To Step Up Advertising ond Promotion of Lumber

Our West Coast lumber industry has had a tough Volume this year slipped down below the lows of There is a general feeling that the bottom has been in lumber demand. The long-range picture is good, much higher level of new home construction. But it and rugged year, make no mistake about it. 1956 and prices have been the lowest in years. reached and that spring building will spark a pickup with increasing new families after 1960 calling for a is the immediate future which holds the attention of sales managers and mill owners.

There is restrained optimisim running through th€ West Coast industry, stimulated by the-generaf belief that the lumber business will show some recovery in 1958.

Mortgage bankers indicate more money will be available for home construction and there is evidence that most areas which had a surplus of unsold new homes now have cut their inventories down to a workable level. Production has been reduced during the year by mill closures and cutbacks, so that no unwieldy surplus inventory has been allowed to accumulate and hang as a deadly threat over the industry.

Whatis being done to increase demand for West Coast lumber in 1958? In the first place, our association members voted a dues increase lale in 1957, the added monies to go into a stepped-up advertising and promo- tion program.

Lumber customers will see in the nation's leading she'i- ter magazines a new lype of full-color and full-pa e advertllng. The theme of our new campaign is "Live Better in a Home of Your Own."

By H. V. Simpson, Executive Vice-President

.Emphasis of the new advertising series is first on the advantages ofa home as such, second on the advantages of a wood home, and third on the advantages of West Coist

Decorating For Christmas

fhree 6re companies sprang up spontaneous- ly in Nevada City, California, after a series of disastrous Mother Lode fires in 1860. The merchants on Main Street sponsored Nevada Hose Company No. 1, making an initial outIay of $400 for a four-wheel hose cart. The fire house, long since remodeled, is now the home of the Nevada Countv Museum.

lumber. The first ad which will appear in January has this appealing headline:

"So nice to come home to your family home bui.lt of the world's friendliest, rnost beautiful building material zaood."

Our newest publication, in our typical full color reproduction, is entitled, "How You Can Own a Home of Your Own." This tells the prospective home owner all the steps in home ownership,from the first step in saving to the final act of signing the deed.

We bellieve this is a practical approach to home merchandising. In the first place, the home building industry is-competing for the coniumer dollar with all other types of consumei goods, such as automobiles, television, all manner of electric gadgets.

We must show the potential home buyer that a home is his best investment, that unlike automobiles and other so-called durable goods, a home has little depreciation and can generally be sold for the original purchase price.

On the other hand, automobiles and other such items have a very high depreciation rate and after a few short years only a fraction of the purchase price can be realized in a sale or trade.

We believe that aggressive selling 'ivill be necessary if lumber maintains its historic position in the construction industry. Not only are we faced with competition from other consumer goods, but we are faced with a life-anddeath battle with substitute materials for wood.

We firmly believe that the only way we can win this fight is to keep up a steady attack. It is true that we do not, as a regional association, have a large budget when compared to other firms which are nationally advertising their products, so therefore cannot possibly compete in number of pages of national advertising run. But we CAN compete quality-wise and that is what we have attempted to do during the 12 years of our national promotion of lumber, particularlv West Coast lumber.

A mijor share of the association activities, whether in public relations, research, traffic or in advertising and promotion, all is directed toward the main goal of helping our member mills sell their lumber at a profit.

We believe we can help torvard this objective by educating the lumber users, by showing them new and better ways to use lumber.

lowell Kolb Heqds SCRLA Commiftee

President Hal Brown of the Southern California Retail Lumber Association has appointed Lowell Kolb chairman of the Lumber Grades committee, the post left vacant by the recent death of Rex Clark. Dealer Kolb is vice-president and manager of the Mullin Lumber Co., Los Angeles, and has been a member of this committee for several years.