Radio Broadcast (May 1929-Apr 1930)

A WideAwake Dealer Solves Some Problems That Every Radio Merchant Meets Whitaker, of Bradentown General view of Whitaker s service shop B. B. Barber tells — bases his success on adhering strictly to four business principles: 1. Prompt and intelligent service. 2. Consistent and persistent advertising. 3. Outside selling with home demonstrations. U. A simple, complete cost system. IIIHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIMIIIt WHAT A FLORIDA DEALER DID Operating in a town of 18,000 where radio 's reception other than that from local stations is limited to about six months of the year, j. A. K. Whitaker, of Bradentown, Florida, has done a job of radio merchandising which is outstanding. The factors on which Whitaker has built a monument of success are only four. And these four factors, he feels, will serve to spell success for any dealer anywhere who will apply the principles, adapting them to the more or less local conditions with which he may be surrounded. Whitaker 's Four Principles As outlined by Whitaker these principles are: 1. Prompt and intelligent service. 2. Consistent and persistent advertising. 3. Outside selling with home demonstrations. 4. A simple, complete cost system. After the bottom had fallen out of Florida real estate, Whitaker opened his store, June, 1926, with two lines of radio and an electrical refrigerator account. It is interesting to note that none of the original lines is carried to-day; the electrical refrigeration business passed out of the picture completely, while the two former lines of radio have long since been abandoned in favor of other lines, featuring Atwater Kent. A line of talking machines replaced the refrigerators and to-day t he business is exclusively musical, being confined to these two lines and their appurtenances. In launching his radio business, Whitaker determined at once to secure a line on the radio situation as it existed in the homes of the territory he proposed to serve, to learn what sort of radio equipment had been sold prior to his entering the field, how much of it had been sold, and if possible the condition of that equipment. As the survey progressed, most of it being done over the telephone on a standardized talk, he realized that he was learning exactly who his prospects were, which families owned sets and which did not, and which owners of old sets were about ready to buy new ones. He wound up with a clean fist of interested prospects on which he decided to concentrate his selling efforts. As his sets began to move into Florida homes Whitaker used his telephone again and again. From his satisfied owners he secured the names of friends who had heard the new instruments and had expressed interest in them. Many of these he converted into customers and then he repeated the process, widening his circle of contacts through sets serviced or sold. The Service System But getting back to Whitaker's four principles for conducting a successful radio business and considering them in their proper order, or at least in the order in which he sets them forth, we find first that he is a stickler for having all the facts at hand. This is indicated by the "Service Record Card" which is printed on two colors of stock: pink for those sets which he has sold and white for the sets of other makes sold by others. The "work ticket" numbers of all jobs, whether cash or charge, are kept on the individual card with the amount of the purchase. On these cards, in condensed form, is 200 • • AUGUST 1929 •