Page 250 - One Thousand Ways to Make $1000

weeks at a stretch. In the early days he originated all the ideas and plans used
in the business, and wrote his own copy. Once on the trail of an idea, he
would forget all about time and would stick until it was developed, or at least
in condition to turn over to an assistant.

Mrs. Sears often complained good naturedly about his devotion to business.
When he left home in the morning she never knew just when he would return.
Sometimes she would hear from him at his office in the early morning hours;
other times the following day from one of his factories several hundred miles
from Chicago, or from a train bound for New York. He never let up until the
thing in hand was completed, even though it took him to distant parts of the
country.

When building an advertisement or a catalog, thoughts of economy never
entered Mr. Sears’ mind. The main idea was to get it right. He was never
really satisfied with his work and would take an advertisement or a catalog
page which had just been printed, look it over carefully and suggest changes
that would give the copy the right appeal or appearance. He would order
pages that had been already set in type set up all over again.

The first advertisements were his famous “Send-no-money” series. When
they appeared, the advertising world stood aghast. These advertisements
violated every principle of good advertising. They were small sized, closely
set in fine type, full of detailed description, hard to read, and without
headings. They began “Send no money. Cut this advertisement out, return to
us, and we will send you . . .” Nobody believed people would read such small
type. But Mr. Sears felt that if the subject matter was interesting, people
would not want to miss a single word. And he won his case.

Anywhere from five to twenty advertisements of this type appeared in each
issue of a big list of publications, with from twenty to thirty million of
circulation in the aggregate. Bills for advertising ran from $50,000 to $60,000
a month and the campaign distributed millions of dollars’ worth of
merchandising. At the same time he was building up his immense catalog
mailing list.