This is a snappy slide recently used by a Brooklyn dyer and cleaner: “Don’t Get ‘Held Up’ for Inferior Cleaning and Pressing. Try Us for Expert Work at Fair Prices.” In the left-hand corner was a sketch of a New York tough pointing his revolver at a terrified meek man.
The follow-up advertisement in the theater house organ was as follows: “Suits Pressed, 25c. Sponged and Pressed, 35c. Cleaned and Sponged, 50c. Dry Cleaned, $1.00. Pants Sponged and Pressed, 10c. Also Ladies’ Work.”
It was as easy as kiss your hand to be entertaining in the first instance, because the slide was one of the stock kind. This fact, however, does not excuse the advertiser from putting some real thought behind his announcements, for, otherwise, the interest of the reader fizzles like a damp firework.
XXXIX.
ATTRACTING FARMERS TO TOWN
If you are a country town merchant, you are at the mercy of the weather, and trade suffers accordingly. The farmer is a good customer, and you must offer some inducement if he is to be persuaded to make his customary trip to town when the weather is bad.
Practically everybody likes motion pictures, and the farmer is probably as keen a fan as his city cousin, only circumstances preventing him from attending so often.
I know of a merchant down in Harrisonville, Missouri, who got wise to the fact and presented his farm customers with free motion-picture theater tickets. He now finds that the weather makes not a particle of difference.
How, then, can you make certain of doing good business every Saturday, rain or shine? I would suggest that you try out the self-same stunt.
In the first place, the local motion-picture exhibitor, being a business man, is always on the warpath for opportunities for increasing his patronage, so, if you approached him on the subject of selling admission tickets at a reduced price, he would undoubtedly come to terms with you.
It might be well that you ask him to put on mostly rural pictures. This may seem like carrying coal to Newcastle, but it has been proven that rural folks much prefer farming subjects.