Ballyhoo (Jan 18, 1957)

Page scan 00013 from Ballyhoo

Record Details:

Title:
Ballyhoo
Date:
Jan 18, 1957
Volume:
Ballyhoo (Jan 18, 1957) National
Leaf #:
00013
Language:
English
Collection:
Canada, Global Cinema, and Hollywood Studio System
Format:
Periodicals
Contributor:
Media History Digital Library, Greig Dymond in memory of David Dymond, Paul Moore and Jessica Whitehead
Coordinator:
Media History Digital Library
Description:

Ballyhoo

  • Ontario 'B' District Ballyhoo, editor: Dan Krendel (1952-55)
  • Profit Blitz for ‘Fitz’, editor: Dan Krendel (1955)
  • National Ballyhoo, editor: Dan Krendel (1956-57)
  • Time Out for Ticket Talk, editor: Norman Barker (1960-61)

Ballyhoo (1952-61) was published by Famous Players Canadian Corporation as a mimeographed internal sales and theatre managers’ newsletter. Editor, Dan Krendel, had been division manager of the Ontario ‘B’ District since 1942, and initially created Ballyhoo in 1952 to circulate weekly updates for a regional sales contest. Ontario ‘B’ District Ballyhoo continued until 1955 as a tool for sharing and incentivizing new sales techniques and publicity methods as the movie business declined in the face of television and the baby boom.

In Fall 1955, Profit Blitz for ‘Fitz’ was a nationwide sales contest, named for Famous Players’ president J. J. Fitzgibbons, honouring his 25th year as head of the business. Dan Krendel was made National Drive Captain and edited a weekly newsletter for the campaign.

From 1956 until at least 1957, National Ballyhoo was published weekly with Krendel as editor. He continued the style and content developed earlier for his Ontario ‘B’ District, but now extended vastly for a chain-wide coast to coast scale. Ballyhoo’s sharing promotional tools came at a time of contracting box office as television and automobile ownership became prevalent in the mid-1950s.

By 1960 until at least 1961, Time Out for Ticket Talk continued as a mimeographed newsletter, edited by Norman Barker of the head office publicity department. Time Out was compiled on a less ambitious scale than Ballyhoo. Compared to the earlier national compilation of local publicity gimmicks, Time Out often contained only a single memo or reproduced local story, and was often undated and only informally edited.

– Paul Moore, March 2024

Date Added:
April 11, 2024
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CAPITOL CALGARY Ralph Mitcheltree must really love this business ,., he certainly works at it, and is one of our most consistent contributors. Not many attractions slip by Ralph without the benefit of a full scale selling campaign ... let's see what he did with OPPOSITE SEX. To get things rolling, Ralph tied up Matinee Cosmetics, and wound up with prominent mention on 52 radio spots, 40 excellent window displays, a fine lobby display paid for by the sponsors, and a stage presentation to the mother of Leslie Nielsen, who as you know appears in the pic, This next deal is a pip ... Ralph went after Juilliard's, Calgary's most exclusive women's fashion shop, and came up with excellent coverage of OPPOSITE SEX on 50 of their radio spots ... Juilliard's newspaper ads also carried mention of pic and theatre, The store also sponsored and paid for a terrific fashion show on the theatre stage every night of the pic's run. A four column pic appeared in the press, followed the next day by a two column ditto, C K X L made mention of the attraction on 56 special spots, and also shared the cost of special window cards made up for this deal, in co-operation with the Matinee people. An exceptionally fine window display was put in by People's Credit Jewellers ... and credit for this must go to Ralph's assistant, Bert Bauer, Ralph was running a VistaVision short on Austria, and to attract the masses of New Canadians in the city, he ran a bilingual ad in the newspaper, and made up a very attractive bilingual display for use on the sidewalk in front of his boxoffice. Nice going Ralph ... keep sluggin' and keep me advised of all your activities. We enjoy hearing from you. seGiaeK «Kiet o Kis CAPITOL TRURO Well, well, well ... we were beginning to wonder what happened to Gerry Tipper ... hadn't heard from him since our BLITZ FOR FITZ. Gerry reports his sales efforts in behalf of a hypnotic act he put in to try an liven things up ... and he certainly did that ... He started by promoting a complete bedroom set which he placed in the large Capitol window ... next he asked for femme volunteers to be hypnotized ... and two insisted on sharing the honors. The Great Dr.Kit obliged and put them both to sleep, This was fully covered by radio and press, The gals were put to sleep early in the afternoon, and were awakened on the stage of the theatre at the evening performance, The street in front of the theatre was jammed, and the cops had to be called out to control the crowds, Business was terrific, and Gerry had to arrange for a return engagement which proved equally successful, Credit for the selling of the second deal goes to Gerry's assistant Norman Carter who did a fine job which resulted in another sell-out. Just goes to show what CAN be done, eh? Keep it up Gerry.