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A Thirsty issue.
Undisplayed Advertisements.-By " The Extractor." Big Bernas or Brewers.
An Enticing Number.
A new point of view is invariably welcome. If sometimes it makes us gasp, it may set us " furiously to think " ; but there it is, it interests us. In this office, in the preparation of this present number, which is largely devoted to motor transport for the brewing industry, to the bottling traffic, and to that gigantic business the mineral-water trade, we have each taken a share. The point of view given below by one of many correspondents has never occurred to us, not even to the junior members of our staff. The present heat wave must have struck the Midlands, whence my correspondent writes, to me in advanee :— "RE BREWERS. BOTTLERS AND MINERAL WATER MAKERS.— " The only effect of your letter has been to bring on a violent thirst. . . . We are sorry that our announcement will not appear in this enticing number."
"By Way of Corollary."
How often one gets an idea from what appears at first sight to be the most unpromising source. I do not suggest that my young friend has no ideas, that would be wrong, because his neckties, his waistcoats, and his socks are ever on a most perfected plan. The colour harmonies are deeply thought out, and although they are at times bewildering, it is not for ordinary man to cavil at them, because a brain has been at work. No slavish following of " The Major's " fashion notes in the penny papers, a feature which was not when I was in my salad days. No! here are boldly conceived harmonies, which are seen nowhere else, and which excite murderous feelings of envy and admiration amongst his peers. He is a motorist, too, and perfectly hair-whitening are the stories he has to tell one. He is the sort who conserves his speed-bursts until nightfall, and then, when he and his passenger are picking themselves out of a cucumber frame on the other side of the hedge, he allows that he ought to have remembered there was a corner there. Of course he has two motors. His sort requires at least two. He is very clever at doing the repairs himself though, I have gleaned this mostly from remarks he has dropped himself, for he has fixed his residence close by a place where he can do brazing. He is blythe spirit with it all, and if ever he looks dull it is because nothing has disturbed the "even tenonr of his way."
The preceding paragraph has proved to be "by way of corollary " only, as another friend expresses it. I started out to say that an idea had been given to me. The young gentleman in question honours me by leading this journal assiduously, tne advertisements claiming his attention first, and he thinks that advertisers do not make the best use of their space. They do not change their matter often enough, and in many instances they are not as convincing as they might be. I feel that there are many that this criticism does not apply to, but, on the other hand, many people dump down advertisement copy and have it standing for weeks and weeks, a procedure which is, I venture to think, wrong. Now, it costs us a lot of money to re-set advertisements, but so convinced are we that fresh advertisement copy brings better results that we always urge our friends constantly to change their matter and to seize every opportunity that offers to make the advertisement striking. I will, at the moment, leave it at that, but as we have a busy season between now and the Olympia Show, I hereby threaten to return to the subject.
Yarwood and the Big Berna.
After all, the tire man has the last word," said Mr. J. Yarwood, of Berm, Commercial Motors, Ltd., to me when last I saw him, which, I believe, was at the Manchester Show. We spent at least one evening together, and fell a-talking mainly about English vehicles and their Continental competitors, and then Yarwood, with the above pregnant remark, switched off on to the various solid tires, and we were able to express some candid opinions and to ventilate some pet theories. Again English goods were ranged against European manufactures, and a dead heat was eventually proclaimed. All of which may net sound very exciting, nor especially illuminating, but the quiet talk confirmed the impression I had already formed that Yarwood has the. doggedness and the persistency which make for success. He comes up too from the cycle side, and his eye glows in common with some others of us as he remembers the cycling days. He was mixed up in the cycle trade, too, and it was his lot to test in the Nottingham district numerous patents, and when he came to his pneumatic mount, a " Referee," he thought that was the finish—he would like to go on riding that for ever.
However. Yarwood drifted into the motor trade as early as 1898, but it was four years ago when he joined forces with the Berna. At the moment Yarwood is laid by the heels in a nursing home at the coast. He is making slow but steady progress towards recovery. His many friends will extend a hearty welcome to him when he once more takes up active command. He had a hard task when he took up the Berna four years go. It must necessarily be hand to overcome insular prejudices, but as long as there is a convincing personality in charge our countrymen soon forget. Yarwood is all this— he is industrious, and he is .very much in earnest over his business. No wonder, then, that the Berms now has seriously to he reckoned with.