Sponsor (Oct-Dec 1962)

^SPONSOR-SCOPE Continued In the area of ad agency management 1963 will probably go down as the year when the era of the computer was met by staffing up with people who had this sole function: knowing how to program the machines. The consensus of the business is the cost of the required computers ($5-7 million) is much too prohibitive for purchase by the general run of upper bracket agencies and that the practice will be to go out and rent machine time as needed. The dawn of the computer era in advertising will do more than presage a new relationship between the agency and the client, such as making available by the client sales, product usage and other data as basic contributions to the decision-making process. It will underscore and magnify the role of the media specialist. The theory that presupposes this is that the function of the researcher will not be one of command. He, broadly speaking, has no knowledge of media; hence he'll have no pragmatic interest in the answer. On the other hand, the experienced media man knows first of all what is being used and why; hence he does care about the answer and is in a position to match his knowledge of media realities to what the machine tells him. Another thing to look for is the refusal of the agency's tv program department to be shunted aside in the media selection procedure. It deems show-picking its vested interest and it must see that this power is not usurped, or risk possible liquidation. Colgate's drug division is backing up the return of its sustained action cold remedy, Congestaid, with an 11-week spot tv campaign. Schedules take effect 25 November, with a week's layoff Christmas week. Congestaid, a competitor to Contac, was returned to the laboratory last season after some market testing. Lennen & Newell is the agency. It may behoove tv to take a bow because of what Rexall plans to do about its lg sales come 1963. These sales have been traditionally held in November and April, but the way things have worked out for the promotions in tv there'll also be lg Rexall sales in January and March. For these events Rexall has gone in for a full week daytime blitz on two or three networks. It's obviously paid off big. Are you looking for extra intelligence on the viewing habits of the working woman (she who spends at least 20 hours a week at non-household jobs) ? NBC TV's circulating some Nielsen findings on the subject, which by segments of the day resolves itself as follows: Daytime: She spends 70% as much time viewing as other women. Early evening: She doesn't spend as much time at the set as her non-working sisterhood. (Obviously, she's got a lot of household chores to make up for.) Prime evening: She views only 5% less than the non-working woman. Late evening: She puts in 8% more viewing than the gals who have no outside jobs. (Apparently she is inclined to make up for that lost quota of daytime viewing.) The guess around the trade is that CBS TV will spot Danny Kaye and his entourage, due for next season, in the Sunday 9 to 10 span, the McCoys moved to 8 Monday. If Sunday becomes Kaye's night the move will have this provocative effect: depriving General Electric of a franchise it has commanded for at least seven seasons. Kaye has been offered to the networks on a basis of 40 originals at $150,000 each and 12 repeats at $50,000 per show. SPONSOR/29 October 1962