Book contents
- Frontmatter
- CONTENTS
- Acknowledgements
- List of Figures
- Introduction: The Medical Trade Catalogue in Context
- 1 The Rise of the Medical Trade Catalogue
- 2 Markets of Medics: Designing the Catalogue
- 3 Inside the Catalogue: The Rhetoric of Novelty, Safety and Science
- 4 Catalogue Production: ‘The Work of an Amateur’?
- 5 At Home, Work and Abroad: Distributing Catalogues
- 6 (Re)Reading the Catalogue: Doctors, Consumption and Invention
- Conclusion: Selling Medicine to Professionals, Professionals Selling Medicine
- Appendix: Trade Catalogues
- Notes
- Works Cited
- Index
4 - Catalogue Production: ‘The Work of an Amateur’?
- Frontmatter
- CONTENTS
- Acknowledgements
- List of Figures
- Introduction: The Medical Trade Catalogue in Context
- 1 The Rise of the Medical Trade Catalogue
- 2 Markets of Medics: Designing the Catalogue
- 3 Inside the Catalogue: The Rhetoric of Novelty, Safety and Science
- 4 Catalogue Production: ‘The Work of an Amateur’?
- 5 At Home, Work and Abroad: Distributing Catalogues
- 6 (Re)Reading the Catalogue: Doctors, Consumption and Invention
- Conclusion: Selling Medicine to Professionals, Professionals Selling Medicine
- Appendix: Trade Catalogues
- Notes
- Works Cited
- Index
Summary
Manufacturers realise more than formerly that badly printed and carelessly prepared catalogues etc, are of little value in inducing customers to buy.
[Anon.], 1922The catalogue advertisement is plainly the work of an amateur … There is always as little as possible, as though it were bad form to be interesting and instructive. This is the usual sort of advertisement written by accountants, bankers, lawyers and other professional people who do not habitually either use or appreciate advertising … Catalogues are carelessly written [and] printed.
Herbert Casson, 1928Manufacturers of medical tools and pharmaceuticals had been successfully producing catalogues for many decades prior to 1928. Yet, their efforts still appeared to be amateur to professionalizing advertising specialists like Herbert Casson. In some ways, Casson was correct: medical catalogues of tools and pharmaceuticals certainly did not contain sentimental images, eye-catching headlines or other facets that appeared in newspaper advertisements and on billboards and that he, and other specialists of the period, considered to be key components of advertising success. However, as we have learned from previous chapters, manufacturers of medical goods were steadily increasing their command of professional medical markets throughout the nineteenth century by including features in their catalogues that appealed specifically to doctors. These manufacturers recognized the need to produce a publication set apart from other forms of advertising: a publication that appeared expensive and not overtly promotional in form or content.
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- Information
- The Medical Trade Catalogue in Britain, 1870–1914 , pp. 81 - 104Publisher: Pickering & ChattoFirst published in: 2014