Broadcasting Telecasting (Oct-Dec 1957)

ADVERTISERS & AGENCIES continued TV: MEDIUM TOO GOOD NOT TO USE Jack O'Mara, director of merchandising and promotion for KTTV (TV) Los Angeles, told an audience at the San Francisco Ad Club last Wednesday that businessmen — regardless of their budget size — are missing a bet if they aren't using television. The figures and the illustrations he used in themselves may not be startling. Yet the way he assembled those facts and figures made his argument both impressive and persuasive. This is a condensed text. Here is a medium of communications and advertising which is not quite 10 years old and which today is being watched in 40 million homes in this country — about 80% of all the homes. It's being watched in the average home almost six hours a day — three-eighths of all the waking moments of the family. The very components which are above the average are the components that should be of most interests: Households where the head of the house has gone through high school average 6 hours and 33 minutes a day of viewing. In homes where the head of the house makes $10,000 or more a year, average television viewing is 7 hours and 21 minutes a day. And in homes of five or more people, viewing runs a staggering 8 hours and 19 minutes per day. The most desirable customers for any product you make, sell or write copy for — the people who can understand your message the best, who have the most money to buy and who eat up and use up everything quicker — these are the people who are far above the average in the amount of time they spend watching television. My contention is that any activity which occupies the American people six and seven hours a day cannot be by-passed by advertisers interested in selling the American people. If I were to discover that all the people of Los Angeles were spending six and seven hours a day sawing wood, you can be darned sure I'd be working to get my KTTV message printed on every board foot that ever came out of the lumber yards. Yet, many advertisers and advertising agencies exist today who have literally never tried television, and many more who have given it only the most cursory trial. I hear such reasons as "We haven't been able to figure out how to translate our selling appeal to tv" and "My sales volume isn't great enough to warrant a television-sized budget." Not being able to translate a selling appeal to tv is all the more reason for continuing to try. It can't be such an impossible job; so many others have been successful at it. And for the fellow with the small budget, I can recall a KTTV advertiser whose entire initial budget, as well as the total assets of the company at the time, amounted to $200. That amount was invested in participating announcements with a direct mail-or-phone-your-order appeal. The product was a cosmetic called Pink Ice — and within three years the girl who had only $200 when she first walked in our door sold her company for $1 million. Or take the case of a carpet store in Huntington Park, a suburb of Los Angeles. This dealer, a man named Al Terrence, had only one location, sold only one product, carpets. He must have had some tall reservations as to whether his sales volume — or his single-store location, or his infrequentlypurchased product — justified a television budget. But somehow he put together enough money to buy a half-hour nighttime program regularly on KTTV. In three years time, he remained in the one location, he continued to sell only carpets and he con 3 More Baltimore Stations Join Advertising Tax Fight WITH-AM-TV and WFBR, both Baltimore, last week joined the growing ranks of local media which are putting the city's new advertising taxes to a court test. WFBR's bill of complaint, signed by Vice President-General Manager Robert B. Jones, was filed in the Baltimore Circuit Court Tuesday. The WITH-AM-TV action, signed by Vice President R. C. (Jake) Embry was filed Wednesday. The latest suits followed the pattern of the others seeking to stop the 4% tax on gross advertising receipts and 2% levy on gross of local advertising media. In addition to seeking a decree declaring the ordinances unconstitutional, invalid and null and void, the suits petitioned for an injunction to stay the new taxes. Already filed with the court are suits by the Sunpapers with its WMAR-TV; the News-Post and Sunday American (Hearst) and its WBAL-AM-TV; WJZ-TV and WCAO, all Baltimore [Broadcasting, Dec. 2, Nov. 25]. man of the BBB's merchandising and advertising committee, said the main problem facing media and advertisers is "phoney pricing." He urged "a little more conscience by advertisers and sellers." FISHER'S SIREN SONG Commercials for Fisher's Blend flour and Zoom cereal are hitting listeners in the northwest and north central states where they live. The Seattle office of Pacific National Advertising, agency for the Fisher products, has written original "state song", jingles for use on 3 1 stations in Alaska, Washington, Oregon, Minnesota and the Dakotas, a la: "How do-ya-do — the best to you! In Ketchikan to Harbor Dutch we love Alaska, love it much. Alakanuk and Aleknagik, Kusko kwim and Kotzebue . . ." etc., to the refrain: "Fisher's Blend Flour, no matter Copy Screening Plan Set in D. C. Radio and tv stations of Washington, D. C, along with newspapers, have agreed to submit all doubtful advertising copy to a review committee of the Washington Better Business Bureau. Announcement of the project, called Consumers Protection Plan, was made at the Tuesday luncheon meeting of the Washington Ad Club by Dewey Zirkin, BBB president. Oscar Dodek, chair wnere u s iouna, Fisher's Blend Flour is the freshest flour in town . . ." Listeners, evidently pleased by the individual attention, not only are buying the products but are writing to get the words of their "state songs" as. well. One of them, who is music librarian of the Seattle Public Library, asked to include the works in the library's documentary collection. Hotpoint Integrates Promotion; DiAngelo Heads New Department The integration of advertising, sales promotion and other operations under one department headed by Lee J. DiAngelo as advertising and merchandising manager was announced for Hotpoint Co. last week by John F. McDaniel, general manager of sales and distribution for radio-tv receivers and appliances. Mr. DiAngelo also will be responsible for merchandising production, product publicity and home economics, consolidating all merchandising functions for all Hotpoint product departments. The new department includes Alfred M. Utt, advertising manager; Joseph F. Adamik, sales promotion manager; William C. Bartels, merchandisingproduction manager; Philip L. Crittenden, product publicity manager, and Francis M. Michael, manager of Hotpoint Institute. Mr. DiAngelo formerly was marketing manager for Hotpoint's Customline department. Five Buy Over $185,000 In Time From CBS Radio CBS Radio contracted for over $850,000 worth of new business and renewals during Thanksgiving week, according to John Karol, vice president in charge of network sales. New orders placed were: Chevrolet Motors Div. of General Motors purchased three five-minute news segments per week for 17 weeks, effective immediately, through Campbell-Ewald, Detroit. Grove Labs, through Cohen & Aleshire, ordered an additional 139 "Impact" segments; American Page 40 • December 9, 1957 Broadcasting