THE old adage money can't buy you happiness will ring true for Glasgow City Council today, when the smile is wiped off the face of the city.

Almost 15 years since he made his first appearance around the city, the Mr Happy character and the Glasgow's Miles Better campaign will come to an end.

Despite a reduction in Mr Happy's exposure, copyright for the Roger Hargreaves character and the logo cost #28,000 for last year alone and, due to the council's spending cuts, it will not be renewed when it runs out today.

Mr John Brown, the council's head of public relations and marketing, said it was not felt appropriate to spend money on the campaign in the current climate.

''With the problem of paying fees for copyright, and then the high promotion costs, we just don't have the money for it,'' he said.

However, he added that the end of Mr Happy did not mean that the council would stop promoting the city this summer and it already had a number of thoughts on possible campaigns to replace Mr Happy.

He said: ''People will still identify the Glasgow's Miles Better campaign with the city and that will not end for the time being.

''Just because the copyright has ended, doesn't mean Mr Happy's association with Glasgow will.''

The idea behind the campaign was conceived in 1982 when the then Lord Provost Michael Kelly returned from a trip to New York, where he had been impressed with the success of the city's I Love NY campaign.

The following year, the Glasgow's Miles Better campaign was launched during a heatwave in an attempt to change Glasgow's image as a city of violence, drugs, and slums.

Other than a brief spell when it was replaced with the Glasgow's Alive promotion, Mr Happy has beamed out across the city ever since, most notably from the blue gas tower next to the M8.

Mr Kelly, who now works as a consultant, said he was not surprised the campaign had lasted so long.

He said: ''The I love NY campaign had already been running five years when I went to New York and we felt that if we got it right, it would work long term, so I'm not surprised that it lasted so long.''

After the initial plan to promote the city, a suitable logo had to be established.

Mr Kelly said: ''We carried out a competition in the old Sunday Standard for the campaign and one of the entries was Glasgow makes me smile.

''This really brought about the idea of smiling and this, coupled with the fact that Glasgow was perceived as a friendly city, led to the Glasgow's Miles Better slogan. The reason the words really caught on I think was because the people of Glasgow were able to articulate their feelings and what they really believed about the city.

''For years they had seen television people coming up and making documentaries holding up Glasgow as everything that was bad about cities, and now they had some way of defending it.''

However, he said, he felt that although the logo was still relevant, Mr Happy himself might be past his day.

''It was a 1970s character and the problem now is that he's out of date.

''Also, if you are trying to promote health, then a wee, round fat figure for a logo is perhaps not a positive image to have.''

Next month, Mr Kelly is going to Lublin in Poland to sell the concept behind the campaign, and he felt it was important for Glasgow to still have some sort of similar promotion behind it.

He said he hoped the words Glasgow's Miles Better could still be used in some sort of promotional sense and added: ''I think the reality is the city is going to have to promote itself and needs some sort of logo, especially if we are going to sell it abroad at a time when it is so important in the international market.''