A Classic Boys From Marketing Pitch

[ChiTownScion]

This was one of those, "things I found while researching something else" items. I saw it, and I immediately thought that Miss Lizzie (and others) would get a kick out of it as a study in marketing. No idea when or where it was published.. but I got a laugh out of it- especially Bobby and Dad's final comments.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Bobby took along a few sheets of that splintery toilet paper, and that took care of that.

Comic-strip ads were a huge fad in the mid-thirties -- you'd see them in just about all the mass-circulation weekly magazines. S. J. Perelmen used to write absolutely withering take-downs of these things in The New Yorker.

(Scene: The combination cellar and playroom of the
Bradley home in Pelham Manor. Mr. and Mrs. Bradley
and their two children, Bobby and Susie, are grouped
about their new automatic oil burner. They are all in fault-
less evening dress, including Rover, the family Airedale. )

Bobby— Oh, Moms, Fm so glad you and Dads decided
to install a Genfeedco automatic oil burner and air con-
ditioner with the new self-ventilating screen flaps plus
finger control! It is noiseless, cuts down heating bills, anc?
makes the air we breathe richer in vita-ray particles!

Susie— Think of it! Actual experiments performed by
trained engineers under filtered water prove that certain
injurious poisons formerly found in cellars are actually
cut down to thirty-four per cent by switching to a Gen-
feedco!

Mr. Bradley (tonelessly)— Well, I suppose any thing's
better than a heap of slag at this end of the cellar.

Mrs. Bradley— Yes, and thanks to Buckleboard, the
new triple-ply, satin-smooth, dirt-resisting wall plastic, we
now have an ugly little playroom where we can sit and
loathe each other in the evening.

Bobby— Hooray for Buckleboard! Since Dads made this
feedbin into a playroom, no more hanging around the liv-
ery stable with questionable acquaintances!

Mr. Bradley— Yes, we now have a livery stable right in
our own home. The initial expense was brutal, but the
money only gathered two and a half per centum in the
bank.

Bobby and Susie (munching candy bars)— Hooray!
Hooray for this new taste sensation!

Mrs. Bradley— Harvey, Fm worried about the chil-
dren. Don't you think they have too much energy?

Susie— Choc-Nugs are just loaded with energy, Moms!
These crackly nuggets of purest Peruvian cocoa, speckled
with full-flavored, rain-washed nut meats, call forth a
chorus of "Yums" from every wide-awake girl and boy!

Bobby— In Mexico it's "Viva el Choc-Nugo!" but in
America its "Hooray for Choc-Nugs!" Any way you pro-
nounce it, it is pronounced "Goodylicious" by millions of
eager candy-lovers!

Mr. Bradley— I see that I have fathered a couple of
Yahoos. . . . Bobby, answer the door.

Bobby— Had we installed a set of Zings, the new electric
chime, it would not be necessary for callers to wait outside
in the rain and sleet. . . .

Mr. Bradley— Answer the door or I will knock your
block off, you murdering little saw-toothed ape. (Bobby
goes to door, admits Mr. and Mrs. Fletcher and their three
children, attired in long halbriggan underwear. General
greetings.)

Mrs. Fletcher— Don't mind us, Verna, we just
dropped in to sneer at your towels. (Unfolding a towel)
My, they're so absorbent and fluffy, aren't they? You
know, they're made of selected fibres culled from high-
grade flat-tailed Montana sheep subject to rigid inspec-
tion by qualified sheep inspectors.

Mrs. Bradley (listlessly)— They fall apart in two days,
but we got tired of using blotters.

Mrs. Fletcher— Verna, I think it's about time you
and I had a heart-to-heart talk about your skin. You're as
rough and scaly as an old piece of birch-bark.

Mrs. Bradley— I know; it's my own fault. I neglected
my usual beauty cocktail.

Mrs. Fletcher— Skins, you know, are divided into
three types— cameo, butter-scotch, and mock nutria.
Yours defies classification.

Mrs. Bradley (miserably)— Oh, how can I win back
my Prince Charming?

Mrs. Fletcher— Why not follow the example of glam-
orous Mrs. Barney Kessler, socially prominent matron of
the Main Line?

Mrs. Bradley— What does she do?

Mrs. Fletcher— Each morning, on rising, she scrubs
her skin with an ordinary sink-brush. Then she gently pats
in any good brand of vanishing cream until Kessler dis-
appears to his office.

