Life, 1922-05-11 · page 31 of 38
Life — May 11, 1922 — page 31: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page is primarily **advertising, not satire or comedy**. It contains two hotel advertisements: 1. **Hotels Statler** (top): Announces new properties opening in Buffalo, Cleveland, Detroit, and St. Louis, with a new Buffalo location opening early 1923. 2. **Hotel Pennsylvania** (bottom): Promotes "The Largest Hotel in the World" near Pennsylvania Terminal in New York. The center section is an **internal company message** from what appears to be a hotel management figure (photo included) to employees. It's a serious, direct appeal emphasizing that the company's written promises to guests are binding—as binding as promises to banks. Management warns employees that service standards cannot be neglected and that all previous instructions remain in effect. The tone is earnest corporate communication, using the magazine's valuable advertising space to reinforce employee accountability rather than make a humorous point. This reflects early 20th-century management philosophy: publicly shaming or motivating workers through mass media.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
- LIFE: 29 Hotels Statler Buffalo - Cleveland ~ Detroit - St. Louis A new Hotel Statler (1100 rooms, 1100 baths) is now building at Buffalo— to open early in 1923; 500 more rooms will be added later. e kept ongs,” Still t have "t sick t their rald. “If you have ever been doubtful as to whether we mean what we say, this ought to settle it.”* Hote : Pennsylvania th. The Largest Hotel in the World Opp. Pennsylvania Terminal. N :|An cAdvertisement to Our Employees: People generally pay more attention to telegrams than to letters, don’t they? You agree, because you know that the man who pays several times the cost of a letter to get his message before you quickly and prominently has something important to say. That's exactly why I'm giving you this message in expensive—and valuable —space when I might get it to you more economically in several other ways. That's why I'm advertising, to you, the service you give. There's another reason, too. I'm here going on public record with this— which I wouldn't be if the same sheet of printed words were sent to you at the hotel or at your home address. Now forget those preliminaries and get the message: You know, and I know, that the policies of this business are simple, and plain, and easily understood. You know, and I know, that the biggest job in run- ning these big hotels is to keep the human side of service up to our standard. The mechanical service features don't make one one-hundredth the trouble that the people who give service do. Our guests are promised, by our policies and in our advertising and otherwise, a service that isn’t only thorough, but is also helpful; that isn’t perfunctory, and that is interested; that isn’t ever grudging, and is always courteous. ‘Those written promises, made to our customers, are just as binding on us as are the written promises to our bankers to pay them certain moneys. What I'm saying to you, here and now, is that those promises must and will be kept; and I'm saying it in this way, in addition to all the other ways you know about, because I want you to know that these are promises of record, and that neither you nor I nor anybody working in these hotels can forget them or neglect them, and get away with it. All previous instructions stand, you understand, and all alibis are outlawed. You're to do all your cuthority permits toward satisfying any guest, and if that doesn’t satisfy him you're to see that he gets to your superior. You're to be guided by the Codes; you're to use your head, I don’t want to preach, and I don’t want to scold. If I do either I'll do it in private. What I'm try- ing to do is to put this to you in this most forceful way I can think of. If you have ever been doubtful as to whether we mean what we say, this ought to settle it, L2002v tn comicbooks.com