Sponsor (Jan-June 1956)

IS ON THE AIR reaching thousands of prospective customers in this area i read promotion! Make if work for y ow ! ' Branches promote radio : Each of company's 67 field offices shows display card with local radio personality, time schedules Brush man might be $1.50; for a cosmetic canvasser, $1 to $2. But the average unit sale for Tilo is $700, a major investment for any householder. It isn't too difficult to sell a toothbrush or a lipstick to the lady of the house, but it's a sales problem of another level entirely when you're asking the homeowners to sign for a new roof when the old one isn't leaking — yet. Tilo has other selling problems. Even though it's 42 years old, its firm and product name hadn't really been bandied about until the company started on radio last September with an experimental four-station announcement schedule. Says P. E. Donnellon, Tilo vice president in charge of sales and advertising: "We started out with an idea of testing in four cities how Tilo's name would be received by radio listeners and how Tilo field men — both managers and salesmen — measured radio response in their local area. We isolated the radio areas from each other, so there would be no audience overlap. We used WCBS, New York; WGAN, Portland, Me.; WWNY, Watertown, N. Y., and WPRO, Providence. "In every one of these areas we found the particular kind of results we wanted were being delivered." At that point, Tilo began preparations for launching a full-scale 26week drive on the 28 Yankee stations. This keyed the original radio plan recommended by executives of Moore and Co. advertising agency in Stamford. Conn., which has serviced the Tilo account eight years. Tilo, before entering the radio realm, used very little advertising of any kind. Its biggest promotional emphasis went to telephone directory yellow pages in local markets where it maintained fully-staffed field offices. The two Moore agency executives who presented that first radio recommendation were President Joseph Moore, who supervises the Tilo account and William E. Bolster, executive on the account. This is Bolster's explanation of why radio was chosen to present the Tilo concept. Comparing the traditional use of local newspapers by accounts of this kind, he says: "With radio, you don't get listener distraction. You can pinpoint exactly whom you want. "An even bigger reason for recommending radio is the fact that our primary audience target is the woman. We want to talk with her, get our ideas across, help our salesmen get in to see her and then have her ask him to come back when her husband is home. "With radio, we get the element of personalized selling. It's more personal than printed advertising, more persuasive." Tilo's radio buying matches exactly its marketing areas, and meets the specifications of its marketing demands. These marketing demands have changed enormously since 1914, when Fenton R. Brydle rounded up $2,000 to invest in his own roofing business. He offered a new service and a new sales method. He sent local men from house to house to talk with housewives and suggest they invest money in Tilo roofing or siding. Only Tilo-trained workmen would install the materials, and work was always guaranteed. For the first time, a property owner bought roofing or sidewall materials and had them installed by the same company. Tilo operated that first year from a single office in Bridgeport, Conn., yet in that time Brydle bagged 650 customers. A decade later in 1924, Tilo boasted 10 branch offices, $1 million in finan( Please turn to page 72) **-*< Uses radio letterhead: All correspondence has this heading TILO BUYS 37 OUTLETS IN 9-STATE EASTERN AREA 28 stations in The Yankee Network WAAB, Worcester, Mass. WABI, Bangor, Me. WABM, Houlton, Me. WACM, Presque Isle, Me. WALE, Fall River, Mass. WARE, Ware, Mass. WBRK, Pittsfield, Mass. WCOU, Lewiston, Me. WDEV, Waterbury, Vt. WEAN, Providence, R. I. WEIM, Fitchburg, Mass. WFAU, Augusta, Me. WCTH, Hartford, Conn. WHAI, Creenfield, Mass. WIDE, Biddeford, Me. WKNE, Keene, N. H. WLLH, Lowell, Mass. WMAS, Springfield, Mass. WMUR, Manchester, N. H. WNAB, Bridgeport, Conn. WNAC, Boston, Mass. WNBH, New Bedford, Mass. WNLC, New London, Conn. WOCB, W. Yarmouth, Mass. WPOR, Portland, Me. WSYB, Rutland, Vt. WWCO, Waterbury, Conn. WWSR, St. Albans, Vt. And 9 additional outlets WBOC, Salisbury, Md. WCAU, Philadelphia, Pa. WCBS, New York City WEOK, Poughkeepsie, N. Y. WCR, Buffalo, N. Y. WCY, Schenectady, N. Y. WHEC, Rochester, N. Y. WNBF, Binghamton, N. Y. WSYR, Syracuse, N. Y. 25 JUNE 1956 31