Variety (Dec 1944)

\\ (Mhicsday, December ST, 1944 RADIO 27 Nielsen Survey, Claiming Truer I^c Of Audiences, Will Expand Postwar By BILL HUNT Chicago, Deo. Ifl. Fir.-l coiiipreh«nsive explanation (■[ ilic Nielsen Radio Index, long a niysteiy even to the experts, giv»n lii-. e rc'cenlly by a top Nielsen ex»o, firows Hint principal differences b«- tvvcon-N'ielseii, Crossley d/ici Hooper Tiiclliocis or and measurement are live, 10 wit: 1. Nielsen gets into non-telephone homes as well as those wilh-phones. C. h H. self-titled "coincidental phone niethod" surveys hit only llio.^c with phones. 2. Niel.<cn meter aulomatically cli.iils listening time for all programs on iipiy and all stations tuntd in, net- work or indie, 24-hours-a-day, com- paied with spot-checks by . Hooper siul C.KB. thus gaugiUo exact time li.ilencr.s dial in, how long Ihey stay tuned in, and when they tune out. It provides a niinute-by-minute study of liie program audience, thereby enabling the programmers to spot commercial plugs at the correct places lo reach the greatest li.stening Hiidionee. ;i. .Nielsen has a more closely con- trolled sample—ad agency jargon )neani]i.sj that by actually sending his eiiKinecrs into'homes to hook listen- jiifi-mcasure gadgets on radios he delcimincs exactly what income bracket the family is in, if it has more than one radio, if it is rural or urban, etc. Without a controlled >amplc. it's argued, any kind cl poll can be catastrophic, as witness what happened to Literary Digest following a helter-skelter presiden- tial .sliaw vote a few years back. 4. In addition to urban auds reached by C. 4c H., Nielsen gets a line on listening habits in rural communities. .■). Not in use yet, due to man- power -shorlages, but in the making l>- a doorbell-ringing survey of all conunodilics purchased for the home, a i.i Industrial Surveys. Besides the difference listed, Niel- sen also claims the actual slice of radio raniilics reached by C. it H. is only about 18%, whereas he cross- sections 27%. Explained that C. & H. surveys in 32 and 33 coast-to-coast metropolitan areas, respectively, ac- count for 34% of all radio families in the U. S. Fifty-three per cent of all urban families in the areas cov- ered by C. & H. own telephones; hence, actual percentage reached by the two vel.s is said to be only about IB-;,. Nielsen, on the other' hand, ftay- ing in a comparatively small area and avoiding Mountain and Pacific lime iiones, claims he can account for listening tastes of approximately eight million, radio families, or loughly 27 per cent, merely metering Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illi- nois, lower Michigan, Wisconsin, and eastern quarter of Missouri. Post- war possibilities, needless to point out, are staggering. Because of the present "averaging" methods, none of them have a 100% coverage, and all are "indicative but not conclu- . sive." Expansion Planned Nielsen reps, it's claimed, visit homes in every wage earner bracket, including farms and non-phone homes, attaching the Nielsen Audi- meter, a combination graph and motor gimmick that charts actual use of radio minute-by-mlnute through the day and night, also showing what stations are tuned In and for how long. Only 1,000 of these, because of shortage of mate- rials, are in use now, but wholesale postwar production is promised. Eight hundred are in one-radio homes, remaining 200 being spotted • m two or muUl-racfio homes. Pur- ported that these homes are typi^ of between 8,000,000 and 10,000,i ■ in every income stage. Gadget, in addition to its impor- lance as an aid in helping sponsors ^d producers build up shows, 1^ . vital in locating commercials within ine programs in order to reach max- ■mum number of llstenei's. Along with the expected manu- ■ facture of the meters lmmediat«ly aiier the war, Nielsen expects to Mt started on door-to-door housewife polls. Aim here, If a new item ap- pears In the home one month, Is to . and oat what, influenced the famUy >o buy it, pitch being that radio or What-not did an efficient salei Job say,- a bar of "Saby Dumpllna" . -oap shows up on the shelf ihottTy aner the "Baby Dumpling" soaper « Preemcd. Radio Index ig a comparatively Ifoent development of the A. C. Sflelsen Co., Chicago, fa.Tioun for /cars as originators of Nielsen drug tnd food Indices and, more recently, a liquor Index. Tj^ete are market and home survey', aimed to help large Industries In niuniifacture and distribution of their . produels, in whloh agents check stock supplies on shelves In stores and in family pantries, . iceboxes and bathroom oabinets. Numbered among the com- pany's accounts are Sterling Prod- ucts, Qeiieral Mills, Procter & Gam- ble, Lever Bros, and Kellogg. Lit Stanza on WHN,N. Y., Looks O.K. for Bankroll "Author Meets Critic," forum- format half-hour .