[A letter from the Proprietor of the Ginger Cubes to his Advertising Manager, who is ill in hospital.]
DEAR RUSSELL: When I heard that you had been taken to the hospital with a badly dislocated sense of proportion and exhaustion of the adjective secretions, I was worried. The doctor said that you were suffering from a severe attack of deprecation and under-statement, and I feared that would mean you would be quite unfit to help me in the forthcoming campaign for Ginger Cubes. But I hear now that a few weeks of silence and relaxation will bring you round. I have ordered the Police Gazette and The Nation to be sent you. Each in its own way is highly entertaining.
In our last conference, just before you were taken ill, you tried with your usual energy and bullheaded vitality to persuade me to say a word about the Ginger Cubes at the Paperhangers Convention. You made a great deal of the point that this would be a vast gathering, and that it would be excellent business for me to give them a “message.”
I ask you to meditate this thought: give me a small group of folks who are more or less interested in the same sort of thing that I am, and I will “talk my head off.” But speaking to large, miscellaneous audiences, many of whom are only incubating there to pass away the time until the theatres open, is my idea of loss of compression.
We have appropriated a fine promotion budget for the Ginger Cubes, but I am holding up any action until I can argue the situation with you. About newspaper advertising, for instance—I want your opinion as to the papers which are read (1) most carefully, (2) by the class of people to whom the Ginger Cubes are likely to appeal, (3) at the time of day when their minds (and palates) are receptive—i. e., morning or evening? For instance, do you think that people will be likely to be tempted by the Cubes in the morning, just after breakfast? I think not. I believe that the evening, in that faintness and debility that are supposed to attack office-workers on their way home (especially in the subway) is the psychological zero hour for the Ginger Cubes.
Miss Balboa, to whom I am dictating this, says that she never noticed any sign of weakness or lack of energy in the evening rush on the subway. I believe it is worth while to get the feminine reaction on this matter before we make any decisions. One thing I have always regretted about you as an Advertising Manager is that you are not married. Wives are often very helpful in these questions of merchandising strategy. But perhaps you can question some of the nurses at the hospital and get their reaction.
In regard to these mediums, the question of circulation does not cut any ice in my cynical and querulous mind. It is not a matter of circulation, but of penetration, that excites me.
The chemical laboratory reports that the Cubes will positively have a soothing and tonic effect upon the digestive organs, and that we are justified in saying so. Unfortunately they say that the Cubes cannot possibly be of any value in combating “pyorrhea,” so we cannot go riding on the other folks’ toothpaste copy. For your amusement, I have thought up this slogan:
WHY NOT INVEST IN
A NEW INTESTINE?
TRY GINGER CUBES
Which is probably too startling. But anyhow, when we have decided, I wish our copy to be Cumulative, Concise, and Continuous. Then, ho for the Ginger Cubes!
Yours,
NICHOLAS RIBSTONE,
President The Ginger Cubes Corporation.
N.R./D.B.
[A letter from the Proprietor of the Ginger Cubes to his Advertising Manager, who is ill in hospital.]
DEAR RUSSELL: I am glad to hear from Dr. Nichevo that you are doing well. He reports that in your delirium you had visions of nothing but full page insertions, so I realize that you must have been a very sick man. I am glad you are coming out of it. The Doctor says that a little quiet meditation on business problems will help to bring you back to “normalcy.”
So you might think this over. I have just been telling the boys at our conference this morning that I want our advertising matter for the Ginger Cubes to be distinguished. I’ve been much impressed, for instance, by those ads that Childs restaurants have been running for some time, in which they make use of historians, philosophers, poets, and what not, to introduce the topic of food. I am wondering whether, in your extensive reading, you have come across any literature in which Ginger or Cubes have been written about in a pleasing, sentimental strain? Miss Balboa thinks that Shakespeare said something about Ginger being “hot in the mouth,” but I am a little afraid of that word hot. How about
THESE CUBES FROM THE SOUTH
ARE WARM IN THE MOUTH
What I want you to do is tell me what the resources of literature are in the way of quotations about Ginger.
Some of the boys are much taken by a suggestion that has come in from the Gray Matter Advertising Agency, who somehow got wind of our plans. Mr. Gray, the Psychology Director of Gray Matter Agency, wants us to mark the cubes with little spots of white sugar, so that they look like dice. Here’s the joker: he wants us to pack them in little boxes in which half the cubes will be marked as five-spots and half as deuces, using the slogan, They Always Turn Up Seven.
That seems to me a bit complicated, but I must admit that I’m rather struck by the idea of advertising the Cubes as Digestive Dice. I’m having the idea of marking them with sugar spots looked into, to see what it will cost. I visualize a subway poster showing the cubes tumbling out of a dice shaker, with the words Throw These for Good Health. Do you think that is too distinctly masculine an appeal? But think of getting this idea across to the lunching public, of always carrying a box of the Ginger Cubes in their vest pocket (we could have the box shaped like a little dice-shaker, hey?), they can use them to throw for who is to pay the check, and then eat them. Can you put that thought in twelve words?
What a pity that neither of us is married, and has no wife to fall back on for advice in this delicate matter. Miss Balboa, my new stenographer, thinks that women would not be attracted by this gambling note; she says that women are born Dutch-treaters, and do not fall for the idea of settling the lunch-check by mere chance. Please see what the hospital nurses think about this.
This man Gray, from the Gray Matter Agency, is a whirlwind. He has shot in some suggestive layouts for car-cards that make my head spin. These are some of his aspirations—
DIGESTIVE DICE
MEAN LUCK FOR THE LIVER
TRY GINGER CUBES
FOR A CHEW IN THE TUBES
CHOOSE GINGER CUBES
And he has doped out a map showing the whole digestive apparatus laid out like a subway system, and the Ginger Cubes keep traffic moving.
All this seems to me a bit too unconventional, although I confess I am amused by the originality. Tell me what your reaction is. I’m sending you some of the Cubes to distribute among the nurses.
Yours,
NICHOLAS RIBSTONE,
President The Ginger Cubes Corporation.
N.R./D.B.
[A letter from Miss Candida Cumnor, one of the nurses at the Hippocrates Hospital, to Mr. Nicholas Ribstone, President of the Ginger Cubes Corporation.]
DEAR MR. RIBSTONE: Poor Mr. Russell is still very weak, and has not been able to write to you himself. Dr. Nichevo says that he has never seen a more interesting case of complete exhaustion of the salesmanship glands. He thinks that the patient must have been under a very severe strain for a long time preceding the breakdown. I gathered from what Mr. Russell said in his period of delirium that he had been trying to sell by mail order a complete set of Tolstoy’s works, but by some mistake had bought the wrong mailing list from one of the houses that deal in such things. They gave him a list of members of the Ku Klux Klan, and the returns on his effort were so disheartening that it broke him all up. He was very queer for a while. But one delusion helped a great deal. He had a fixed idea that the temperature chart at the end of his bed was a sales graph, and the more peaks there were in it the better he was pleased, for he thought that at last the K. K. K. were beginning to fall for Tolstoy.
At any rate, he is much better now, and asks me to write to you for him. I must say that I think you picked a fine Advertising Manager for your Ginger Cubes: I have never seen such an enthusiastic fellow. The specimen drawings for car cards that you sent him are pinned up on a screen beside the bed, and he hardly takes his eyes off them. He has had all the nurses in the ward munching the Ginger Cubes, or Digestive Dice as he likes to call them, and is asking me to make a note of their opinions. He says he plans an interesting lay-out under the caption
COMMENTS OF THE MEDICAL PROFESSION
ON THE GINGER CUBES
I must admit that I find the Cubes very tasty and refreshing.
To show you that he is really picking up, I will tell you that this morning he asked me to send out to the nearest newsstand for a number of magazines and papers, which he has been looking through with close attention.
But I must not deceive you. In spite of his enthusiasm he is still very weak, and it will take a lot of building up before his merchandising centres are up to par. It would do no harm if you were to send him some stimulating books to read, such as Orison Swett Marden or Dr. Crane.
By the way, Mr. Ribstone, someone in your office has made a mistake in addressing letters to this hospital, the name of which is not Hypocrites but Hippocrates; the spelling is nearly the same but the pronunciation is different, after the name of a famous doctor of old times. Now I must draw to an end, for the patient needs attention; this is a long letter but he wanted you to know all about him.
Yours sincerely,
CANDIDA CUMNOR.
[A telegram from the National Drug Novelties Company to Nicholas Ribstone.]
Chicago, April 11, 1922.
Hear interesting rumour about new lozenge Ginger Cubes to be marketed by you would you consider entrance of outside capital in this venture or sell outright trade name formula and goodwill. Believe you have a winner.
EDWARD GARTENBAUM,
President National Drug Novelties.
[A telegram from Nicholas Ribstone, president of the Ginger Cubes Corporation, to Edward Gartenbaum of the National Drug Novelties Company.]
Decline discuss selling interest in Ginger Cubes distribution plans perfected watch our smoke.
RIBSTONE.
[A memorandum sent to heads of departments of the National Drug Novelties Company, Chicago.]
OFFICE BULLETIN No. 38946 (Series B).
