Sponsor (Nov 1946-Oct 1947)

OPEN HOUSE Radio Station WCCO, Minneapolis, Minn., Saturdays, 9:30 J<> p.m. est PROGRAM: Taking ;i columnist-commentator and turning him into a quiz master isn't the easiest job in radio but WCCO has done it with their number one newscaster, Cedric Adams, and built a topnotch audience participating program around him. Cedric doesn't talk down to his victims and his stature isn't diminished by the studio crowd's calling him Cedric which gives you some idea of just how good Cedric is. Second plus for the show is that the prizes are all products for sale at the sponsor's (Sears) — that gets away from the freeplug-for-the-prizes that haunts so many quiz-program builders. Extra added bit of good programing is the strip-tease routine, in which the contestant undresses a manikin (wooden) as each question is answered correctly. Each garment so taken off the dummy belongs to the quiz participant. During the broadcast reviewed, the young lady undressing the girl manikin took its girdle right off. The questions (all the way through) are well planned and at least one of them makes use of the vocal talents of Bob Larkin, the singer on the show. It's a top-drawer job, production as well as program-wise, with a special bow to Wallace Olsen, musical director of the station, who leads the orchestra and does a couple of songs, instrumentally, during the proceedings. COMMERCIAL. Because the gifts are all on sale at Sears the plugs are painless. Frank Butler, who handles the commercials, is smooth and there's no question but that the show sells. In the press they featured Sears' Infant Sleepers at $1.10 and at the same time on the air Dr. Denton's at $1.65. Two thousand of the latter were sold and many newspaper ads that were sent in with mail orders carried a notation "we want the sleeper advertised on 0{>,n lions, if it is available." The Open lions, type of quiz is the answer to any department store's problem of selling without over-spieling. TIME. Tins has only been on the air for Sears since October 5 so proof of the time pull isn't at hand yet. Previous sponsor, Butternut Coffee, hit as high as 1 1. 1 for the January-April period. It's early in the morning but the audience is filling the studm bj l| am., a half hour before broad casl time. PROMOTION: Nothing unusual has been done to sell the program, though air time 40 has been used, newspaper space bought, and store-wide promotion has been utilized by Sears. Since it's producing everything that's expected ol it now. there seems little use for the station to over-extend itself at this time. (A merchandising program has been planned and will go into the works when needed. CREDITS: This is a station-built program which proves what can be done with local shows. Everything's as smooth as could be desired with Wallace Olsen, Bob Larkin, Frank Butler, and Cedric Adams all due for deep bows. THE EARLY MORNING FROLIC Radio Station CKLW. Detroit-Windsor. Daily, 6-9 a.m. est PROGRAM: This show is 13 going on 14 and it's as fresh as it was in 1938 (five years after it was first heard i when the boys, Joe Gentile and Ralph Binge, started going to town commercially. It has everything that every other rise and shine program has but you'd never know it. The time, the weather, and the commercials bear no resemblance to any other known form of madness. The belly laughs are not extra-added attractions but the commercial basis of the program. If anyone else but these two attempted a skit in which they try to bring a 12-foot monster to life and fail to move him until they dose the Frankenstein conception with Dr. Caldwell's laxative, he'd be barred from the air. With Gentile and Binge i that last name is real -not a gag) it even entertains families like A. G. Ruthven's (he's U. of Michigan prcxy . COMMERCIAL: This is one across-theboard series (daily that is. with the exception of recorded musical interludes that are whisked on and off. 100 per cent commercial and not even the Federal Communications Commission has thought of squawking. The boys are apt to shock their sponsors in everything but the cash register -where they still ring the bell, with such things as downhill eyeglasses ("They make the job of mailmen, salesmen, and policemen seem downhill all day-long.") Spots are sold on a $20-a-time basis and the waiting list is long and drooling. TIME: Earlj morning competition is usually run-of-the-mill and while there are some good get'em-uppers in Detroit this show is really stiff competition. It nol only gets its audience but it holds it. PROMOTION: Dick Jones, commercial manager of CKLW, doubles as press agent and promotion man extraordinary for this show. There's been a steady flow of copy about Gentile and Binge in the newspapers (they're always doing something that's good copy Time, Vogue. Band Leader, and Libi rty are just four of the national publications that have stopped being national long enough to plug the Gentile-Binge combination . . . and that of course means CKLW too. CREDITS: Joe Gentile and Ralph Binge are the duo to whom all the credit belongs, although J. E. Campeau, who graduated from salesman to manager of the station, has backed the boys up every time (since 1938 that they needed it -you can't be nuts before the mike without a station manager who's nuts with you. COMPANY'S COMING Radio Station WOW, Omaha. Monday through Friday, 12:30-12:45 p.m. est PROGRAM: This, a light zany 15 mil is far better than the writing on the program. It is planned to reach the home while mother is cooking. Russ Baker does the scripting but he's better as mc and Ray Olson, two-time Davis Award Cup winner, is delightful as is the singer-stooge, Morton Wells. The format is just a couple of guys between a couple of songs by a three-piece musical combine and one of three singers who slip in and out of the program on different days. The quality of the "humor" may be noted in a typical routine which had Russ Baker trying to steal a bone from a dog fit had some meat on it), ending with a line to the effect that it could definitely be stated at that time that the "program was going to the dogs." COMMERCIAL: Most of the advertising is straight yet the show simply screams for some light-comedy sales treatment of the sponsor's "Ever Fresh" line of frozen and ready-to-cook poultry products and butter. Highlight of the selling is the cooking hint, which is very nicely handled by Russ Baker. It's serious but there's a wee smile in it as Baker does it TIME: Noon is a good time to talk food, if you can catch your audience. Company's Coming has an Omaha rating of 10 which at lunch time means it has caught on. CREDITS: The boys who do this show are top staff members of WOW. Russ Baker is head of the station's newly organized television department. Ray Olson is production manager of the station. The sponsors, C. A. Swanson and Sons, fee! they have a happy buy in Company's Coming, which is a swell title even if it shouldn't happen company come) at noon. TELE-VARIETIES WNBT, New York. NBC-TV, Sundays. 8:15-8:30 p.m. >st PROGRAM: The lirst scanning of this I tecember 8 indicated what every SPONSOR .