«uslainer on WHN, N.Y., for past three years is expect- ed to iiab a .sponsor In February, if negotiations by Book of the Month. Club are successful. Program, heard 8-8:30 p.m. Mon- days, features di.seussion.s among S. K. M. McCaflery; assoc. ed. of American mag; Sterling North, lit- erary critic of the N. Y. Post, plus weekly guest critic and gliest author. Voted 'Most Popular' Several disc-jockeys on N. Y. indies who have become prima donnas since jumping out of the announcer.s' salary class iiUo the coin-making cycle (hat goes Willi 'commercial bankrolling, arc getting .<:o hard to work with, engineers handling theiv pro- grams have given them a new name. Tliey are now known as "Disc- .lei keys." Ex-Radio Guys Handling Pitt WAC Recruiter I Pitt.'iburgh. Dec. 26. .\ new program to spur WAC re- cruiting in his territory, which was launched over KDKA last Saturday afternoon i23) under the title of "AVcek-End Pass," is .being written and. produced by a couple of former Pittsburgh radio men now in the 1 service. Sgt. Bob Shield, ex-produ- cor at KDKA, is directing the show and it's being scripted by Cpl. Phil Davis, who once headed continuity department at WCAE. Both Shield and Davis have been slalioned in Pittsburgh now for some time. Show fea'aires Dick Averre's four- some, ciu'rent musical unit at Hotel Roosevelt's Fiesta Room, and Jcannie Regal, local radio and band singer. Det. Station's Art Classes for School Click With Folks at Home, Too Detroit. Dee. 26. Proriuciiig school radio programs of interest to the general public is no e='sy ta.sk on anybody's rariio .station but WJR here is doing the added trick of teaching "art appre- ciation" without television. Tile station found it easy to pro- vide 9:45 a.m. musical programs for Detroil'.s parochial .schools which would still hold tlie interest of tlie regular adult audience. But the tough problem came up when the Detroit public .schools wanted to have art appreciation on the Thurs- day morning program to wliich their school radios are directed. Art, unlike music, has to bo seen 10 be appreciated, everybody a.yreed. so they loft it up to Mark Hass. WJRs educational director, und Mr.s. Kathleen Lardie, the public school's radio..cducation director, to find a way. This is the way they imkinkcrt it —without benefit of television: Kadi program is devoted to one of the famous paintings in the Detroit In- stitute of Arts. After ;t is selected by the Institute odicials, approxi- mately 5,000 reproduction.s, "through the courtesy of WJR," are furnished, oloiig with a story of the painting, the artist and the hisloricial back- sroimd, to students and teachers In hundreds of classrooms. The reprints arc before the ptu- denls as they listen to the:r radio lesson—a dramatization of the inci- dent w'hich inspired a t eat painting. The actors are chosen from a select group 'of students studying radio drama. . The program is conducted so tlie general listening public is unaware of the direct educational purpose underlying the broadcast of picttncs brought to life. At the same lime, the students feel the program Is beamed directly to them. Tlie educational programs evi- dently are not cutting off the sta- tion's adult .nudience for it lias con- tinued for the past 12 months lo liave the highest morning Hooper among local .stations. .•\kron.—Peg Rogers McPhcrson will be in charge of continuity and women's activities for WIIKK, which is expected to begin broadca.sting operations shortly after the first of the year. T.. or how to win the Boltimore morket! No Horatio Alger story this—just a pay-off trio .. . hortietown product . ... hometown program . . . and Baltimort't own big hometown Station WFBR. And tht ^Program?—the now famous "Quiz of Two Cltitt" . . . running in rival cities all over the nation, but originally created at WFBR over six years ago for tht Qunther Brewing Company whose bottled beer roee from third place to first place in this most com- petitive beer market. Ineldentally, and coincidentally, the ratings for six years at no time show /ess than 31% of the •AfHK^-—Booth, Vltlffy *- Schwinn, Inc. listeners tuned to the "Quiz" on WFBR and the peak has hit 71% of all listeners. Some record for a night-time program! Even if it were network with the erstwhile Prince of Wales ' abdicating his much publicized throne. Remember the above facts when"' people start talking about RESULTS in Baltimore! Yes, if you want to know what to buy in Baltimore . . . buy what the successful home town boys have always bought and are buying today ... W ... F ... B ... R. MFMBER - MUTUAL.IR0ADCASTIII6 SYSTEM.* NATIONAL REPRESENTATIVE-JOHK BUIR i'CO.