Spors Book of Bargains, 1939
They didn’t call it the Great Depression for nothing. You leaf through a catalog like this one and you can feel the hunger and the desperation that the Spors Company promised to address. You can sense the dusty roads, small towns, and cheap hotels the traveling salesman traversed, driven by the hope of the next big sale.
Spors would sell you products at wholesale, which — with gumption, the proper go-getter attitude, and a little luck — you could resell to others. The process could turn you from the unemployed and depressed city dweller in the left picture into the comfortable suburbanite at right complete with a home and car.
The “Beauty of Selling” was not only that you could “Make Money Every Day”, but that you could do it using nothing more than your American brains, wits and charm. Being your own boss, you could travel anywhere, anytime, make a few sales, and move on (gaining a smartly-dressed woman by your side along the way).
Only two years earlier Dale Carnegie wrote “How to Win Friends and Influence People” which also promised success in life, if you could just be the boss of your own attitude. A powerful message, which is why “How to Make Friends” is still in print today.