A New Mode of Advertising (British Patent No. 9413, 1887)
A three-page British patent specification, No. 9413, applied for on 2 July 1887 and accepted on 2 August 1887.
What it is
A three-page British patent specification, No. 9413, applied for on 2 July 1887 and accepted on 2 August 1887. The applicant is Artemas Ward of 31 Snow Hill, London, who calls himself an advertising agent. It claims a new mode of advertising on brushes and wooden ware. The method is simple: burn a trade mark, trade name or descriptive text into the back of a brush with branding irons, then paste a perishable label over it. At the point of sale the goods look unmarked. Once the label gets wet or wears off in use, the brand appears and stays for the life of the brush. Two figures show the brush branded and the brush labelled. The collection files it under Sapolio, the soap whose advertising Ward ran; the patent itself names no product.
Why read it now
The idea that lasts is that the product in daily use is a medium the brand already owns. A brush in the kitchen is seen every day for years, which no paid space in 1887 could match. The same logic runs today through embossed products, branded scoops and tools packed with goods, and anything that shows the maker's name at the moment of use rather than only on the shelf. What has dated is the concealment. Ward's selling point was that buyers would not know an advertisement was on the brush when they paid for it. Modern advertising codes, including the disclosure rules Saudi Arabia applies to paid influencer content, push the other way: advertising should be recognisable as advertising, and a reveal that feels like a trick costs trust. How to use it: list the objects a customer keeps and handles after purchase (box, bottle, tool, bag), and put a durable, useful brand mark on the one they touch most, in plain view.
Passages worth keeping
My invention relates to a new and improved mode of indelibly advertising upon brushes and wooden ware
يقدّم صاحب البراءة اختراعه على أنه طريقة جديدة لوضع إعلان لا يُمحى على الفُرَش والأدوات الخشبية.
a manufacturer or dealer may advertise his goods on brushes and wooden ware without defacing the appearance of the brushes and wooden ware when sold to the public
يستطيع الصانع أو التاجر أن يعلن عن بضاعته على هذه الأدوات دون أن يفسد مظهرها وقت البيع.
without the public knowing that an advertisement is contained thereon at the time when the public purchase the brushes and wooden ware
ميزة الطريقة كما يعرضها صاحبها أن المشتري لا يعلم بوجود الإعلان على السلعة لحظة شرائها.
When the aforesaid perishable label becomes wet or wears off by use of the aforesaid brush, the Trade Mark Trade name or other descriptive matter indelibly branded upon the back of said brush becomes exposed again
حين يبتل الملصق أو يتآكل مع الاستعمال يظهر الاسم التجاري المحروق على ظهر الفرشاة ويبقى ظاهرًا.
The scanned text has OCR errors. The passages are quoted from it, with only obvious slips fixed.
What it teaches best
Read the original archive.org
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