Ballyhoo (Jun 1960)

Page scan 0004 from Ballyhoo

Record Details:

Title:
Ballyhoo
Date:
Jun 1960
Volume:
Time Out for Ticket Talk (Jun 1960, no date)
Leaf #:
0004
Language:
English
Collection:
Canada, Global Cinema, and Hollywood Studio System
Format:
Periodicals
Contributor:
Media History Digital Library, Greig Dymond in memory of David Dymond, Paul Moore and Jessica Whitehead
Coordinator:
Media History Digital Library
Description:

Ballyhoo

  • Ontario 'B' District Ballyhoo, editor: Dan Krendel (1952-55)
  • Profit Blitz for ‘Fitz’, editor: Dan Krendel (1955)
  • National Ballyhoo, editor: Dan Krendel (1956-57)
  • Time Out for Ticket Talk, editor: Norman Barker (1960-61)

Ballyhoo (1952-61) was published by Famous Players Canadian Corporation as a mimeographed internal sales and theatre managers’ newsletter. Editor, Dan Krendel, had been division manager of the Ontario ‘B’ District since 1942, and initially created Ballyhoo in 1952 to circulate weekly updates for a regional sales contest. Ontario ‘B’ District Ballyhoo continued until 1955 as a tool for sharing and incentivizing new sales techniques and publicity methods as the movie business declined in the face of television and the baby boom.

In Fall 1955, Profit Blitz for ‘Fitz’ was a nationwide sales contest, named for Famous Players’ president J. J. Fitzgibbons, honouring his 25th year as head of the business. Dan Krendel was made National Drive Captain and edited a weekly newsletter for the campaign.

From 1956 until at least 1957, National Ballyhoo was published weekly with Krendel as editor. He continued the style and content developed earlier for his Ontario ‘B’ District, but now extended vastly for a chain-wide coast to coast scale. Ballyhoo’s sharing promotional tools came at a time of contracting box office as television and automobile ownership became prevalent in the mid-1950s.

By 1960 until at least 1961, Time Out for Ticket Talk continued as a mimeographed newsletter, edited by Norman Barker of the head office publicity department. Time Out was compiled on a less ambitious scale than Ballyhoo. Compared to the earlier national compilation of local publicity gimmicks, Time Out often contained only a single memo or reproduced local story, and was often undated and only informally edited.

– Paul Moore, March 2024

Date Added:
April 11, 2024
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: terrific co-operation that I received from Theatre Confections Limited. Jack Fitzgibbons, Norm Rea and Harry Sullivan, leave no stone unturned in order to make success come your direction, and it's a pretty wonderful feeling to start off on a series of this type knowing that you have backing of this calibre. To sum up, these projects take a lot of time, but believe me, it is well worth any effort you put into it. Quite apart from the fact that you sell a lot of confections and take money to the bank, both very important items, you build up a tremendous amount of good will for your theatre. I know in my own case that these projects have opened more doors for me than anything else I lave ever done or could think of at the moment. The whole city is aware of the project and everyone thinks kindly of the theatre for initiating the promotion and providing the leadership. And what is important for you to know is that yor regular matinee attendance on Saturday does not suffer as a result of these free shows. By actual count, using figures from our 2h-sheet, our matinees for the ten weeks that the series was running, increased by 56.3% and for the ten weeks after the series, increased by another 45.8% or a total increase of 102.1% over the 20 week period, during and after the series, in addition to the guaranteed rental provided for us by the morning show. Our merchants love the idea and I have had them tell me that they look forward to these shows because parents leave the children for us to baby-sit while they shop in comfort, knowing the children are receiving safety instructions and good clean entertainment, in comfcrtable, clean, safe and well supervised surroundings.