Lumber Industry Votes to Bolster the Nqtionql Wood-Promotion Progrqm in'6O in All-Out Drive

Washington, D. C.-Plans for stepping up the tempo and increasing the effectiveness of the lumber industry's year-old National Wood Promotion Program were approved by the subscribers to the program. To strengthen present activities and finance the start of several new projects, the 35-man National Wood Promotion Committee, responsible for administration of the program, approved a 1960 budget oI $1,363,424--21% above the $1,130,000 allocated for 1959.

The new budget will permit an expansion of all phases of the NWPP-advertising, merchandising, product publicity, technical promotion and intra-industry cooperation work. At the same time, the National Wood Promotion Committee called on the 17 member associations of the National Lumber Manufacturers Association to work for "full industry support" of the NWPP.

In other actions, the committee : ( 1) instructed the program's Advertising-Merchandising Subcommittee to sfudy "positive" ways of offsetting derogatory statements by wood's competitors:' (2) increased membership of the National Wood Promotion Committee from 35 to 37 and membership of the program's Intra-Industry Cooperation Subcommittee fiom five to nine.

A..B. Hood, vice president-general manager of the Ralph L.

Smith Lumber Co., Anderson, Calif., was re-elected chairmair of the National Wood Promotion Committee. Eliot Jenkins of Eugene, Ore., was re-elected vice chairman.

A highlight of the meeting, attended by more than 300 industry principals, was a colorful hour-long presentation of a proposed l0-year research-advertising-trade promotion program designed to put wood ahead of its competitors in the race for new markets of the 1960's.

Tl.re program calls for new or expanded marketing activity by the lumber industry in five broad areas.

Jack Fairhurst of the Fairhurst Mill Co., Eureka, Calif., chairman of the Advertising-Merchandising Subcommittee, said the 1960 budget will provide for accelerated advertising in consumer and trade oublications.

Reviewing first-year activities, Fairhurst reported that NLMA had initiated and completed more than 150 individual publicity projects with about 80/o placement in newspapers, magazines and other media. Among new projects undertaken during recent months, he said, were a TV film in cooperation with the National Association of Manufacturers, "Environment for Learning;" a l6-mm sound-color motion picture on the use of wood in school construction, to be shown to architects and school planners, and a "Blueprint for Better Schools" program featuring scale models and working drawings of a wood "idea" school.

E. C. Rettig of Potlatch Forests, Inc., Lewiston, Idaho, chairman of the Technical Promotion Subcommittee, disclosed that during 1959 technical promotion field men exceeded by nearly 80/o their goal of 5,000 personal contacts with engineers, architects, designers, specifiers and builders. Rettig also discussed the effectiveness of recent building code work, especially in suburban areas of rapid growth, and said progress has been rnade in developing data on the heating and air conditioning costs of wood-frame versus masonry construction.

Tests will begin shortly, he said, on the comparative fire resistance of heavy timber and steel roofing systems. A four-year test of a new alkyd resin exterior house paint, just completed, shows this type of paint to be definitely superior to standard federal specification paint, and the results will be used by NLMA staff members in an effort to get wood constrttction accepted for permanent military housing, Rettig stated.

Retting also said that work is underway or has been completed on the following technical publications : a 44-page booklet on the proper use of wood in home construction, "Manual for House Framing;" an eight-page design booklet, "Random Length Wood Decking," for architects and engineers; and a 16-page updated booklet on "Design of Wood Formwork for Concrete Structures."

Other technical material now in preparation or recently completed covers wood plank-and-beam construction, wood versus concrete floors, updating of the "National Design Specification for Stress-Grade Lumber and its Fastenings," a classroom text on this publication, material on decay and termites, and instructions oh how to obtain lower fire insurance rates on wood construction.

New activities, Rettig revealed, will include a booklet on the use of wood in churches, "Environment for Worship;" a publication on the advantages of heavy timber construction; a series of leaflets on why wood is best for various building components;