Minutes of Conference Held in Directors’ Room,
April 12.
Mr. Gartenbaum reported that he had had a telegram from Ribstone declining assistance in financing the Ginger Cubes. Mr. Gartenbaum thought the matter important enough to warrant calling the directors together. Was it possible that Ribstone had access to new sources of capital hitherto unemployed in the drug trade? This seemed unlikely in view of their own recent canvass. Mr. G. asked Mr. O’Keefe, who had just come back from New York, whether he had been able to find out anything definite about the plans for Ginger Cubes.
Mr. O’Keefe said that he had found the trade greatly interested in the rumours that had been current. It was said everywhere that Ribstone had got hold of a formula that was a knockout, and that the Ginger Cubes had caused more talk in pharmacist and confectionery circles than anything since the Smith Brothers sold their razors. He had not been able to get any very definite dope about the distribution plans, but it was common talk that Ribstone intended to spend half a million in the New York newspapers. He had heard that the Gray Matter Advertising Agency was to handle the account. Mr. O’Keefe said that Mr. Gray was an old friend of his, but going to Gray’s office to inquire he found the reception room so choked with solicitors from the newspapers that he did not wait.
Mr. Oldham asked if this man Ribstone had had previous experience in the drug specialty line which would warrant their believing he could make a go of the so-called Ginger Cubes.
Mr. Gartenbaum said that Ribstone had had no experience in that field, so far as he knew, but that he was a very clever merchandiser and had done big things with the Ribstone Memory Course several years ago.
Professor Devonshire of the laboratory department was called upon to ask if he had any idea what the formula of the Ginger Cubes might be, and whether it could be easily duplicated or improved. Professor Devonshire said that, speaking as a chemist, ginger had many possibilities as a popular drug staple, that its principal constituents are starch, volatile oil, and resin; that it has carminative and purgative values, especially for dyspepsia and flatulence, and is helpful for seasickness, headache, and toothache. He said that as soon as the Cubes themselves were on the market he could analyze them and suggest a variation in the formula.
Mr. O’Keefe said that he had tried to get hold of some of the Cubes, but that they were being carefully kept under cover. He believed that Ribstone’s plans were still in the air until his advertising man, Russell, was out of hospital.
Mr. Gartenbaum asked if Mr. Russell was in hospital because he had been trying some of the Ginger Cubes.
Mr. Oldham said that he had been greatly impressed by the amount of gossip in the trade about the Ginger Cubes, but he believed the value of the thing lay not in any unique formula but in the cleverness of the name Ginger Cubes, and particularly the additional name Digestive Dice.
Mr. Gartenbaum agreed and submitted it to the meeting that it would be well worth while to ride on Ribstone’s effort by putting out a similar product with an equally catchy name. He instanced the way Eskimo Pie was followed immediately by a dozen imitations, all very nearly as successful.
Mr. Sombre of the Promotion Department asked if Mr. Gartenbaum had thought of any name as appealing as Ginger Cubes.
Mr. Gartenbaum admitted he hadn’t, but said that his mind was working on this matter and the only thing he had thought of so far was Ginger Blocks.
Mr. Sombre said he thought that was too similar to Ginger Cubes and might mean legal proceedings.
Mr. O’Keefe suggested Tingling Squares.
After a good deal of discussion, Mr. Gartenbaum adjourned the meeting, ordering these minutes to be sent confidentially to heads of departments. Another conference to be held to-morrow at which suggestions for a rival name would be brought in.
By E. K. R.,
Stenographer.
[A letter from Allan Russell, Advertising Manager of the Ginger Cubes Corporation, to Nicholas Ribstone.]
Hippocrates Hospital, April 14.
DEAR BOSS, I’m still a bit seedy but am getting better every minute thanks to the care these “good people” have taken of me. This is my first letter and it will have to be short. Just wanted to say that if you still need an assistant in the office I’d like to recommend Miss Cumnor, one of the nurses here, who has been taking care of me. She is tired of the nursing job and wants to get into a “business position.” Certainly she’s a mighty capable girl and her medical knowledge would be of great value to us in marketing the Cubes. She is 23 years old and ambitious.
I’ll be out of here pretty soon now, I hope, and am keen to get into the thick of the fight for the good old Cubes.
Yours always
RUSSELL.
[A letter from Nicholas Ribstone to Allan Russell.]
Ginger Cubes Corporation
|
Nicholas Ribstone, |
Executive Offices |
Cable Address: |
April 14, 1922.
DEAR RUSSELL: Here are our letterheads. How do you like them? I am sending some to the hospital so you can use them for any letters you may need to write. Show them to the nurses and get their reaction. The more they circulate, the better.
