Radio and Television Today (Jan-Nov 1941)

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HOW DEALERS SELL FM ^^8 NEW METHODS USED IN "QUALITY RADIO" MERCHANDISING When a retailer can average up his unit sales in receivers and get a figure over $300 he's sitting pretty. It's happening in FM today. But a dealer does not inherit that kind of business simply because his battered shingle hangs on the street. He has to do some extra work, and make some sales plans that are specific, aggressive and enlightened. In the FM areas, many radio men have already roused themselves to new merchandising procedures. To report these, Radio Today has consulted both the specialist in the skyscraper and the man at the whistle stop. In the first place, retailers should sail into the merchandising of FM with some pioneering plans, declares Ben Gross, the Stromberg Carlson executive who is widely recognized as an expert on selling higher-priced radio. Mr. Gross reminds us that dealers have searched long and desperately for a radio development that would give the buying public a valid and dramatic reason for buying a new radio. Many of the AM "gadgets" have failed in this respect, in spite of vigorous promotion efforts to describe them as major radio improvements. FM is the answer, he says, to the retailer's plea for merchandise that is spectacularly and genuinely new. Thus it deserves a specific sales procedure of the all-out character. First among his store-tested suggestions as to how to handle the new sales, is one about how to reply intelligently to the many folks who come in with the simple query, '"What's this FM I hear about?" This question is a frequent one, and the answer often determines the success or failure of the whole encounter. GET THE INFO To be able -to answer in a sales-producing manner, Mr. Gross recommends that the dealer school himself carefully on (1) what it is, (2) how it was developed, and (3) what it will do. This information should be assembled with the confident feeling that such matters arc not for engineers OCTOBER, 7947 only. An adequate "talking" knowledge of FM can be grasped and packaged for the public, by the most non-technical of radio men. It should be regarded as an interesting and comfortable advance in a major radio development. As for actual demonstrations in stores, this executive suggests that the prospect be taken first to hear a first-rate program on a good AM set. There is no need of mentioning at this point that AM is being demonstrated. Proceed to "destroy" this by a noise-creating device, such as an electric razor or some other item familiar to the prospect, which will give the result desired. Now you turn to FM, in magnificent contrast to the noisy AM, and then demonstrate how it is untouched by the noisy appliance. Sets used in this stunt should all be the same make so that the emphasis goes directly onto the system, rather than the make. Home demonstrations, says Mr. Gross, now have an entirely new meaning for the dealer, and 1941 store policies should be based on this fact. It is pointed out that once the luxuriant tones of FM are produced for the prospect in {Continued on page 58) A resounding demonstration of FM by GE experts, working with noisemakers plus miniature AM and FM transmitters.