Mrs. Bradley— And then?

Mrs. Fletcher— I can't remember, but she's got a
complexion like a young girl.

--- from "The Best of S. J. Perelman," Modern Library 1946.

 

[F. J.]

Splinter-free!

Did you notice that they’re advertising it as “splinter-free?” Also, it’s only single-ply as two-ply was first introduced in Britain in 1942.

And here’s a comic-ad for Camels from 1933:

 

[Fading Fast]

Two thoughts -

One, "splinter free," ouch, was that really an issue?

Two, I doubt a father could call his son a "cry baby" today without being hauled away to jail (or at least it would never make it to advertising copy)

 

[LizzieMaine]

We used to get that splintery toilet paper at our gas station -- it was the really cheap bulk-packaged kind that came wrapped in brown butcher paper.

 

[jamespowers]

We used to get that splintery toilet paper at our gas station -- it was the really cheap bulk-packaged kind that came wrapped in brown butcher paper.

Geez! I'll take the marketing guys over having to use splintery toilet paper......

 

[LizzieMaine]

I'd like to see the Boys locked in a cellar with nothing but prune juice and a pallet full of splintery toilet paper.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Meanwhile, even actual comic-strip characters were drafted into service by the Boys, long before Snoopy ever sold life insurance. Consider the case of poor old constipated Captain Katzenjammer.

 

[LizzieMaine]

And of course, just as Popeye had his spinach, Li'l Abner had his Cream Of Wheat...

 

[ChiTownScion]

Meanwhile, even actual comic-strip characters were drafted into service by the Boys, long before Snoopy ever sold life insurance. Consider the case of poor old constipated Captain Katzenjammer.

Too bad that Der Kapitan had never met Horace Rumpole (of the Bailey). Jack Pommeroy's claret would have kept him "astonishingly regular"......AND he could have a form of "dot dosing" that would have gone well with a meat entrée.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

Meanwhile, even actual comic-strip characters were drafted into service by the Boys, long before Snoopy ever sold life insurance.

I have a somewhat bitter story about Met Life. I have tons of Snoopy pins, earrings and jewelry, they were part of a business venture by my Mom which never got off the ground. She was originally going to be the distributor for these pins, I'm not sure of the details, but the gist of it is that Met Life managed to snatch the license right out from under her and then threatened legal action. As a result these pins which I jokingly refer to as my "inheiritance" sat in my parents' garage for years. After my parents died I decided to just start selling them myself.

 

[jamespowers]

 

[LizzieMaine]

Al Capp never met an advertising tie-in he could refuse. So to speak.

 

[AmateisGal]

I have a somewhat bitter story about Met Life. I have tons of Snoopy pins, earrings and jewelry, they were part of a business venture by my Mom which never got off the ground. She was originally going to be the distributor for these pins, I'm not sure of the details, but the gist of it is that Met Life managed to snatch the license right out from under her and then threatened legal action. As a result these pins which I jokingly refer to as my "inheiritance" sat in my parents' garage for years. After my parents died I decided to just start selling them myself.

Would love to see them! I am a HUGE Snoopy collector.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I mean, seriously. Even Capp's satires of other comic strips got endorsement deals.

 

[jamespowers]

Al Capp never met an advertising tie-in he could refuse. So to speak.

He liked money.

 

[Eddie Derbyshire]

I've never been more convinced that I need splinterless toilet paper. What next? Non-shatter toilet seats? Non-exploding soap? Bleach-free toothpaste!? You Americans have it all

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[HudsonHawk]

I've never been more convinced that I need splinterless toilet paper. What next? Non-shatter toilet seats? Non-exploding soap? Bleach-free toothpaste!? You Americans have it all

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Perhaps I live a charmed life, but I've never even *heard* of splinters in toilet paper until this thread.

 

[jamespowers]

Perhaps I live a charmed life, but I've never even *heard* of splinters in toilet paper until this thread.

Thank God that you haven't. Nowadays You have everything:

 

[jamespowers]

I've never been more convinced that I need splinterless toilet paper. What next? Non-shatter toilet seats? Non-exploding soap? Bleach-free toothpaste!? You Americans have it all

Sent from my GT-I9195 using Tapatalk

We try. In prosperous countries we tend to have everything we want: