"It Is a Fallacy That The Public Witl Automatically Seek The Best"

By Jach Dionne

Last month we quoted in this spa.ce a sclling talk, by a sales authority, in which he laid down 6ve fallacies that business gcnerally has sufrered from, in its attitude towards the public. All five of them were vital But thd first fallacy he named is one that applies so directly'to thc lumber industry that it medts further discussion. ThBt is:

"It is a fallacy that the public will automatically seek the best. It has to be educated and directed."

Surely no other industry suffcrs from that mental dclusion so much as does the lumber industry. Lumbermcn and lumber organization5 and lumber associations will tcll you, and show you, and quote you to prove THAT THEIR PRODUCT IS BETTER S U I T E D FOR CERTAIN PURPOSES THAN OTHER COMMODITIES WHICH THE P U BL I C IS USING FOR TIIOSE PURPOSES. They can tlrivc home thc facte conccrning that pioposition with irrcsirtible logic and expericmce. THEIR stufi is BEST. Thcrefore it is right to supposc that the public will choose it and use iL

No one evcr jumped to a more impracticable and ndiculous conclueioit. The ear of trhe public is to him who speaks, not to him who descrves. The public buys that whictr it is sold otr, not that which is bcet fitted fc the purposes to be served. It always has. It dwayr will.

Not only in this but in errcry other linc of businccs, the best sold commo'dity ie the most uscd commodity. To doubt it is to simply admit complete ignorance of what is going on.

Take a single example in the lumber industry-an outstanding onc. A ccrtain substitute for lumbcr has set an example to the whole world in the last threo years for progressiveness, forceful merchandising, and market development. It hac rnade thc old+imey "leaps and bounds" look slow by contrast, An entircly unknown quantity just a short timc ago, it has sold itself to the building induatry and to the public the nation over, in a vcry short timc.

Rcams have been written, and volrunes havc been spokcn by thc lurnber industry to prove that this commodity is not as good as lumbcr, for the uses to which it is put. Facts, figuree, experiments, and investigations arc quoted to prove this fact. And-truth to tell-the chances are that there arc numerous commodities on the market to'day that are far betterr in evcry wuly and for all purposqs than this successfully sold commodity. It is NOT thc BEST. It really ranks low down in the list, everything considered.

What has that to do with the situation? Nothing at all. The public has been sold this commodity, thc dealer has been sold on it, and its sale is continually increasing in the face of the evidenco that you can get better commodities to serve the sarne purpose. And it will continue to increase until somoone outsells it. The commodity that finallv outsclls it will not nocessarily be a better quality. It may be considerably lower. It rrill depend only on one thing-the merchandising.

You can sell sawdust in competition with corn meal, and blue mud in competition with chocoliate drops, if you scll them hard enough. It's being done every day. Thcre's no way to doubt it.

Tho time has come when lumber mqn have got to quit SELLING EACH OTHER on thc merits of their product, and infinitely irnprove their efrorts at selling the public. It isn't going to do any more good in f928 to know that you have a superior product, than it did in 1927. You've got to make the fellow that builds WANT your product, be^it good or bad. An4 until you dq inferior products are going to outsell you, and cut deep into the vithls of your business. They always have. They always will.

More than ever beforg 1928 is going to be a MERCHANDISING YEAR. The best sold commodity is going to be the most used. The quality of the product is going to be of secondary consideration.

The lumbermen stand in groups today- and ask each otfier-"What kind of a market will we have in LE28?"

Thc mcn who manufactwe that substitute we have beetr talking about, aren't asking that qucstion They didn't ask it a few years ago when they began making an entirely unknown product. If they had gone at it lumber fashion, wondering what fortunc and providetrce was going to furnish them in the shape of a demand, how much of that commodity would ever have been sold?

Every foot they sold, they created their own market for. Every foot they scll in tlre future, they must create a market for. When they quit creating demand, thcir demand will cease.

The public is not going to automatically seeh the best in building materials this year, Mr. Lumberman- It is going to buy what is best sold, just as it did last year, and the year before, and every other year, only in the future the selling will be even more important than in the past. The selling era has arrived. The days of easy orders are gone.

Let's make 1928 a MERCHANDISING YEAR in the lumber industry.

Nothing else will solvc the problem.