How Handkerchiefs Were Sold By Mail

A few years ago, a merchant in the clothing business in Buffalo failed. While he was waiting for the bankruptcy proceedings to be closed, he had no money and little credit. But he did have a family, and he had to do something to keep them from starving.

So he got a friend to advance him a few dollars and with that he bought some cheap knitted ties, and started mailing them - without orders of any kind to lists of likely buyers. With the ties, he sent a letter, offering the ties at 50 cents apiece, and enclosing postage for their return or for remittance.

Within a few months he is said to have cleared $200,000. In five years, it is reported that he made a couple of million. Similar offers were speedily made by dozens of other concerns. Here is the letter that successfully sold some hundreds of thousands of initialled handkerchiefs by this unique method.

Letter

Here's the most unusual offer you've ever received.

For years, it's been the custom among well-dressed men who were fastidious about their handkerchiefs to have BOTH their initials embroidered on them. But up to now, they've always had to order them specially at considerable expense. For there were so many combinations of initials (630 to be exact) that no store could possibly carry them all in stock.

The result has been that fine quality handkerchiefs individually monogrammed have cost from 75 cents to $1.00 each. (Your wife will quickly verify this.)

Now, we've conceived the idea of monogramming handkerchiefs without orders (in quantities that would keep the cost low) and sending them by mail to a carefully selected list of Business Men who would appreciate the wonderful opportunity afforded them.

You are one of the men we selected. Your handkerchiefs are enclosed - four of them monogrammed especially for you WITH BOTH YOUR OWN INITIALS.

These handkerchiefs are of fine quality, are fully-sized - 18 inches square and have a neatly hemstitched border. You will readily see that such handkerchiefs should cost 75 cents each when specially embroidered in silk with your initials.

If you'd like to keep these handkerchiefs, send us - not 75 cents each, not over 50 cents each - ONLY $1 FOR THE WHOLE FOUR. You can easily do it by slipping your check or money order in the enclosed envelope.

But, if you don't want to keep the handkerchiefs, just put them back in the envelope, paste the enclosed label and stamp over the address and shoot them back to us.

Isn't that a fair way to do business? It's the only way we know in which individually initialled handkerchiefs can be sold so reasonably.

When you send us the $1, in full payment for the handkerchiefs, please do not return the label with the stamp attached. Thank you! Every penny counts in selling handkerchiefs in this unusual way.

Yours for unusual handkerchief value,

P.S. There's a birthday or anniversary coming up soon for some man you know, and you'll be looking for just such an attractive gift as those individually monogrammed handkerchiefs. Why no double the amount of your remittance now, tell us his initials, and we'll get the handkerchiefs off at once - either to him or to you!