Tested & Not Approved

After 21 months of a battle royal between Hearst's Good Housekeeping, biggest ad-carrier among women's magazines, and the Federal Trade Commission, FTC last week cracked down. It ordered Good Housekeeping to mend its practice of issuing "Tested and Approved'' seals vouching for the worth of advertised products tested by Good Housekeeping Institute and Good Housekeeping Bureau.

The FTC bill of particulars said that all products thus guaranteed did not live up to the claims made for them, that the seals tend to "mislead and deceive" buyers. Further FTC complaints: that readers get the erroneous impression that all products advertised in Good Housekeeping are covered by such seals of approval; and that advertisers use the statement "guaranteed by Good Housekeeping as advertised therein" with the phrase "as advertised therein" so blurred or microscopic as to be almost unreadable.

Henceforth, ordered the FTC, Good Housekeeping must make no seal guarantees unless they are 14-karat, money-back or replacement guarantees; and it must work harder at its tests.

Stringent though the FTC ruling is, it is moderate as compared with the acrimonious bickering that preceded it. Each side called over 100 witnesses. Good -Housekeeping's Attorney Isaac W. Digges called the FTC charges "vague, uncertain, undefinite, confused, confusing, argumentative, ambiguous, self-contradictory, conclusory and unintelligible." Hearst Magazines General Manager Richard Berlin charged that the attack on Good Housekeeping's 35-year-old seal business was inspired by subversive groups bent on destroying advertising altogether.

Only one incident afforded anything like a light moment during the long-drawn-out wrangling. Among Good Housekeeping-advertised (but not seal-approved) products introduced at the hearings was a Polish ham. Bursting open, it exuded such gamy odors that the court had to be cleared.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.