A Look Back: Photos from 1950

Photo: PMP Archives

Mail your message

A variety of direct mail pieces accompanied an article that explored the benefits of this popular form of advertising. Author R.L. Hawks of Interstate Exterminators in Wichita, Kan., said direct mail advertising, especially when sent four or five times, gives pest management professionals an advantage over non-advertising competitors because when the need for pest control arises, prospective customers will remember your company and come calling. A company should allocate 5 percent of its gross income to direct mail advertising, and never “cut a penny from the original plan.” Recommended methods included government postcards (the least expensive option, at 1 cent), your own postcards, form letters, typed letters, circulars, self-mailers, blotters and booklets. Founded in 1937, the fourth-generation, family-owned company is known today as Hawks Inter-State Pestmasters.

Read the full article from our archives.

Photo: PMP Archives

Ready for his close-up

In 2023, the National Pest Management Association also celebrates 90 years of serving the pest control industry. In 1950, the president of the National Pest Control Association, as it was known at the time, also served as president of the Illinois Pest Control Association (IPCA). Harold Jennings was interviewed by Bill Evans for Chicago TV station WBKB (now WBBM) as part of the IPCA’s publicity campaign to explain “modern pest control has become an exact science, requiring the services of experts trained in their profession and using scientific equipment and chemicals.” Jennings, who is the grandfather of Niles, Ill.-based Smithereen Pest Management Services’ fourth-generation president, Jack Jennings, also shared his message in newspaper articles and AM radio appearances.