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This self-supply gimmick is s.o.p. for the Artels (small cooperative groups of artisans), which place numerous ads. One ad, by the Metal Workers' Artel, prints a photo of a huge office safe, offers to make such safes for any comer—provided he brings his own iron.
Flirting With a Bogy. Some of the best Soviet advertising appears in the LIFE-like magazine Ogonek, which uses U.S.-style layouts. Many Ogonek ads are similar to U.S. wartime institutional advertising, i.e., they boost goods not pres ently available. Other Ogonek displays feature the Mikoyan Meat Trust and that old Russian delicacy, caviar (see cut). Price: only 40 rubles ($10) a Ib.
Mikoyan in his speech stressed the need for salesmanship, not only in advertising, but in the stores ("Every worker in a store is an agitator for Soviet goods") and in distribution ("We have to make full use of such means as business contracts and orders in advance").
He said: "We have to eradicate the prejudice that trading is easy and simple . . . The planning of trade has to take into account factors which are liable to continuous fluctuations: the relationship between supply & demand, the needs of the consumer, local peculiarities and climatic conditions. I should say that a man who is planning trade must—in order to assess these factors accurately—possess a creative instinct, a kind of commercial intuition."
This is about as close as any Bolshevik can get (and live) to praising that old Bolshevik bogy, the market economy.