Sponsor (Oct-Dec 1964)

SPONSOR WEEK Demand National Tv Coverage/ Lee Urges Admeni FCC Commissioner sees UHF as answer to fringe-area advertising; scores networks for retarding progress Boston — Calling on advertisers to "demand lull national coverage," FCC commissioner Robert E. Lee last week took the major networks to task for holding back the growth of UHF through failure to make programing available to existing outlets. In an address before the Advertising Club of Greater Boston, the commissioner pointed out that among the 100 largest cities of the United States, nine have four or more stations, 38 have three stations, 34 have two, 12 have only one, and seven have no stations. Dubbing the situation "deplorable," commissioner Lee asked: "Is the advertiser interested in getting exposure in these large markets? Would he like to be carried on a station that delivers pictures with a crisper quality, free of interference from automobile ignition and other electrical sources, and free from airplane flutter? Tell your networks this is what you want and the only way they'll be able to deliver the goods is through UHF stations." Citing Marion. Ind., as a case in point, the commissioner said the networks argue that they get into Marion via Indianapolis. "Yes, they 'Huntley-Brinkley' A 52-Week Sellout New York — The line forms to the rear for sponsorship of The Huntley-Brinkley Report on NBC-TV. With the addition of three more sponsors, Don Durgin, vice president for network sales, says the news program is completely sold out for 52 weeks. The new accounts are the Bauer and Black division of the Kendall Co. through TathamLaird Inc., and the Colgatc-Palolive Co. and Wilkinson-Sword Inc. via Ted Bates. Nine other sponsors participate in the series. get in and you should see how," he declared. "The people who want to watch have to erect antennas towering high above their roof-tops. I venture to say they pay as much for their antenna installations as they do for their receivers. Is this what the advertisers call getting in?" Lee continued: "It's one thing to have an assignment table providing channels for these places, to obtain passage of all-channel receiver legislation and in other ways beat the drum for UHF, but it is quite another thing to get the networks to realize that the country is begging for first-class television unblemished by snow and interference and with the choice of more than just a few programs." Contrasting tv with radio as an ad medium, the commissioner said that in radio, advertisers "don't rely on the big 50 kw to get their message to all the people on the outer fringes of the area covered by the mim Lee . . . "antenna lowers" I station's signal." They also make buys on smaller local stations, he pointed out. "They are not satisfied with fringe reception in radio. Why should they be in television?" Commissioner Lee's address came on the heels of the debut of Boston's newest tv outlet, channel 38, which went on the air the week previous as the nation's first diocesan-owned, semi-commercial UHF station. Roslow: Restraint in Research Data Use New York — "Research data must not be projected unwarrantedly or taken out of context," cautioned Sydney Roslow, president of Pulse, at last week's Pulse Man of the Year luncheon. Prior to presenting awards to the team of Chet Huntley and David Brinkley, the Pulse president had a word on research in general and public opinion polls in particular. "It is interesting to see some of the spotlight shift from broadcast research to non-broadcast research," he declared. "We recently saw the spectacle of an entire print project withdrawn unreported because of the massive sample-copy distribution of one of the publications under survey." Turning to public opinion polls, Roslow said an interesting phenomenon about them is that "people 16 who get low readings don't like them, and are often inclined to smash the machinery rather than look to the factual causes. Sometimes there is something in their organizations, their operations, their images, which can be corrected." This is not to say that research is without limitation, Roslow added. "Often these limitations can be mitigated by liberal doses of judgment, brains, intuition in their use — in a word, good and adequate homework." Roslow continued: "Something else must be added — restraint." In making the Pulse Man of the Year award to Huntley and Brinkley, Roslow pointed out that this is the first time it had been given to anyone in broadcast journalism, and the first time to more than one person. SPONSOR i i