This is just to tell you that I am going out of town for a little rest over the week-end. We have got things pretty well lined up so far. I shall be glad when you get back so we can visit together for I want your advice. You understand advertising men better than I do, I guess. To me, a great deal of their jargon is a mystery. What, for instance, do you think of the enclosed one that has just come to me from the Gray Matter Agency? Does it mean anything?
Miss Balboa, by the way, is somewhat upset by a remark made by your Miss Cumnor, about our error in spelling the name of the Hospital. I’m afraid the mistake was due to my wrong pronunciation, which she misunderstood.
AS EVER,
NICHOLAS RIBSTONE.
N.R./D.B.
(Encl.)
[Enclosure, sent by Mr. Ribstone to Mr. Russell, being a letter from the Gray Matter Advertising Agency.]
MY DEAR MR. RIBSTONE: Obviously you intend, ultimately at any rate, to have a nation-wide, or even world-wide, distribution for the Ginger Cubes. You are going to need a large merchandising staff. I wish to enlist your interest in our newly created Department of Salesmanizing. Let us train your representatives before they go on the road, and instil into the personnel just those qualities of enthusiasm and confidence that go to make not mere salesmen, but Ambassadors of Commerce.
I solicit the pleasure of convincing you on this topic; in the meantime let me briefly state the nutshell of our theory.
In our Salesmanizing School, which is really a kind of Graduate College of the Selling Arts, we seek to drive out from the student all negative and minus thoughts, ideas of possible failure, business depression, etc., and to substitute robust energizing concepts, positive and plus in their nature. Many a man has come to us doubtful about his own selling abilities, doubtful about the general condition of trade, doubtful about economics and literature and even theology. When they leave us, after a three weeks’ course under Mr. Harvey K. Tidaholm, they have pronounced convictions.
You wish to have your product—the Ginger Cubes—marketed swiftly, cleanly, universally. There are four steps in this process. The commodity must be
(1) Institutionalized
(2) Publicized
(3) Distributionized
(4) Internationalized
To bring this about, your representative personnel must be
(a) Humanized }
(b) Stabilized } = SALESMANIZED
(c) Energized }
It is on such matters as these that Consumer Preference and Dealer Convictionability are based.
I should like very much to have our Mr. Harvey K. Tidaholm discuss this matter with you. I know that your reaction will be enthusiastic.
Yours faithfully,
GEO. W. GRAY,
Technical Director, Gray Matter Advertising Service.
[A letter from Nicholas Ribstone to George W. Gray.]
DEAR MR. GRAY: I am just leaving town for a few days rest. All decisions have been postponized until my advertising manager returns. He is now hospitalized. I will confer with you as soon as I am re-urbanized.
Yours truly,
(Signed, in absence, with rubber stamp.)
NICHOLAS RIBSTONE.
N.R./D.B.
[An article in LOZENGE AND PASTILLE, the weekly trade journal of the throat tablet trade.]
THE VALUE OF THE CUBICAL FORM FOR MEDICATED CANDIES
BY BEN F. MENTHOL,
Secretary of National Lozenge Men’s Chamber of Commerce.
A great deal of talk has been roused in lozenge circles by the formation of the Ginger Cubes Corporation, to manufacture and distribute a new product called the Ginger Cubes. Mr. Nicholas Ribstone, the head of the enterprise, while reticent as to details, admits that he hopes to spring a surprise on the world of bronchial tablets and breath-perfumers. We understand that the Ginger Cubes, while more in the general nature of a confection than a medical preparation, are based on a careful pharmacal formula, and will go before the public on an appeal at least partly therapeutic.
But what interests us is, that Mr. Ribstone’s venture again brings up the necessity of standardizing the shape of the medicated sweet, if lozenge men are ever to get back to genuine prosperity. At present the lozenge and jujube world is in a state of wild disorder and lack of intelligent coöperation. Post-war deflation has not been followed by anything constructive. Lozenge men are cutting one another’s throats instead of healing the public’s. Mr. Ribstone, unconsciously, has put his finger on a vital spot in the lozenge industry.
Hitherto the trade has manufactured its products mainly in four shapes:
(1) Square tablet
(2) Round tablet
(3) Spherical
(4) Oval
It will be evident, however, that for close packing and neat appearance, the cube is undoubtedly an attractive shape. It is well worth consideration on the part of the trade whether a general adoption of the cube would not be advantageous. Moreover, a great economy could be effected by standardizing cartons and containers. How can the present debilitating fluctuations be ironed out while the whole industry is proceeding on a basis of mere individualism? We do not wish to disparage competition, which is the life of trade, but to advocate a higher form of coöperating competition. The lozenge trade owes it as a duty to humanity to take its part in the general stabilizing and soothing movement. The inflamed throat of Commerce can never be healed until lozenge men get together. There is no reason why the breath-sweetener clique should be so jealous of the digestive wing, both suspicious of larynx and bronchial men. We hope that at the convention in June these matters can be taken up and constructively dealt with.
