Washed With Live Steam

Over 70 years ago, one man had the answer to increasing almost any product's sales and literally crushing the competition.
Claude Hopkins. And today his advice is even more valuable than it was during the 1920s.

Hopkins was one of the most famous ad men and really the Father of modern advertising. His two books "My Life in Advertising" and "Scientific Advertising" are worth reading and re-reading.

By educating a prospect about how things are done in your business, even if it's the same exact thing any one of your competitors could tell, will produce a tremendous selling advantage.

Let me share with you how Hopkins used this advertising secret to rocket a so-so beer brand from 5th place into a tie for 1st place in just a matter of months –

Schlitz Beer hired Hopkins to increase their falling market share. Every beer manufacturer at this time was screaming "PURE" in their ads. In fact, companies were spending a fortune just advertising this 4-letter word as big and as bold as they could. They even took out double pages ads to put that word in even bigger letters. All this shouting and no explaining was making zero impression on the buying public. Nobody ever explained what 'pure' really meant until Hopkins came in.

The first thing Hopkins did was to take a factory tour. On this tour he was shown plate-glass rooms where beer was dripping over pipes. Inquiring the reason for this, Hopkins was told that those rooms were filled with filtered air, so the beer could be cooled without any impurities.

Next, he was shown huge expensive filters filled with white- wood pulp that provided a superior filtering process. The manufacturer then went on to explain how they cleaned every pump and pipe, twice daily to assure purity. And also how each bottle was sterilized not once or twice, but four times before being filled with beer.

Then, Hopkins was shown the 4,000 foot deep artesian wells dug to provide the cleanest and purest water available, even though the factory was right on the shore of Lake Michigan. (At this time Lake Michigan was not polluted and could provide clean water.)

Finally, Hopkins was lead into a laboratory and was shown the mother yeast cell, that was a product of 1,200 experiments to bring out the robust flavor. And he was told all the yeast used in making Schlitz beer was developed from that original yeast cell.

After his tour Hopkins exclaimed, "Why don't you tell people these things?" The manufacturer's response was “Because every beer manufacturer does it the same way.”

And to that Hopkins replied, "But, others have never told this story..." And he went off to create an advertising campaign explaining to people what makes Schlitz beer pure highlighted with the tagline "Schlitz beer bottles - Washed with live steam". Once again he told the same story any brewer could have but he gave a meaning to purity. And this is what took Schlitz from 5th place to a tie for 1st place in market share.

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