Sponsor (July-Dec 1950)

Forecasts of things to come, as seen by sponsors editors Outlook 1950 radio set production 32% higher than preceding year Home, portable, and auto radio production in the first four months of 1950 is 32% ahead of the 1949 figure. This April, 882,706 sets were made as compared to 506,469 in April, 1949— an increase of 376,237. Portable set sales promotion during the coming summer months should keep sales and production figures at a continuing healthy level. Tobacco industry competition increases as cigarettes, pipe tobacco, cigars vie for favor Cigarette smoking is now at about 355,000,000,000 units a year, up 3,000,000,000 from 1949. Pipe smoking is up 8%, with pipe tobacco consumption 45% higher than it was during 1935-1939. The major cigarette companies will rely on big names like Godfrey, Como, Hope, and Benny to keep cigarette sales at a high level. Pipe smokers are being lured by Martin Kane — Private Eye (Model, Old Briar. Dill's Best, and Tweed on NBC-TV) ; Grand Ole Opry (Prince Albert, NBC); Sports For All (Mail Pouch Tobacco, MBS). The cigar makers appeal to their audience through newscasts and sports (Vandeventer & The News, WOR; Yankee baseball, WINS) ; and through national spot campaigns. Beer drinking at home is trend attributed to TV With the growth of TV, there is a trend toward more beer drinking at homes and less in public drinking places, according to R. J. Cheatwood. president of the National Beer Wholesalers' Association. This may precipitate a shift in merchandising and advertising, with heavy radio and TV advertisers like Pabst. Schlitz, Ballantine, and Blatz emphasizing the carry-home carton and no-deposit containers. Concentrated milk is latest in the frozen food field Frozen and concentrated milk is slated for sales tests later this year. If the success of hi-V, Snow Crop, and Minute Maid frozen fruit juices is any indication, frozen milk will find a ready market. Beatrice Foods Company researchers and other laboratories have been experimenting with quickfreezing concentrated milk for a year. Major drawback: the frozen product tends to have a slightly curdled appearance when it is made soluble. C. H. Haskell, president of Beatrice Foods, says the product should find its best market in states like Florida where milk sells for 25c to 30c a quart. When the product is ready, the success of spot radio for dairy firms points to use of that medium. Airlines, railroads take to the air to compete for passengers The airlines, both scheduled and non-scheduled, have had an exceptionally busy month. One airline executive attributes airline increases in the Chicago area to the rail strike in May. With travel increasing in the summer months, the airlines and railroads will fight it out for passengers through radio, TV, and other media. For example. T.W.A. and New York Central are both using broadcast advertising to gain passenger favor. T.W.A. is using spot radio and TV in New York. Chicago, and Los Angeles as well as some programing. The New York Central runs a spot radio campaign and non-scheduled airlines have also found spot advantageous. Video will be tested as medium for motion picture promotion The movie makers have long relied on newspaper linage to bring the customers into the nation's theatres. Then, for some time, companies like 20th Century Fox, Paramount, and Warner Brothers used spot radio to spur lagging attendance. Now TV, supposedly the movie "menace," will be added to Hollywood's promotion artillery. Columbia Pictures will use seven Los Angeles TV stations in a test against all other media in San Francisco. The campaign, costing around $14,000, Avill feature coming attractions of upcoming films designed to get the video viewer out of the house and into the movies. Success of the test will mean a sizable motion picture appropriation to TV. Mechanical dishwasher potential second only to television Approximately 5()( ).()()() mechanical dishwashers have been installed in homes in the last three years. And, says C. K. Reynolds, Jr., product sales manager of Apex Electric Manufacturing Company (Cleveland), "Our market potential is second only to television." He believes the industry will sell 300,000 dishwashers in 1950. With Hotpoint, General Electric, Westinghouse, Thor, and Apex in hot competition, broadcast advertising probably will be used. Less than 3% of more than 37,000,000 electricall) wired homes have switched to mechanical dishwashing. This compares with such "saturation" figures as 73% for clotheswashers; 80% for refrigerators; 18% for electric stoves; 13% for irons. 1950 looms as record year for automobile production and sales Auto production is expected to total 6,000,000 passenger cars and a million trucks in 1950 — a 13% increase over last year. Production is matched by heavy demand brought about by an increase in family income, family spending, and a strong replacement demand caused by the 16.000.000 pre-war cars siill in operation. Because of this bright sales picture, major auto makers are expanding their use of broadcast advertising. For example: the Ford Company is now plugging "two Fords to a family," showing the advantages ot owning two low-priced automobiles as compared to ownership of one expensive model. Oldsmobile (General Motors) is scheduling a weekly series of 18 radio and 10 video announcements this fall. S SPONSOR