Radio age research, manufacturing, communications, broadcasting, television (1941)

gramming on the air. He stated that the $12,000,000 NBC color studio expansion program started last Novem- ber will mean that by next autumn "we'll be in a position to double our live color programming on the network and do more film programs in color too." The major features of the expansion program listed by Mr. Pinkham included: — Equipment of the Ziegfeld Theatre in New York as a color studio; — Construction of an additional color studio in Brooklyn; — Construction of an additional color studio at Burbank, California, at NBC's Color City; — Installation of color recording equipment at Bur- bank, so that the increasing volume of network color programs can be recorded and broadcast in color at the same local time as in New York, whenever this is possible and practical; — Additional expansion at Burbank, including more color film facilities, a new master control for Color City, and construction of a technical building to house this additional color equipment. As for the programs themselves, Mr. Pinkham said: "By next fall, we expect that many of our principal evening attractions, in addition to the 90-minute Spec- taculars, will be presented in color. Depending on how the schedule works out, it's entirely possible that be- tween NBC and CBS (Columbia Broadcasting System), there will be important color programs on the air every night of the week, with several color shows on key evenings like Saturday and Sunday." Immediate evidence of expanded color programming by NBC was the special colorcasting of eight additional shows during March. These included the George Gobel Show on March 3, the Dinah Shore Show on March 6, 8, 20, and 22; "This is Your Life," on March 7; the "Texaco Star Theater", starring Jimmy Durante, on March 24, and the "Lux Video Theatre" on March 29. These productions were in addition to the continuing NBC color schedule, which totals now about 40 hours a month. Color TV Opens New Era of Mass Sales, Says Folsom A, AMERICAN retailing is on the threshold of an entire new era in mass merchandising with the advent of color television, Frank M. Folsom, President of RCA, told the National Retail Dry Goods Association recently at its annual convention in New York. "Perhaps no other facet of our American merchan- dising system stands to gain as much from the intensive selling capacities of color television as does the retailer," he said. "No one has as much or as great a variety of merchandise and services to sell as the department, chain and specialty stores of America. No one meets the buying public in greater numbers or more intimately. No one should be more interested in the most advanced and best selling techniques available for reaching that public. So it is that, with color Television, we combine sight, motion and sound to create a fabulous selling tool." Mr. Folsom and Robert A. Seidel, Executive Vice- President, RCA Consumer Products, spoke to the con- vention before and after a special closed-circuit color TV demonstration designed to show NRDGA members how color can be used effectively as a new merchandis- ing technique. The demonstration, produced by NBC TeleSales, originated at NBC's Colonial Theatre, at Broadway and 62nd Street in New York. Called "Wide Wide Window," the special closed- circuit program represented a translation of a typical retail store window into television, which serves as a window to bring the store's merchandise into the average television home. Included in the program were demonstrations of varied and newsworthy merchandise, and actual television selling techniques. Arlene Francis, star of NBC's "Home" program, was mistress of cere- monies for the demonstration show, which included as participants, Jinx Falkenburg, Bill Cullen, Pegeen Fitz- gerald, and more than twenty-five fashion models. The retailers, meeting at the Statler Hotel, saw the program on 40 RCA Victor color television sets in and around the grand ballroom of the hotel. Said Mr. Seidel: "Right now, RCA's dealers are selling color receivers at only about a thousand a week — but the volume is mounting daily. During 1956, RCA will manufacture — and our distributors and dealers alone will sell at a profit — upwards of 200 Thousand receivers. ... Of course, color TV needs to be sold. But what new product doesn't? But color television is truly wonderful, and hundreds of thousands of your customers can afford sets now, at today's low prices of from $695 to $995. Hundreds of thousands of others will be able to buy color sets in coming months, as production increases and prices are adjusred downward." RADIO AGE 5