How a Great Lumber Company Stimulates Interest in Home-Building

National Advertising of Weyerhaeuser Organization Directed to Creating More Demand for Lumber

The brief story of a program undertaken in a modest rpay that suggests some of the'possibilities.

(From the Weyerhaeuser Log)

-Can anyone connected with the lumber business predict w-hat would happen to the industry as a whole if the same efiorts were beiirg made to genetite interest in homes as are norv being expended in behalf of automobiles?

Take every line of advertising that you now see devoted to automobiles, accessories and necessities for the operation and maintenance and substitute copy which inteiligently describes the multifold advantagei -of home ownirshif. What effect would it have upon the nation ? Upon the citi- zens? Upon our general prosperity? Upon-the lumber busrness /

Make an issue of home ownership and then present the facts as they should be presented. Leave out thi mawkish, sentimental twaddlings that frequently creep into horne ownership ca-rnpaigns and put it up to ihe public as a hard neaoed practlcal venture.

_ Ignlt it high time to wake somebody up on the subject? Isn't it timJ to take a place in tine witli other industries and demand attention? How many times per year is the average citizen made to ponder over the numberless advantages that accrue to the man who owns his own home ? What_ intelligent constructive program is in operation to sttmulate a desire on the part of the 65,000,000 renters in this country to make them-actually WANT a home of their own r

It is quite the fashion now days for lumbermen to get right up in meeting and heartily condjmn pe.oPle. for buyin! autbmobiles at the rate they are. It is pointed out.that ni67,149 cars were registered in the United States in 1925' Ttrat $1,000,000,000.00-worth of motor vehicles were sold for cash'duiing the year and that $3,100,000,000.00 worth were sold on time wiih total down payments amounting to $1,000,000,000.00.

Such figures startle the lumber industry- They -are impressive eiough to startle anyone. But th-e lumber dealer is hardest hit beiause much of the money that formerly went for homes is now going for automobiles and the tendency is becoming more -and-more pronounced in that direction every year.

Naturally the lumber industry would like to divert this money or it least part of it into its own ca-!h registers and to see the same intirest taken in a place to live in as is now being taken in coupes, limousines, touring cars and other automotive methodi of individual transportation.

But there is small chance of such a thing happening as long as the present automobile advertising background doriinates the-consciousness of every inhabitant as it does today in every conceivable form that the ingeluity of man can devise and practically nothing is being said in defense of homes.

(Continued on Page 21)