Students' name used by profit making concern

By Barrie Saunders

Students are being used by a New Zealand publishing company fro make what has been described as excessive profits on Tournament handbooks.

The company, published at no cost to either the Auckland Students Association or Victoria the last two Tournament handbooks.

In fact as an added inducement Victoria was paid a £50 honorarium. The company undertook to sell all the advertising and pay all printing costs. 1000 copies were to be printed.

The company call themselves "publishers and advertising consultants" on their letterhead.

They are an Auckland based firm.

A temporary office was established in Wellington while they worked on the Easter Tournament handbook this year.

However several firms who advertised in the Auckland handbook believe they were mislead. Many understood by taking space they were helping to sponsor the publication and were making a sort of donation to the Students Association.

An advertising executive of a large freighting company toid Salient his company was "only interested in helping student;. We would not have advertised if we knew profits were going to this company.

"We were approached by a man who said he was representing the Students Association and asked if we would help the students by sponsoring an advertisement in the students magazine. The full page cost £32/10 - and we considered this a donation to the Students Association." he, said.

A Wellington florist who took a quarter page in the pages of advertising space in the Auckland book was taken by Wellington businesses — many small family concerns.

Wellington GHB stores, butchers, dairies, decorators, a cartage and forwarding agent, an Island Bay service station, an investment concern, a building contractor and a Lower Hutt hairdresser were among those in the Auckland handbook.

President of the Students Association, John McGrath, told Salient the company's offer was accepted because of delays at the time. In the past Victoria has appointed an editor and an Advertising Manager to produce the handbook.

Easter Tournament controller John Stevens told Salient they "would not have accepted the offer if they knew the company was going to mislead the public in any way."

It is understood the company would like to produce Otago's Handbook for Winter Tournament this year.

A further study of the advertisers revealed very few-used advertising agencies. "This could be because we are wise to this practice." an agency executive told Salient.

It is not known how many advertisers in this year's Tournament handbook refrained from advertising in other student publications.

This years Cappicade Advertising Manager told Salient some firms declined to come into Cappicade because of their commitment in the Tournament handbook.

"Cappicade is a much better business proposition because it has 25 times the circulation, a bigger page, is more widely read and yet has similar advertising rates," he