Radio today (Jan-Dec 1937)

:^lAf IV 1937. ©CIB 338764 Stai— Darrell Bartee Randall R. Irwin M. H. Newton B. V. Spixetta Vinton K. Ulrich Lee Robinson Sales Manager RADIO TODAY Orestes H. Caldwell Editor M. Clements Publisher Copyright 1937 Caldwell-Cleraents. Inc. 4S0 Lexington Ave. New York. N. Y. Tel. PLaza 3-1340 Vol. III. No. 5 RADIO DEALERS AVERAGED 11.7% PROFIT * Questionnairing 5,000 retail radio dealers in its special survey of radio costs and profits, E.usio Today has received store operating statements covering nearly $3,000,000 of retail radio sales made during 1936. Analysis of these returns, presented in detail on following pages, show that the average of dealers' profits on radio sales was 11.7 per cent of total sales volume, with cost of merchandise running 5S per cent, and total operating costs averaging 30.3 per cent. Radio sales for 1936 were reported 34 per cent ahead of the preceding year, and stock turnover averaged six and one-half times a year. Customers bought 32 per cent for cash; 15 per cent on credit account, and 53 per cent on installment plans. Store operating costs averaged as follows, total sales equalling 100% : Salary of owners 10:5% Employees 3.1% Rent 3.4% Advertising 2.3% Telephone, light, heat 2.4% Free servicing, installation 1.9% All other expenses 1.7% Total expenses 30.3% Cost of merchandise 58.0% Net profit 11.7% This survey of retail selling costs and profits in radio by Eadio Today is the first which has been made, directed particularly at the radio trade, since similar radio surveys were made under the same direction five and ten years ago. While valuable general surveys of all kinds of retail businesses are conducted annually by Dun & Bradstreet and others, these have sometimes led to conflicting results for radio when dollar voliinie of "service sales" is inadvertently added in writh merchandise sales. In the Eadio Today survey, paid-servicing volume was kept entirely separate, and reported as an independent business operation, so that the above figures give a true picture of the radio-merchandise operation. RADIO STORMS THE NEWSPAPERS * With one smash message or another, radio manufacturers finished the last year with interesting totals in radio advertising lineage run in newspapers. Media Eecords, Inc.. reports these firms as leading newspaper advertisers, with lines run : Crosley 58,259 Delco 7,438 General Electric . . 417,810 Grunow 428,518 Philco 2.071,238 EGA 559,146 Stewart-Warner . . 68,990 Westinghouse 24.030 Zenith 422.730 RADIO PRODUCTION BY STATES * A chart in our April number showed the relative percentages of Federal excise tax paid, by states, as an index to radio manufacturing by states. For brevity the chart was titled "Where the Eadio Sets Are Made," but it should have been explained that the excise tax covers not only home radios but also radio tubes. parts, etc., and phonographs and records, radio sets making up five-sixths of the volume. Automobile radios, however, are not taxed under the radio classification but as "automobile accessories," so that the auto-radio volume does not appear in the radiotax percentages, thus accounting for some of the apparent discrepancies in the radio-tax figures by states. LAME LISTENING ■*■ Eeceivers with one leg in the junk-yard have been counted, among 5,360 radio families, by Prof. L. M. McDermott. College of Commerce, De Paul University, Chicago. While investigating other angles, the professor discovered this about the age of seta in use among these families : 1 year old 20.6% 2 years old 20.3% 3 years old 18.7% 4 years old 14.7% 5 years old 11-2% Over 5 years old 8.5% Survey also revealed that 61% of the families had more than one set, and that radio was the first thing they wanted after a car and some insurance. May, 1937