Ballyhoo (Jan 2, 1955)

Page scan 0009 from Ballyhoo

Record Details:

Title:
Ballyhoo
Date:
Jan 2, 1955
Volume:
Ballyhoo (Jan 2, 1955) Ontario 'B' District
Leaf #:
0009
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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5 CENTURY « HAMILTON (cont %d.) with propane ... I've got so much stuff from him this week ooo all ef it slightly terrific ... that I really don't know where to begin. I°11 say this for the guy ... he classifies his material so well, three separate seetions this week, each neatly tagged, that I can start just about anywhere without prejudicing his total effert occ Se, what’rs we waiting for? in tho line of routine baliy, Mel tells us that his Picke thoeStars contest in the Review still going strong ... and this week it got our boy an excellent front page story ooThe photo foatured was 2a four column shot of the stars of SHOW BUSINESS ooo fhe Century still knocking off lots of valuable radio time ever both Friday night shows ... "Meet Ne at the Brant” end the Kresge Corral. Mel received a good display ad .oc free, on the Classified page of the Daily News ... tying in with their Christmas Shopping Guide ... The Gontury lobby, front, confection baPr eter were gaily decorated for the festive season ... each plugging the gale of F.P. Book Tickets. Now how about a little P.R.? Did I say Little, Mel does the kind of a job each Christmas that the youngsters end their varents talk about ell year ... Mel is a Shriner, and each year he organises the Hamilton Shrine Club into a smoothly funetioning organization for the collection of TOYS FOR TOTS ... Each child who centributes a usable toy to the fund is invited to be Mel's guest at a special morning performance during the holiday BESSON coo The toys collected im this manner are distributed in time for Christmas te the less fortunate youngsters of the eity by the regular Red Poather services o.oo Bach year in excess of 1,000 toya aro distributed in this manner. To get the ball rolling, many of the loeal Shriners donated mew teys to the fund ... They paid for the printing of thousands of colourful window stickers which decorated nearly every store window in the city ... to say nothing of the windshields of hundreds of cars, busses and street Cars, ete. This deal was publicised over the p.a. systems of aearly every public school im the area ... G K O GC and GC H M L devoted literally hours of air time to plugging the event oco and the toys kept ponring ino fhe Dally News van a five colunmm pic of Mel and some of the other Shriners in front of a mountain of toys, and the Spec came through with a good three column pie. Both were accompanied by excellent stories giving details of the seteup. Jane Baker devoted nearly half a column to Mel and his toys. You're right Mel ... and seems that I quoted this before oo. "A men is never so tall as when he stoops te help a Little shildk® and in ay book ... You're a mighty tall man. And if you guys want to be selfish about it ... just renember that every time this deal was mentioned over the air, in the press ... sven on the stickers, the name CENTURY biased out like a neon tube ... Good P.Ro pays off ooo in @VOry Wao