[A letter from Mr. Gray of the Gray Matter Advertising Agency to Nicholas Ribstone, proprietor of the Ginger Cubes.]
MY DEAR MR. RIBSTONE: I do not wish to seem too insistent, but I am so interested in the success of the Ginger Cubes that I feel it is my duty to inform you of the tested methods in which prosperity has been attained by other manufacturers.
I am so confident of your eventually deciding to place your advertising account in our hands that I went ahead last week and had our Laboratory of Merchandising Survey conduct a preliminary clinic in the local field. Of course, you understand that you are not obligated in any way; but I felt that this was the most useful mode of helping you to envisage your problem.
Just a word about our Merchandising Survey work, which is headed by Mr. Henry W. Geniall. Mr. Geniall is a man who knows how to talk to dealers in their own language; he is a born sales engineer. He began selling in 1892 and has never stopped; though now he sells service instead of commodities. He is the author of a book which has run through fifteen editions, including the Scandinavian, entitled How to Meet and Dominate Your Fellow Men, an autographed copy of which I am having forwarded to you.
The principle of our Merchandising Survey is to conduct a preliminary investigation of markets, in a representative field and on the highest plane of detached observation. Our Merchandising Surveyors are not to be confused with the street men employed by the less professional agencies. Most of them are college graduates; they are so tactful and genteel that they are welcomed by the dealers as valuable counsellors and coöperators; very often they are asked to stay to supper.
The survey we conducted shows conclusively that there is going to be a big market for Ginger Cubes if they are well publicized. We drew up the inclosed printed blank and questionnaired 100 druggists in the uptown section, just as a preliminary test. I have selected the inclosed at random from the returns, to show you the kind of thing. The others are being bound in a folder, which I will have much pleasure to lay before you on your return to the office, together with a tabulated analysis.
It is a pleasure to be able to put at your disposal all the resources of Gray Matter Service.
Faithfully yours,
GEO. W. GRAY.
Technical Director, Gray Matter Advertising Service.
[Confidential Report of an interview with a druggist by a Merchandising Surveyor from the Gray Matter Advertising Agency.]
INTERVIEW
Name—Higgly-Piggly Drug Store.
Address—673 Sunnyside Ave.
Type of Store—Chain.
Party Interviewed—J. K. Liquorice, Mgr.
Subject of Interview—Ginger Cubes Canvass.
Approachtalk Used—General Coöperation No. 3, as per Mr. Geniall’s suggestion.
What Brands of the following Does Dealer Sell—
(List in order of popularity):
Throat Tablets—Roko, Southern Soothers, Tussicules.
Cough Drops—Lady Larynx, Lotos Cone.
Confectionery Laxatives—Sugar Chew, Cascarilla.
Appetizer Lozenges—Paprika Pastilles, Curlicues.
Digestive Tablets—Stowaways, Cul de Sacs.
Medicated Candies—Sweeto, Spicy Chiplets, Candoids.
Breath Purifiers—Balmozone, Pineapple Hints, Clover Slices.
* * * * *
To What Does Dealer Attribute Success of These Best Sellers? Newspaper Advertising.
Does He Push Any Particular Brands? If so, Which? No Answer.
What Methods of Manufacturers’ Promotion Produces Best Result for the Dealer? Newspaper Advertising.
What per cent. of his customers suffer from Sore Throat? Ten per cent. in winter.
What per cent. from bad digestion? No answer.
What per cent. from cacopneumonia (bad breath)? No answer.
What per cent. prefer a doctor’s prescription to a patent medicine? Fifty per cent.
What Does Dealer think of prospects of Ginger Cubes? Excellent; thinks name very “catchy.”
Does Dealer approve the subtitle “Digestive Dice”? Yes.
Will He Use Window Display Material? Sure.
General Remarks—Dealer suggests we investigate what effect the Ginger Cubes will have on smokers’ tongue; says ginger bites the tongue after smoking, would not have percentage of ginger too powerful.
Name of Surveyor—Richmond Brown.
Analyzed by Henry W. Geniall.
[A letter from Allan Russell, Advertising Manager of the Ginger Cubes Corporation, to his employer, Mr. Nicholas Ribstone.]
Hippocrates Hospital, April 18.
DEAR
