National Campaign Aids in Selection of Best Customers

By C. L. EAUILTON Secretary, Weyerhaeuser Forest Products

Given an industry which has put practically the entire stress on manufacturing, whieh except in isolated instances has never recognized the need for advertising and service, which has been pretty much contented with making a good prod.uct and letting the market absorb it. Complicate the situation by stifr competition from other industries, making difrerent sorts of products which are nevertheless to a great d.egree interchangeable with the first industry's products. There you have a condition which requires well considered treatment if all is to be set to rights.

That, in a nutshell, is the situation in the lumber industry. There has been comparatively little advertising done in the interest of lumber and the forest products; nothing to compare in quantity with the considerable amount by the makers of the other materials which can be used in building, in packing, and the other services which lumber performsand. has performed throughout the ages. The competitive products have been forced into more ad.vanced methods of merchandising and selling by reason of the fact that they had to displace a material already established. The lumber ind.ustry has been able to go along on the impetus of lumber's long use, and on its intrinsic worth.

In consequence, the whole industry has sufrered. a great deal of competitive punishment which it never should. have hacl to suffer. In not a few lines where lumber is fully as good as any other material, and even better, it has been practically relegated to second position. In more, its use has been going ahead, but not so fast as it should have progressed. Atrd meanwhile there has grown up what aIrnost amounts to a mythology of lumber "facts," most of them with about the same basis of truth as is behind any mythology.

A Fallacy to Be Combatted

Take, as typical, the remark which one hears frequently and from practically every source except the Iumber ind.ustry: "Oh, it would't pay to use lumber for that. You can't get good lumber nowadays, the way you could a few years ago. There simply isn't any of that good old-fashioned lumber left in the country. " If you question the speaker, the date of the time when " good, old-fashioned lumber " was available will be found to vary with his age. If he is 70, then there has been no good. old-fashioned lumber to be had since the '80's or the early '90's; if he is 40, you are likely to find that "good., old-fashioned lumber" became extinct in the first d.ecade of the twentieth century; and if the speaker is not over 25, you are likely to find that the decadence of all lumber dates from about the beginning of the war.

Now the fact is, as consideration should show anyone who has a fund of general information, that virgin forests which are being logged today are composed of the same sort of standing timber &s were the virgin forests logged 30 years ago. Manufacturing practice in the lumber industry has gone ahead, just as it has in every other industry. Consequently, better manufacturing methods applied to the same sort of logs get out lumber fully up to the quality that has ever been available-and, whisper it softly, perhaps it is a little better today than it was back in the '80's!

Another idea which has gained wide currency is that a wooden building, because it is a wooden building, is inherenly a fire-trap. I-let us, for the sake of honesty, admit that when sufficient flame is applied to a stick of wood, the wood is likely to burn. Let us admit that when the same heat is applied to a similar piece of steel, or chunk of concrete, it does not burn. If wooden buildings were merely aggregetions of sticks, they would be more likely to sufrer ffre loss than steel, brick, concrete and other fire-resistive structures.

The actual fact is that a wooden builtling, properly constructed and designed, is highly resistive to fire.- A heavy timber post exposed to fire in a properly designed mill construction building, for instance, will char on the surface, and eventually burn up; yet it will support its load about three times as long as an unprotected steel post. More facts can be summoned in this connection-but I should be getting ahead of my story. The point I wish to make is that the fact that wood burns is of no greater importance, usually, than that steel buckles when subjected to great heat under heavy stresses, or that concrete flakes ofr, or that mortar burns out from between bricks which it is supposed to bind together.

There are plenty of other fallacies current on the subject of the demerits of lumber. The two I have cited. are perhaps the most widespread, and are typical.

The Associated Weyerhaeuser Companies constitute the largest interests in the lumber industry. Their output is the greatest, their holdings of stan{ing timber the largest; all the way through, they are the kirgest unit in lumbering.

Yet, until advertising w&s commenced the name "'Weyerhaeuser" held comparatively little significance to the general public. It was as nearly unknown to the public, and even to many lumber users, as could. be true of so important an organization. Even in St. Paul and Minneapolis, which have been Weyerheeuser headquarters for more than 30 years, there was an unbelievable ignorance of just what the organization constituted, and what it did.

These companies produce every variety of Northern timber, or at least every one of the more important varieties. The product is everything between Douglas fir and tamarack, everything from huge timbers to shingles and lath. The Associated Weyerhaeuser Companies have no one perticular species or form of lumber specialty. Consequently they have no one speciffc commod.ity to feature in selling and advertising.

