Billboard advertising (Sept 1896)

BILLBOARD ADVERTISING. Vol.. IV.. No. 8. CINCINNATI, SEPTEMBER I, 1896. per year, i 1.00 BILLING LIKEJA CIRCUS. ■ Th^cSreus guild was the first to adopt and utilize the billboard. The observer does not have to retrace the years of the present century beyond the forties to note the earlier billing of peripetetic ei- aibitiona] enterprise, and to associate the marvelous advancement of the art of post- ing with that of poster printing. Crude indeed was the early show poster.. A single double-medium sheet. of the main levers in accumulating colos- sal fortunes to such men as Seth B. Howes, W. W. Cole, John Robinson, P. T. Bam tun, or James A. Bailey, why will not the poster be of equal advantage in What is sauce for the goose is sauce for tbe gander, and if poster work is so extra- ordinarily profitable to exhibitional enter- L G. ASBURY. Tbe portrait that adorns our first page of ]. G. fore the public And, as demand creates supply, the bill \ posting organisations throughout the Union are ably and effect- — \$ nally supporting their efforts. There is Asbnry, of Indianapolis and New scarcely a town or cry in Amer.cn but ^ of ^ most y . has its pe manent billboards of mortar; vertiseni of the age. And speaking of age, 1 who, as a rale, ' with scarce an exception, can be relied on to faithfully and intelligently j ^ _ r - e of type, *. "the acme of poster printing. From far larAnear the populace gathered 'r " "-.see.a single poster of thirty .two sheets, - and in six or seven colors, associated with ' numberless others of greater or less di- mensions on the walls, advertising a single enterprise or attraction. \ Within the .experience of the writer of this screed—an old circus advertiser- a hun- a marvel of bill- J. 0. ASBURY. to lake .advantage, and now boards of seven handled feet in length and twelve feet high are every-day affairs. - The desideratum thus attained by the J judicious use of the poster, has 1 lost on the shrewd an ' vertiser of many otber guilds, or profes- : aions, than that of the circus man. Thus • " If the use of the poster has been one To bm like a cirens is. I her ef ore. day by day. increasing in custom with others than those of the circus profession. Self- evident propositions can not be ignored, 1 of important enterprises are pull ■ ing out of the old ruts of fdvertising. and are adopting tbe poMertis the most efficient and remunerative means of bring- ing their commodities or ven.^rea be- Greeley's Opinion. One day a minister called on Horace Greeley to get a subscription foi a tem- perance society. Greeley paid little at- tention to htm. The minister kept insist- ing that he would speak to him. Finding the usual way fruitless. Le said, in a ■■hat loud tone! " Mr. Greeley. I live that knows Asbury' would say that he is a and has been for the past how. those who knew hu ago will tell you that he didn't ; day older than than he does now. A himself admits to thirty. One of Mr. Asbury's first 'e with sign advertising was way back in tl seventies (or was it in the sixties?) when he secured a contract from Blackvrell'a Co. for signs*'covering n country; after which he joined the Pearline forces and painted Pyle's Pearline from Nova Scotia to- Mexico. Then came Mail Pouch Tobacco, cover- ing the railroad lines of ten States. This order required two years in its execution, mm. wellw were the leases on the locations that thou- sands, of the signs still stand in almost as perfect condition as if just pi So satisfactory n the Mail Pouch people with sign adver- tising as originated for them- by Mi. Asbury, that they adopted the system" on a large scale, and have, for a number of ir, own force of and the I. W. 1 New York Notes for the past few issues have told of the splendid showing that he is giving Harper Whisky in New York City at the present time. Mr. Asbury's thorough knowledge of. the business, gained by hard knocks at the scaffold itself, has peculiarly fitted him for handling men, and for judging of the quantity of work each employe should be capable of putting up under varying circumstances; and he can figure almost to tbe cent of the exact cost of tbe material required in doing the worlt. As a usual thing he takes oaly one article at a time to advertise, and then gives that article hi* undivided atteotioo. He makes it a rule to dtop down unex- pectedly 00 his men. 1 0 get a sut^pboo fromyou lor be working.'nor how far away will not give you a cent. There are'not grab a half enough people going to hell now." » many tl