Legal Bureau,” “The Western Law Association,” or something similar.

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 I have no doubt but that the field for the mail order legal business is very large, and that
such a proposition can be very successfully worked, and on really small capital, where one
possesses the necessary abilities as a lawyer, a businessman and a correspondent.

CHAPTER XVIII

Soliciting Insurance by Mail – Immense Saving Over Present Method – A

Plan That May be Profitably Adopted by Agencies or by
Solicitors Themselves, Having Small Capital –
How to Advertise.

In view of the enormous expense of selling insurance by methods now employed and of
the many other disadvantages thereto, it seems strange to me that none of the big insurance
companies has as yet attempted to change its selling plans and go after business in a mail order
way. Many of the large companies have taken steps in this direction, however, as there is
certainly more advertising being put out by these institutions, now than ever before. Practically
all of this advertising, though, is on the publicity order and not put out with the idea of getting
inquiries from possible policy holders. Insurance people are doing more circularizing also, than
in past years, and this probably applies more to agents than to the companies themselves.
There are many methods that insurance companies and their agents could employ to
advantage in soliciting business by mail, and I will here suggest briefly just one of the plans that
might be profitably followed, and this applying particularly to agents. We will say that the agent
is operating in a limited territory. Of course then he could not advantageously advertise in
magazines or periodicals of general circulation. He should use first the columns of leading dailies
circulating in his territory, this with the idea of getting inquiries from interested persons. This
advertising would cost considerably less than direct circularizing, considering the number of
people that can be reached by both methods with a given appropriation.
The insurance proposition presents almost limitless ways of advertising. For instance, an
ad of rather a blind nature might be employed which would merely suggest that one
contemplating taking out insurance – life, accident or fire, as the case may be – may find it
advantageous to write the advertiser. The ad need not necessarily suggest that the advertiser is an
insurance agent.
Then different ads could be used appealing to different classes of people as, for instance,
businessmen, young men contemplating matrimony, farmers, etc.
After disasters like the San Francisco and Baltimore fires, or local conflagrations of
importance, one selling fire insurance could to advantage call attention in their ads to the lessons
which such disasters teach and the moral – to take out insurance on buildings or goods at once,
and through this particular advertiser.
Then an ad which would appeal particularly to busy men might start out by suggesting
that if the latter do not like to be hounded to death by insurance solicitors, the mail order
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department of such-and-such agency will give all the information he may desire, asking him to
name, if possible, the kind of policy he is most interested in; and these different classes of
policies might be mentioned in the ad, by way of suggestion.

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 26 – Possibly your plan of doing business, your advertising
matter and your follow-up scheme are on the whole good and proving profitable. At the same
time there may be a single weak spot in the whole thing that you cannot see – until an “outsider”
shows it to you – that can be strengthened to make your profits still greater. The man who is
through learning all there is to know, even about his own business, you can always set down as a
“back number.”

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 27 – Don’t expect to build up a profitable business on inferior

goods. You can’t. A business that depends upon first orders seldom pays. And you can’t get
“repeat” order if you don’t sell good goods.
The subject of such an ad, by the way, suggests one of the great advantages of soliciting
insurance by mail, as no doubt there are many busy people who have in mind to take out
insurance but keep putting off the matter, as they fear that if they make inquiries of insurance
companies the solicitors will camp on their trails and worry the life out of them until they either
sign applications or give up in disgust.
The advertising as suggested in the daily papers will be far less expensive than soliciting
in person, saving time and money. When one answers an advertisement of this nature he
probably is a “live subject” for the insurance man, or he would not write in, and so it will pay to
follow him up quite freely, if judiciously and intelligently. After awhile the agency or the
solicitor may have dozens or hundreds of good prospects to write to every day, whereas it might
take him weeks and months to call on the same people in person – and, for that matter, of this
same number of persons that a solicitor would see, probably a very small percentage of them
would be in the market for insurance, anyway.
In addition to this classified advertising if there are good periodicals, as religious,
financial, agricultural papers, etc., that circulate exclusively in the territory covered by the agent,
so there would be no waste circulation, then these also could doubtless be used to advantage.
This method of going after business can be employed not only by agencies with plenty of capital
back of them, but also by solicitors connected with such agencies who work on commission and
who have little money.
This article will be continued in the next chapter, and will deal particularly with the
question of what to do with the inquiries after receiving them.

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 CHAPTER XIX

More About Insurance by Mail – How to Follow Up Inquiries Advantageously

- Literature to Use – An Aid in Securing Local Agents – Also
- Helpful Efforts at Personal Soliciting.