The Weyerhaeuser Sales Company is the marketing organization. Formed in 1916, it was the first step in & more progressive. marketing of Weyerhaeuser Forest Products. And Weyerhaeuser Forest Products is an association comprised of and supported. by the associated companies to handle the advertising and service activities of the organization.

ltrhat the Advertising Aims to Accomplish

"The id.ea behind Weyehaeuser Forest Prod.ucts," said. the initial announcement of Weyerhaeuser Forest Products, "is to further the use of lumber by giving users an idea of just what the lumber industry is and what its resources are i what it produces; and how the products can most profitably and advantageously be used. Perhaps this seems rather a broad programme. Aclmittedly, it is. But it is necessary to keep in mind the whole situation, in order to comprehend. just how this programme ffts in with the needs.

''Despite the breadth of the aim it fits most closely with the interests of the Associated. "Weyerhaeuser Companies. Their specific interest in the whole thing consists of : 1. emphasis of the name of the trade-mark; 2. contact with users which the advertising brings about; 3. the fact that because the 'Weyerhaeuser interests are the largest in the industry, they must get at least their proportionate share of any benefits which accrue to the industry, from increased sales or otherwise.

"'We are trying to profit by what has been learned in what little lumber advertising has gone before ours. 'We are careful not to oversell our proposition, for one thing, because that has reacted. most unfavorably on some of the eampaigns in the past-especially in a few instances where some one specific variety of lumber was advertised..

"One instance of this-and any number of such instanees might be cited-was where a certain sort of lumber was so well sold (or oversold.) that in one line manufacturers who had always used. other woods began using this one. The 'wood was not especially well adapted to their uses; any lumberman of wide experience could have told that. But the contagious enthusiasm of the seller infected the buyer, until the new wood had been in use a while and complaints began to come back to the manufacturers from their d.ealers. That wood has received such a black eye that its sales, even for purposes to which it is well adapted, will inevitably be impeded for years to come.

"Quite similar was the case of another lumber advertiser -again with just one sort of lumber to push. This advertiser made sales of telephone poles of its particular species, for use in a territory where other woods were plentiful, and tested in use. The new poles failed dismally to meet the climatic exigencies, and the story got around to such an extent that sales resistance for that prod"uct has increased. even where the lumber is admirably fittecl to the job. That is the sort of mistake we are earnestly trying to avoid. "

The first year's campaign was purely educational. It was intended simply to get folks acquaintetl with the 'W'eyerhaeuser name alrd trade-mark, its importance in the industry, its facilities, and the fact that the Weyerhaeuser organization can today supply just as fine lumber as ever has been manufactured.

In the advertising this year the company has four major campaigns: f. industrial crating; 2. industrial construction; 3. industrial material; 4. housing. Next on the list is the farm market for lumber. The company is cou:rting on a farm campaign as a part of next year's advertising.

"Before we went into this advertising," continues the announcement, "we d.id a rrery considerable amount of research -not the 'research' which consists of going out and. asking a few questions in the market, but the brass-tacks, thorougly practical sort. We studied. the markets which exist; we recapitulated Weyerhaeuser sales in every market, and to every significant lumber-using industry, for one thing. And we found that while, &s we already knew, we were doing a large business,'we were getting in some fields a good share of the available business and. in others an astound.ingly small share. These latter faets we had not, of course, realized..

"Axd then, too, we went into the uses of lumber from the user's viewpoint. 'We studied the results which the Forest Products Liaboratory had obtained, and we carried. on experiments of our own. We went into the engineering phases of lumber using, so that we really had a story to tell. And then we went ahead with our advertising and service to take advantage of all the preliminary work.

Service Rendered Prorpective Purchaserg

"Take our crating campaign, which is now running. 'We found that worthwhile economies could be accomplisheil in crating, that the strength of a crate depends more on the design than on the amount of lumber used, and that the average ccmmercial crate contains considerably more lumber than is necessary. 'We have been pointing out in our crating campaign that these facts are so, and. that we are prepared. to assist any shipper who asks us to.

"'We have on our staff a crating engineer of wide experience. FIis services are at the disposal of shippers, without obligation or e)ipense. His services are now booked several weeks in ad.vance, and it looks as though we shall have to increasc that portiou of our staff materially. In severaL plants rvhere he has gone in for us, he has accomplished lumber economies runing into many thousands of dollars annually.

" Atrd while we mean it, of course, when we say that this service is available without obligation, the company which borrows our expert realizes that we have in mind that his services will bring us business.

"Our industrial building campaign is pointing out just what constitutes 'mill construction,' and. what advantage it has over other forms of building. We are emphasizing that real mill construction is highly resistive of ffre. 'We are pointing out, what everyone knows but does not stop to consider, that the great majority of fires orginate in the contents of a building rather than in the structure, and. that if there are at hand adequate facilities for putting out the fire, the building structure is not going to catch fire anyway. We are pointing out that a mill construction building equippetl with automatic sprinklers is given as low a rate by the fire insurance companies as in any other type of builcling unsprinklered, and that the lower cost of the mill construetion building means not only a saving in capital and inter. est, but also a smaller amount of insurance to be carried..

