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EDISON PHONOGRAPH MONTHLY, FEBRUARY, 1916
Out Among Our Dealers — Continued
EXPECTS 100% INCREASE IN 1916
"In connection with the music end of this firm's business we will tell you the following interesting details, having to do with a new idea in selling musical instruments in a small town the size of this, which has less than four thousand population, and the entire county having less than sixteen thousand people," writes W. C. Brewer, manager of the Music Department of the Lair Furniture Company, Charleston, Mo.
"The writer began with this firm, taking charge of their music department a little over a year ago. Of course it took several months to get things to going at all, but for the last twelve months to date, we have had ample opportunity to try out our idea, and the results speak for themselves. In the past twelve months we have sold in phonographs and records alone over forty-five hundred dollars; in pianos, players and player rolls we have sold over six thousand dollars. Both the piano and the phonograph business has been built up here in the twelve months past. But the most interesting feature of this development is this: we do not send out canvassers, we have no 'doorbell ringers,' we do not go out after the business by personal calls; we make the business come to us, and the way we do it is this: This firm takes a full page ad. in the one newspaper in the county that has a good circu
lation ; the music department gets about one-fourth of this space weekly. We do not offer any 'special' talk, we simply preach quality and store service. We do not feature terms, other than to mention that payments may be had if desired. The word 'bargain' does not appear either in our ads. or in our letters to buyers.
"After a prospect is once located we bombard him with personal letters, written by the writer. Not the 'cut-and-dried' sort of dead copy stuff that pro
F. D. Lair, President
W. C. Brewer, Manager
fessional copy writers put out by the bale, but genuine 'personal' heart-to-heart talks to prospective buyers.
"When the writer came with this firm the town had three so-called newspapers, none of which really reached the buying public. Mr. Lair had long sought for an advertising medium that would produce results, but in vain ; so, about a year ago, he bought two of the so-called newspapers, combined them into one (The Enterprise-Courier), got out and hustled up a big bona fide, live circulation; a circulation that reaches every corner of this county. Then we began to run our full page store ads. All the business of this store, musical or other lines, is confined practically to this county. The same general plan of reaching prospects that is employed in the music department is employed in the other departments, with some slight exceptions, made necessary by the nature of the various lines.
"In the music department each prospect is reached by a personal letter at least once each month, and sometimes oftener. This is also true, in the main,