To those who reply to this advertisement a circular letter is sent
stating that the work required consists in filling in with bronze
paint store-window price tickets printed in outline, one of which,
partly filled in, is inclosed as a sample.
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The circular states that the work is easily done, requires no previous
experience, and that all that is necessary, is to do the work in a
neat manner. Two dollars and a half a hundred is offered for tickets
filled in as described, and the prospective victim is assured that
she can easily gild at least 100 tickets a day. She will require an
"outfit," of course, the cost of which is generously put at the
remarkably low price of $1.10.
In return for her $1.10 the victim receives a handful of window
tickets, a small bottle of bronze paint, and a brush for applying
it--the actual value of the articles furnished, including postage,
being fully covered by the extra 10 cents.
The worst is yet to come. When the woman, having parted with her money
and having spent her time in filling in the handful of tickets sent
her, returns them, at her own expense, she receives, not a check in
payment for the work done, but a circular letter stating that her work
is "unsatisfactory." She may possess the talent of a Rosa Bonheur and
a department store ticket writer rolled into one, but she will never
succeed in selling a cent's worth of bronzed price tickets to the
fakers who sold her the "outfit." Their business is not to buy but
to sell, and her fate is not to sell but to be sold. Similar to the
work-at-home scheme is what may be described as the letter-writing
dodge. The following is a typical advertisement of its class:
LADIES--Earn $20 per hundred writing short letters. Stamped
envelope for particulars. Gem Manufacturing Company,
Cassopolis, Mich.
When the woman anxious to earn an honest penny replies to this ad. she
receives the following letter:
Dear Madam:
We pay at the rate of $20 per hundred or 20 cents for each
letter sent us in accordance with our printed circular of
instructions, and make remittances to you of all money
earned by you at the end of each week. The letter which we
send you to copy contains only eighty words, and can be
written either with typewriter or with pen and ink, as you
prefer, and you can readily see that you can write a number
of letters during your leisure time each day.
You do not pay us one penny for anything, except $1 for
the instructions and for packing and mailing the Ideal
Hoodwinkem which we send you.
There is no canvassing connected with the work, and if you
follow our instructions you can earn good wages from the
start.
When the victim sends her dollar for the instructions and for the
Ideal Hoodwinkem (or whatever the name of the article the fakers are
selling happens to be), she discovers that the 20 cents is not to be
paid merely for writing a letter. Oh, no! The 20 cents will be paid
only for such letters as induce some other woman to part with a dollar
for one of "Our Ideal Hoodwinkems." The following letter, which is
sent after the unsuspecting one's dollar has been safely salted down,
lays bare the true inwardness of the scheme:
Dear Madam:
We herewith hand you trial blanks, also copy of letter
which you are to write. You are to send these letters out
to ladies, and for every letter which you write and send
out and which is returned to us with $1 inclosed for one of
our Ideal Hoodwinkems, with your number on the letter, we
will send you a cash commission of 20 cents.
It is needless to say that the fakers do not expect their victim to
be so stupid as to send out the letters on the terms indicated. The
object of the plan is accomplished when "dear madam" parts with her
dollar for the letter of instructions and the Hoodwinkem, which would
be dear at 10 cents.