As I suggested in my previous article on soliciting insurance by mail, this method ought

to overcome, among other objections, the one of confusing the “prospect” by giving him too
much to digest at one time, or taking up so much of his time with so many things as to leave no
impression with him that will “stick.” In following up the inquiries received from the advertising,
I would bear this fact in mind. Most insurance companies have an abundance of literature dealing
with different phases of their particular propositions, or with different forms of policies which
they write. Instead of sending all of this circular matter out at once, I would mail only a little of it
at a time, and in most cases the form letters can be appropriately written along the lines of the
enclosure or enclosures. Thus by taking up only one subject at a time you will be reaching
different people differently, as one argument, or one kind of policy, will interest one man more
than another. To handle your inquiries along this line will require quite an elaborate follow-up
system, but I believe it worth while for the reasons mentioned, and also because you will then
better get the benefit of the accumulative effects of your advertising.
Your first letter might be more or less of a general nature, calling attention to the main
advantages of insuring in your particular company and then asking the inquirer to send you
certain information, filling out the usual application blank, or perhaps a smaller blank than
ordinarily used, calling for the information upon which you could base your estimate, and which
should enable you to give further information of interest to each particular inquirer. Your replies,
after receiving such blanks filled out, of course ought to be personally written. In your first letter
you could enclose to advantage circular matter also of a general nature dealing with the standing
of your company, describing briefly the different classes of policies you handle, giving references
or testimonials, etc. It would be a good idea to enclose also a small circular telling the advantages
of your system of soliciting by mail, including the time and annoyance it saves the inquirer, etc.
Then in succeeding form letters you can refer to the different forms of policies in detail,
as the Regular Life, Endowment, Interest Bearing, Gold Bond policies, or whatever forms of
insurance your company may issue, and in each of these letters enclose circular matter bearing
upon the same subject. Thus, you see, if you can get your inquirer’s attention riveted on just the
one subject, and get your arguments to “sink in,” you will more likely interest him in this way
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than to talk at one time every form of insurance that you handle. In this same way you can also
carry on an educational campaign, showing the advantages, for instance, in the young man
insuring at an early age when the insurance will cost him less, and how, if he takes out
endowment insurance, he can realize on the same probably at a time when it will be very useful to

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 28 – Advertising is not today the gamble that it formerly was.
There is a greater accumulation of experience to go by. You can key your advertisements and
know just what each publication is doing for you. You can adopt methods of following up
inquiries and orders, and office systematizing that formerly were little known. Therefore, if you
are one of the old time advertisers who came to the conclusion that “advertising does not pay,”
you’d better wake up – your competitors are awake all around you.

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 29 – Are your men on the road salesmen or just “order
takers?” If the latter it may be your fault, or theirs. Either educate them as to how to get
business, and make business, or get salesmen that can produce.
him in business. In the same way you can talk to businessmen and farmer separately, wives and
mothers, etc., having such portions of your letters written in the third person, so that where any
particular argument is not applicable to the persons to whom you are writing, it will not at least
do any harm.
Of course these suggestions are only of a general nature, but they may prove of value in
the case of anyone starting such a campaign, and necessarily no two companies, or solicitors for
the same, could hardly use a cut-and-dried follow-up system that would fit in all cases.
In soliciting insurance in this way there are opportunities also for getting hold of local
agents in different localities, these to be picked either from policy-holders or from those who
have failed to buy insurance of you. Such an agents’ proposition made after you have sent out a
number of your form letters, of course then it ought to be easier to interest one in your agents’
offer.
While we are showing the advantages in soliciting insurance by mail, you should not lose
sight of the fact that the methods suggested should assist materially in your personal efforts or the
efforts of your agents. It may be a good idea, in fact, to make calls at regular intervals on people
on your mailing list, or to refer such persons to local agents after all of your follow-up letters
have been sent to them. All of these letters, with the enclosures, would then serve as a good
introduction to the solicitor, and in many cases the “prospect” doubtless will then have been
already converted and it will take but little time to get his signature to the application blank.

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 CHAPTER XX

The Selling of “Staples” – Articles of Every-Day Use Do Not Require

Elaborate Descriptions – The Main Thing Is the Price –
Therefore, Sell Such Goods at Bargains.

