Chapter XVIII

THE ADVERTISING OF PROPRIETARY MEDICINES.

The methods of advertising adopted by the proprietors of secret
medicines are many and various. Some employ big posters on hoardings,
others--an increasing number--have fringed the chief railway lines of
the country with great boards bearing the names of their nostrums;
almost all agree in making large use of newspapers, magazines, and
other periodicals, and of copious distribution, through various
agencies, of circulars and pamphlets. It is impossible to read any of
the popular newspapers or magazines without seeing that the extent
of such advertising is very great. As a particular example, there
lies before us a letter recently sent to retailers by the makers of
certain proprietary medicines, in which it is stated that

We have already largely increased our advertising, and over 800
newspapers and magazines, embracing the whole of Great Britain, are
regularly carrying very effective advts.

Ten million leaflets have been ordered to be insetted in all the
principal periodicals and magazines during the next three months.

Booklets will be distributed from house to house throughout the
Country during the whole summer.

In the case of another nostrum, a single article, which was before
the courts a few years ago, it was proved in evidence that in five
years 83 million pamphlets had been issued, and that, in the words of
the judge, “they had flooded the English-speaking world with their
advertisements.”

While the undifferentiated “man (and woman) in the street” represents
the millions of potential customers to whom the nostrum maker wishes
to appeal, both the number and nature of the advertisements of
proprietary medicines in any given periodical do not by any means
depend only on its circulation, and the operation of certain general
rules may easily be traced. There is an obvious relation between
the intelligence and education of the readers on the one hand, and
the extent to which they can be appealed to by such advertisements
as we are considering on the other, these varying in inverse ratio.
A striking illustration of this may be seen by comparing the
established reviews and the monthly magazines, or the _Times_ and
some of the halfpenny dailies. A reference to the current issues of
the _Fortnightly Review_, the _Quarterly Review_, and _Blackwood’s
Magazine_ shows one advertisement of a proprietary medicine in each
of the first two, and none in the last; while a single one of the
illustrated magazines--the _Strand Magazine_--provides twenty-six,
and a Christmas number of the same contained sixty-three. Similarly,
on an arbitrarily chosen day, the _Times_ contained one such
advertisement occupying one column, while the _Daily News_ contained
eight occupying four columns, the _Daily Mail_ four occupying three
columns, the _Daily Express_ eleven occupying three and a-quarter
columns, the _Evening News_ four occupying two-thirds of a column,
and the _Star_ five occupying two columns. A close connection may
easily be traced, also, between the number of advertisements of
patent medicines and the character of the other advertisements, the
fact that a large amount of credulity on the part of the readers
can be counted on being as evident from the one as the other. For
example, advertisements of clairvoyants, palmists, “astrologers”
who offer to foretell a person’s future from the date and hour of
his birth, preparations for removing superfluous hair, preventing
blushing, or developing the bust are frequent in those publications
most favoured by the proprietary medicine maker.

Some of the Sunday papers which have very large circulations show a
very full share of advertisements of nostrums; an unselected copy
of one of these which is before us contains no less than forty-one
such advertisements, occupying nearly seven columns. Some of these
papers have gained a good deal of notoriety for the large amount of
space which they devote to reports of divorce suits and sensational
crimes, and it is not surprising therefore to find the majority
of proprietary nostrums advertised in them belonging to the most
undesirable classes. For example, out of the forty-one just referred
to, seventeen are of medicines for “female complaints,” five for
“lost manhood,” and two for diseases of the urinary organs. Such
advertisements are also abundant in the low-class “comics”; one of
these taken at hazard contained eleven of female remedies, along with
advertisements of “rubber preventives,” “chic female pictures,” and
the like.

“Religious” papers appear to be a fairly good hunting-ground for the
advertisers of nostrums. In one of these--a weekly--we find eighteen
advertisements of such preparations, along with “galvanic rings for
rheumatism,” “1s. for £1,” “£2 weekly made by selling remnants,”
“blushing cured,” “superfluous hair removed,” etc.; and on another
page the announcement, “The prayers of the readers of this journal
are requested for the blessing of God upon those who conduct it,
and also upon the sermons and narratives which are printed in it.”
The smaller provincial papers are in a good deal of favour for
advertisements of secret medicines; as a rule a few local products of
this kind are advertised as well as those of wider sale. A feature
which is often to be noticed in such papers is that advertisements
are accepted which from their headings and general appearance look
like news paragraphs, and they are sometimes so worded that an
ordinary reader might never suspect their real significance, and no
warning “[Advt.]” or other indication appears at the end.

The feelings of disgust and annoyance which are aroused when
advertisements of this kind are met with in such abundance in
newspapers are of very little importance in comparison with the far
greater evil of the power over the press which thus passes into
the hands of the owners of the various quack medicines. Certainly
one of the most effective ways of preventing people being imposed
on by such articles is to publish as widely as possible authentic
information as to their composition and real value; but in this task
little assistance is to be obtained from the lay press, on account
of the large pecuniary interest which such advertisements give it in
supporting the trade. The great concentration of the ownership of
newspapers, magazines, etc., in the hands of a comparatively small
number of companies, is not without influence in the matter; for a
newspaper which does not obtain enough advertisements of medical
nostrums to give it an interest in supporting them is effectually
prevented from printing anything adverse to their interests if it
is the property of a firm or company owning other papers which
do receive such advertisements largely. The importance of this
consideration can be at once seen in connexion with any proposals
for legislation; if there should appear any likelihood of an Act of
Parliament being passed which would interfere with the liberty to
fleece the public by means of secret remedies, the proprietors of
such things can practically order the greater part of the press of
the country to misrepresent what is proposed, and in every way to
stir up hostility to such a measure. This consideration should not
be lost sight of in judging of the proceedings or the findings of
the Parliamentary Committee of Inquiry into the subject of “patent”
medicines.