Contests have a regular place in merchandising. There are many varieties of contests and most have brought large, direct returns.
A COOKING RECIPE CONTEST
The cooking recipes of their neighbors are always a source of interest to housewives, and upon this fact a Kentucky grocer based an ingenious variation of the contest scheme. He offered three good prizes to be given to the authors of the three best cooking receipts submitted during the month that the contest remained open. The fact that there was no stipulation as to the nature of the receipt would have made it impossible for a jury to decide on the merits of entries differing altogether in character.
The grocer therefore shifted the responsibility of making the awards, leaving the decisions to be settled by ballot, one vote being allowed for every 25 cent purchase or for every 25 cents paid on account. One month was allowed for submitting receipts and during that time a number of receipts, each signed with the author's name, were published each day in the grocer's advertising space in the newspapers. The remainder of the space was devoted to prices on such goods as were called for in the receipts. This insured the daily reading of the grocer's advertisement and in many cases the advertisement was cut out and preserved for future reference.
The receipts were all published during the first month and a second month was allowed for voting. Beginning with the second month the names of the ten contestants receiving the highest number of votes were published daily in the advertising space. This had the effect of developing a great deal of interest and had a marked effect on the daily sales. The merits of the receipts were almost altogether lost sight of and the issue became one of personal popularity between the contestants. In this way a number of ladies were drawn into the contest who would have refused to allow their names to be connected with a popularity contest. As the time limit drew near the interest increased the demand for votes and ran up the sales in a very satisfactory manner. After the prizes had been awarded the grocer published a little booklet containing all of the receipts and distributed it free to his customers.
A RIDDLE CONTEST
The Ghiradelli Chocolate Company of San Francisco conducted an advertising contest which might, with some changes, be used advantageously by the retail merchant, though not on so large a scale. The Ghiradelli Co. gave $1,000 in prizes to the persons submitting the best selections of riddles relating to their product. They issued a circular which gave the story of their ground chocolate from beginning to end and it was from this information that the riddles were made.
The rules of the competition were few and simple. Any person who chose to do so, was permitted to compete and all that was required was that the riddles be clear, concise and clean, and that they be founded upon the "Story of Ground Chocolate." The money was divided into one capital prize and 190 smaller prizes. The object, of course, was to get people to read and study the story of Ghiradelli's Chocolate and there is no doubt that this was accomplished. Every one who got a circular would be sure to read every word of it in the hope of stumbling onto an inspiration for a riddle.
This kind of advertising is, of course, general in its nature and direct results are not expected. Its purpose is to get certain facts before the people in a way that they will be remembered. Mr. F. J. Cooper, who managed the Ghiradelli contest says of it: "Personally, I do not think that there is any form of publicity that equals a clean, legitimate scheme of this kind, and I am satisfied that the name, Ghiradelli, is today known throughout the West as it never has been before."
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