In advertising staple articles there are several things to bear in mind. In the first place,
we should remember that staples of any kind are usually obtainable everywhere, even at the
crossroads country stores. Therefore, there should be no particular reason for one’s buying staple
goods of a mail order house, many miles away, in preference to buying at a local store, except
one can save money on his purchase.
There is the keynote of the whole proposition of selling staples by mail – the saving of
money.
When you are advertising some specialty which cannot be obtained locally, or which
cannot be easily obtained there, then of course, the situation is different. You may have some
remedy, for instance, for rheumatism, or for dyspepsia, or for some other ailment, which one
cannot obtain in his own town, and then he will send off to you for the medicine, provided you
have something of real merit and which he knows to be of real merit, and he will pay you the
price, provided he has the price, which you ask. On such specialties, therefore, you may make
several times the profit that you would make on staple goods. On the other hand, in advertising
staples and you advertise goods that people know, and know the prices of, you do not have to
give much descriptive matter or spend much time in trying to convince one as to the merits of
such articles, for they already know.
If, for instance, you are advertising Sapolio or Royal Baking Powder – every woman
knows what these brands cost, and they know what the goods are. If you can, therefore, offer
such staple products at 10 per cent or 25 per cent or 50 per cent lower than the regular market
prices, then you are offering them an advantage which is apparent to them at once. The same
applies of course not only to groceries but to hardware, dry goods, etc., where the articles are of
known brands. Therefore, on staple articles the thing to advertise is the price, rather than the
merits of the goods themselves.
Of course there are many ways of presenting these price propositions, as you may offer
an article singly at less than the prevailing price, or you may give a combination of articles upon
one or two of which you might really lose money and yet make enough on the other articles to
give you a profit. Then, again, you may make very little money, or possibly no money at all, on
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your first orders, intending rather that these first orders should serve as an introduction to your
house, your methods, etc., with the idea of making your profit rather on future sales.
Such methods are not very different from those employed by the large department stores
in metropolitan cities. To give you an illustration: I happen to know of a department store in
Chicago which around Thanksgiving time advertised turkeys at so much per pound, which price

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 30 – If you’re running your business along the same lines
adopted years ago when you started, you may have gotten into a rut so deep that you can’t even
see that your younger competitors are getting ahead of you on account of the newer ideas and
more up-to-date methods they are employing. Possibly a competent “outsider” could “show
you.”

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 31 – Are you a manufacturer or a wholesaler selling through

“the trade?” You must do more or less business by mail. If you have a good cost system you
must know that your mail order department brings you more net profit than that of any one
salesman. Why don’t you take the hint?
was so far below the market price then prevailing that the housewife who read the advertisement
knew at once that the birds at the price named were really a great bargain. As a matter of fact,
these turkeys, as I know, were sold below the actual cost to the department store referred to,
which bought them in large quantities from one of the commission firms on south Water Street.
The result was that on the day of the sale the store was crowded almost to overflowing with
“bargain hunters” who wanted the turkeys advertised. There were not sufficient salesmen to
handle all of these customers promptly, but the main object was served of getting these people
into the store, and a large percentage of them naturally purchased other goods upon which the
department store made good profit, just on account of this sale.
The object of “getting people into your store” is just as great an object to the mail order
dealer as to the local merchant. Offer them real bargains by mail if you are advertising staples
and you will not only sell the “leaders” which you advertise, but will sell other goods to the same
people, or a large percentage of them. You are getting them acquainted with your concern, and
you are getting them into the habit of buying from you. That, in fact, should be the ultimate aim
of your advertising – to get people acquainted with you, secure their confidence and to get them
on your list of regular customers. Therefore, if you will not make much money on your first offer
of goods at bargain prices and you will get a good percentage of such customers to order of you
regularly, week after week, or month after month, and have such customers on your list for years,
this, of course, is where you will make your real profit out of such customers.
Of course where you are doing a mail order business and selling direct to the consumer
most of these staples, anyway, you can make it an object for one to buy of you on account of the
price consideration, even though you will not be offering quite as big bargains as in your original
bargain offer – upon which you might make no money, or really lose money, when you count the
cost of advertising, etc.
Another point, in this connection, is the fact that while your percentage of profit may not
be as great on staple articles as on specialties, it is likely that you will get many times the number
of “repeat” orders, or orders for other goods from the same customers, as compared with the
amount of money you would receive on specialties.
It naturally follows that a concern dealing in staples must do a larger amount of business
than otherwise to make the same net profits.
It naturally follows, also, that a business of such nature, where all the conditions are right,
of course, will grow faster than the average business which deals in special articles.

