Text 2: capsule history of advertising

Advertising has been around ever since people have been around. Its earliest beginnings, of course, are impossible to pinpoint, but there are several examples dating back thousands of years. Clay tablets traced to ancient Babylon have been found with messages that touted an ointment dealer and a shoemaker. Ancestors of modem-day billboards were found in the ruins of Pompeii. Later, the town crier was an important advertising medium throughout Europe and England during the medieval period. In short, advertising was a well-established part of the social environment of early civilization.

In more recent times, the history of advertising is inextricably entwined with changing social conditions and advances in media technology. To illustrate, Gutenberg's invention of printing using movable type made possible several new advertising media: posters, handbills, and newspaper ads. In fact, the first printed advertisement in English was produced in about 1480 and was a handbill that announced a prayer book for sale. Its author, evidently wise in the ways of outdoor advertising, tacked his ad to church doors all over England. By the late 1600s, ads were common sights in London newspapers.

Advertising made its way to the colonies along with the early settlers from England. The Boston Newsletter) became the first American newspaper to publish advertising. Ben Franklin, a pioneer of early advertising, made his ads more attractive toy using large headlines and considerable white space. From Franklin's time up to the early nineteenth century, newspaper ads greatly resembled what today are called classified ads.

The Industrial Revolution caused major changes in American society and in American advertising. Manufacturers, with the aid of newly invented machines, were able to mass produce their products. Mass production, however, also required mass consumption and a mass market. Advertising was a tremendous aid in reaching this new mass audience.

The impact of increasing industrialization was most apparent in the period following the end of the Civil War (1865) to the beginning of the twentieth century. In little more than three decades, the following occurred:

1. The railroad linked all parts of the country, making it possible for Eastern manufacturers to distribute their goods to the growing Western markets.

2. Thanks in large measure to an influx of immigrants, the population of the United States grew quickly, doubling between 1870 and 1900. More people meant larger markets for manufacturers.

3. The invention of new communication media - the telephone, typewriter, high speed printing press, phonograph, motion pictures, photography, rural mail delivery - made it easier for people to communicate with one another.

4. Economic production increased dramatically, and people had more disposable income to spend on new products.

This improved economic and communication climate helped advertising thrive. Magazines were distributed from coast to coast and made possible truly national advertising. The development of the halftone method for reproducing photographs meant that magazine advertisers could portray their products more vividly. By 1900, it was not unusual for the leading magazines of the period (Harper's, Cosmopolitan, McClure's) to run 75-100 pages of ads in typical issue.

Not surprisingly, the increased importance of advertising in the marketing process led to the birth of the advertising agency, an organization that specializes in providing advertising services to its clients.