"fn going after sales of lumber to concerns which use it as material in their manufacturing, we have espeeially in mind getting as customers the solid well-managed concerns whieh become really good customers, in distinction from the concern which shifts suppliers on the slightest shading of a price, and at the expense of good service. These better managed concerns are of the sort that appreciate really good service, reliability, responsibility, promptness.

"Our whole advertising campaign, in fact-and this applies to the part yet to be described as well as what I have told. about-is intended to select for us a heavy proportion of the better type of c6tomers. This sort of customer, because he has an amount of loyalty for a seller who is a correspondingly good supplier, gives his business steadily enough so that the supplier can afford to cement that loyalty with even better serviee. Our advertising is helping us to get customers who appreciate the value of our sending an expert to help with their creating problems; they see, beyond the slight shading of an occasional price, that it pays to deal with a concern which will point out the possibility of savings in other branches of their work-in such a way, for instance, as showing the value of using short-length lumber at a lower price, instead of selling longer lumber for the customer to cut up after he has paid extra for the length. All the way through, our advertising and. our service are paying us because they serve as natural seleetive agents in bringing us this profitable kincl of trade.

" The one campaign which we are running today outside the industrial field is on housing. This has the same general plan behind it. Ineidentally, our initial service contribution in this field was a book on building practice which has already been accepted as a standard authority.

"Our advertising in the housing field is calculated to give the home builder a knowledge of the valuable qualities of frame construction, to acquaint him with the Weyerhaeuser name and trade-mark, and to educate him to the one important building fact that he has never known: that there are good and bad ways to build with lumber, that good building costs more at first and less afterward, and that it is to his ad.vantage to get good building.

"Broadcasting this fact is of couse of value to the man who is going to have a house built, and to the lumber industry. But fully as important, it upholds the hands of the honest contractor who will do a high-grad.e, honest job if he is given half a chance. Unfortu:rately, the contractor who either does not know how, or else d.oes not care, to do a good, substantial, honest job is a very real evil in the building industry. The honest conractor, against his will, is often obliged to meet this ignorant or dishonest competition by himself skimping and cutting corners to complete a job and get a profit out of it at the ruinous figure the competitor forced on him. Our educational work, by pointing out the advantages of a good job to the owner, gives the honest contractor a better chance to take the contract at a price which' will permit him to do a first-class job.

" Our whole campaign, therefore, is based on bettering conditions in the industry, and among the public-all of which constitute our market. tr'rom this betterment, and from the direct advantages which I have pointed out, the Associated Weyerhaeuser Companies are getting their share of increased profits. The trade is being kept informed. about our work and a campaign to the retail dealer will be a part of our work for the year. While the advertising, and aII the activities of Weyerhaeuser Forest Products, are still in the early stages, already very substantial results are appearnig. And therefore we knou' that, as the work goes on, we shall eontinue to gain by it-and in a cumulative way. "-p16p Printer's Ink.

Siiingles Being Stained At Tiie Mitls

Some of the enterprising shingle manufacturers in the Northwest have started the practice of staining their product at the mill and the plan, it is said, is meeting with good results. So far, but a few sample shipments have been received in California-just to give the dealers an idea what the stained shingles look like. A great variety of colors will be offered, and doubtless many new markets for shingles will be developed. The character of the stain to be used will act both as a preservative and a fire retardent. Shingles will be stained in bunches after they come from the kilns.

For Emergency Uses

When something har to be gomc place elre in a hurr5r-at5"o eamp boerel are yelling for extra men, or for rupplicr, then'r when the M. A. C. Uttlity Car rhows ite need around lumbcring operationr.

Light, fart, economical, thic powerful gaaolinc-drivon rafilway car ir alwayr on the ground for ruch emcrge,ncy acedr. It'r run out with the men or aupplier and back again, rforking before a big rteam engine could be made ready. Utility t Economy! That'r why the M. A. C. rhould bc a part of all camp rolling rtock. Let it do the quick lighter work and kccp the Big logging engincr at their jobr.

The rpecificationr ehow the character of material put into M. A. C. Utility Carr. They are built to worL, not to bo repaired.

M.A.C. ll,''*o

Specification3

Capacity-lO,(X,O lbr. Spccdq--4 to 20 miler per hour, citter fomard or reYeBG.

Maximum Grad*vith lOd)O lb. load, ten per cent. Drive---On all four wheels.

Axles"{hrone Vanadiun Stecl with all workiug Dart! @E- pletely acloredlGearo--Chrcme Nickel Steel run- ning in oil.

Bearingr-S. R. B. Ball Bearing3 and Tinken Roller Bearingr throughout. No babbit or bronze bearingr.

Wheels-Cagt steel, 24 in. dia. 6 in. face.

Fram*All steel.

Cab-Metal coutrocuo[, or uade to order.

Skagit Steel & lron Works

Write to ur for catalog and information on how thc M. A. C. Rail Car can be ured to cut coeta in your opnration. MotorApplianccDivirion, SEDRO-WOOLLEY, WASH.