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 It is the amount of business transacted by Sears, Roebuck & Co., for instance, which is
responsible for the tremendous profits made in the aggregate, rather than the percentage of profits
on the different departments of the business. The concern referred to may make on 3 per cent to 6
per cent net profit on its annual sales, but of course when the sales run up to fifty million dollars
or more a year this profit counts.
The concern selling specialties may make 100 per cent net profit, or considerably more,
but, on the other hand, there are few concerns dealing in specialties who could build up the
enormous business of fifty million dollars per year. This question, therefore, of whether it is
advisable to sell staples or specialties is one that presents both advantages and disadvantages, and
whether it is advisable for an advertiser to take up one or the other line is a matter for each
individual to decide upon, after knowing all the advantages and disadvantages, also the amount of
capital at his disposal, the competition in one field or another, etc.
The principal point I am trying to bring out in this chapter is the fact that when one is
advertising staple articles the main thing upon which he will either win out or lose, is – prices.

CHAPTER XXI

Selling Books by Mail – Some Advantages in Conducting Such a

Business – Little Capital Needed in Starting – Printed Matter,
Transportation, Etc. – Smaller Items of Expense
Than in Handling Most Other Articles.

The selling of books by mail is a very profitable occupation, provided of course that you
get the books that will appeal to the right people and then properly advertise them.
One great advantage lies in the fact that books can be mailed at two ounces for one cent,
while “merchandise” costs one cent an ounce to mail; in fact, some of the goods sold by mail
order dealers are unmailable and must be sent by express or freight; or they may be subject to
breakage or deterioration in transit. The transportation feature, therefore is not the obstacle it
may be in handling other commodities.
There are many other good reasons for going into the mail order book business. If you are
starting out with small capital, for instance, you can save a lot by not being obliged to get out
much printed matter at your own expense. Mot publishers will furnish you with circulars
advertising their books with your imprint on them, either without cost to you or at the cost of
printing. This is something of an advantage, as if you were to print this circular matter yourself it
would cost you in most cases several times what it would cost the publisher himself to furnish
you with the same.
Another advantage in doing a mail order book business is that it is usually not necessary
for you to carry any books in stock. When you secure an order for this or that book you can
simply send the same to the publisher with instructions to mail direct to your customer. You can
send your own label or tag with the order to the publisher to be used instead of his own.
Of course, if you publish a book or several books of your own you will appreciate that it
will be to your advantage to sell to other publishers or mail order dealers in the same way. If you
have something that will readily sell, it will pay you to get out a circular or pamphlet describing
the book in detail, giving testimonials, press notices, etc., and to furnish the same in quantity to
dealers who have good mailing lists.
Of course, as to just how successful this method of advertising will be will depend largely
upon the merit of the publications or the demand for the same, the character of your advertising
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matter and the value of the mailing lists of your customers to whom you furnish such matter.
Printed matter of this sort usually costs very little to furnish to dealers, as when you once get your
matter in type it is only a question of putting the imprints of your customers on the bottom of the
circular or folder.
The subject of selling books by mail is too large a one to include in one chapter. In the
next chapter we will take up the matter of handling different classes of books, their selection,
methods to employ, etc.

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 32 – An advertisement that will bring in $200 direct from the
advertising may be less profitable than an ad, which brings in inquiries containing no remittance
at all – it depends largely upon the scheme back of the advertising. If you lack experience in
formulating such schemes better to go to someone who knows how.

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 33 – Get your prospective customer to come after you for
business – instead of your going after him. Then he has come more than half way. The sale is
more than half made, all other considerations being right.

CHAPTER XXII

More About the Book Business – What Books to Select – How to

Select Good Sellers for a General Business or for Some
Special Line – Handling the Proposition as a
Department of Another Business.

In doing a mail order book business about the first thing to consider, of course, is the
selection of the books themselves, or the class of books. This selection, at the same time, is
dependent largely upon other conditions. Say, for instance, you are already engaged in some
business dealing with a particular class of people. Then, no doubt, you will have a good mailing
list and you can go after the people on such a list for orders for some particular book or line of
books that ought to be of special interest to them.
If you are in the medical business, for example, the addresses on your list of inquirers or
customers ought to prove good ones to use in talking publications dealing with diseases, and more
particularly those dealing with home treatment. You can subdivide the proposition still further as,
for instance, if you are selling remedies for diseases of indigestion by handling treatises on
stomach troubles, constipation, etc.
In many other lines, too, there are valuable books by well-known authorities that could be
profitably handled in some way in the follow-up system. It should not be difficult to get
information concerning these books, the titles, the names of publishers, etc., as there are a number
of directories or catalogues which give such information.
Then, besides handling a book proposition as a “side line,” the book business itself,
properly handled, is a highly profitable one. In conducting such a business one must take the
various conditions into consideration in selecting the line to handle the same as where the books
are handled in connection with another business. Say, for instance, you are posted on “new
thought” subjects and you will be in position on this account to know what societies or what
publishers to go, and what publications there will likely be a demand for, then it may be
advantageous for you to take up a line of works on Theosophy, Christian Science, Spiritualism,
and other such subjects. In this connection, I will say that I happen to know that big money ahs

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been made through handling books on so-called “crank” subjects. A well-known woman doctor,
for instance, is reputed to have made something like $100,000 on an anti-drug book dealing with
ailments peculiar to women, including, also, such subjects as child culture, marriage relations,
etc. This book was published by the author herself. I have been trying to tell, however, more
particularly how to take up the mail order book proposition where you have little capital to start
with and will not be able to go to the expense of getting out on your own account an edition of
some book or another. The previous chapter goes more into detail in this regard.

TABLOID ADVICE – No. 34 – Say you spend $100 in advertising, $40 for printing a
booklet, $100 for postage, $25 for printing form letters, labor, etc. – that’s a total of $265. If you
don’t get any orders from this advertising and the literature, that’s $265 lost, isn’t it? Had you
paid someone who knew how, to go over your scheme for you, suggest the right mediums, and
prepare your advertisement, booklet and letters, his services, if the business proved a winner,
could hardly have been considered expensive, but rather the money spent in this way would have
proved a very profitable investment.

Besides taking up classes of books appealing to special classes of people, considerable

money has been made from doing a general mail order book business. Such a proposition,
however, requires more capital. It will be necessary to get out a larger and more complete
catalogue, for one thing. The large mail order houses like Sears, Roebuck & Co. and
Montgomery Ward & Co., regard their book departments as among the most profitable. I
understand from what I believe to be a reliable source, that one of the concerns mentioned has
been doing an annual business in this department of close to $1,000,000.
As the men at the head of the book departments in concerns such as I mention have had
wide experience in this line there is no better way, probably, of finding out how to select books
that will sell than to go through the book catalogues they issue and see what they are offering. I
might say in this connection that no doubt the so-called “hand-books” dealing with the different
businesses and professions are among the best sellers. I refer to works that bear such titles as
“How to Become a Telegrapher,” “Stenography Self Taught,” “Modern Carpentry,” “The House
Builder,” etc.
Orders for such text books or works of information come in steadily year after year and
so good volumes along this line are considered staples by book buyers and sellers who have had
experience with all kinds of publications. Bibles, dictionaries, atlases and other reference books
are also considered good staples and steady sellers. Reprints of the original Webster’s
Dictionary, for instance, have sold at a really tremendous rate, in spite of the fact that modern
educators and literary persons regard this reprint obsolete.
Of course publishers like Harper Bros., Scribner’s and bobs-Merrill & co., who publish
mostly novels and works of fiction, are able to work up tremendous sales on works by noted
writers that happen to make a hit, but I am not dealing at all with this class of publications in this
article. While such books have made lots of money for their publishers, they are not the kind that
can be profitably handled by those in the mail order book business. They appeal to another class
of readers than what would usually be considered mail order book buyers and, anyway, are sold
principally at book stores and newsstands.
Then, too, it would often be risky to put much money into advertising most novels, the
new ones at least, as their success is always problematical. Many such novels, even though they
appear in the manuscript form to experienced publishers to have in them the elements of success,

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often prove flat failures. Of course, there are enough books issued by the big publishing houses
referred to that do meet with a large popular demand to enable the average publisher to clean up a
nice dividend at the end of every year, but with the man entering the mail order book business the
situation is very different. The latter cannot afford to experiment. Neither can he make the same
profit on his sales if he is buying from the publisher instead of himself being the publisher.
Manufacturing publishers of the class last referred to, in practically every case, have their
own magazines through which to advertise their own books. Harper’s Magazine, Harper’s
Weekly, Scribner’s Magazine, the Reader Magazine, etc., are issued by book publishers, who
have an advantage on this account that the mail order book-seller would not have. Therefore, my
advice to the latter is, as before stated, to handle preferably those books which are known as
staples and which sell particularly to the so-called mail order book trade.
In this connection it should be borne in mind, as I have stated in previous chapters, that
where one is selling staples, whether staple books or staple groceries or staple anything else, that
one of the chief considerations in inducing sales is – price. If you will state, for instance, in your
catalogue in describing a certain book that the publisher’s price is $1.50 and your price is $1.08,
then you are offering a bargain and people who have the mail order buying habit are, as a rule,
bargain seekers. Of course, this price question does not cut so much figure when you are selling
specialties, whether in the book line or in any other, as then the question of competition is not so
likely to arise. When you are handling a special line of books which is not to be found in every
other catalogue or every book store, then the price, of course, need not be cut down to a
competitive basis.

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