Variety (December 1922)

rwt'jTL'. . . 'r.-T i Friday, December 29, 1922 VARIETY v^^:^; :/■■.:;■.; •:■ i ■ •• . ^ \ : ■ -t'' ,r* ..:'1'- .- *N .y^, Tickets .<.. to the Public A.. ■ :■*■ -.'t j»*. IS- The sale of seats to a theatre-going^public is a highly special- ized form of merchandising, so specialized there is none other that in an off hand manner can be compared to it. It is selling the most perishable merchandise ill the world, for there is noth- ing that is more invaluable than an unsold theatre ticket. Noth- ing m the world is deader than **deadwood/* as unsold theitre tickets are termed. t . The Producing Managers' Association is trying to evolve a plan whereby the sale of theatre tickets will be wrested from the hands of a number of *'gyps/* who have been fattening themselves by the sale of tickets at exorbitant advanced prices. This plan, they hope, will restore the confidence of the amuse- ment seeking public in the theatre and the theatre^ managers, and thus revive a patronage that has been steadily drooping for several years. This time is the most propitious to bring to the mind of the Board of Directors of P. M. A. that theatre ticket selling is a specialized business, best handled by those men who have spent their whole life selling tickets, y V Public Without Faith * A ^ The public has lost faith in the box office and even should the managers come to a mutual understanding that no seats should be sold through any other channel than their box offices the public wouldn't believe them. Therefore, in coming to a realization that there should be some radical change made in the method of sale of tickets to the public and the decision th4t a centralized or consolidated theatre ticket office was to be the solution of their problem, the membership of the P. M. A. have taken the first real step in a reconstruction work that might possibly bring the public back to the theatre. But they do not.want to overlook that^whatever sort of a combination theatre ticket office they decide to operate, they must have real ticket men to handle it for them. Real ticket men are mighty few and far between. That goes for the men operating agencies as well as the treasurers. In the ranks of the former the majority are **gyps** who have come into the ticket business within the last decade. . Three Capable Men - > Among the entire list of ticket men there are but three men standing out as possessed of the necessary quahfications to command the innovation which the managers propose to create. One is a man who has vTsion and yet is practical; the other is a born ticket man, his father having been one before him, and the third, a ticket man in the fullest sense of the word, who at one time was the head of a theatre ticket central office system for the use of a group of agencies. The first developed an innovation in merchandising theatre tickets at a time when the managers had unsuccessfully tried to do the same thing; fill the balconies and galleries of their theatres in those slump days for five years or so before the war. At that time the managers got out half price coupons and distributed them through the People's Institute, Wage Earners' Theatre League and ot|ier distribution methods, but the desired result wasn't obtained. At that point a ticket man came along. The managers didn't particularly like his idea, but he dem- onstrated in a short time he was able to accomplish for them the things that they were trying to do unsuccessfully—that of getting the public to patronize the upper floors of their theatres. True, the seats were sold to the public at half price, but the managers were trying to do the selfsame thing with their half rate coupons, but the public would not come. It was this man's merchandising sense that brought the public to his bar- v\.^-i-.J' gain counter arid made them pay for something that the mana- gers couldn^t give them* for nothing. He has sinci developed the business of selling to the public and developing new theatre- goers to a point where it really is a fine art, and it is his vision that evolved the plan which is now under consideration by the managers. Whether or not he will have the assignment to place it in execution is another matter, but it seems that anyone else appointed would without doubt try to change the plan soUhat it might be impractical in its workings, thus discrediting the one who originally worked it out. The born ticket man also went before the managers with a proposal for the selling of seats. This ^orn ticket man to a certain extent has been tremendously successful in merchan- dising tickets, but his clientele has rather been the class element among the theatregoers and he has not had the mass experience of the othefr, who sells to thousands where this ope sells to hundreds. ;> ^ -> Speaking of the third, he has had a tremendous amount of experience merchandising, both in and out of the ticket busi- ness, but always essentially a ticket man. He too has vision and i3 a capable organizer and would be a valuable asset to such' an institution which the managers propose to inaugurate. All three of these or a combination of two of them would be the ideal solution for the executive heads of the Centralized ^^Theatre Ticket Office. Know Value of Service They all know the value of service to the prospective jpiatron and they would undoubtedly immediately wipe out the many little acts of discourtesy that have tended to drive the entertain- ment seeker away from the theatre. Incidentally, they will also understand the necessity of real ticket men behind their counters when the Centralized Ticket Office becomes a reality. This is going to be the alUmportant contact point between the public and the sponsors of the innova- tion. Here is the point where the actual battle must be fought and it is going to take real ticket men to win the public back. Not the abrupt *'all sold out" or *'Naw, we ain't got nothing better" type of ticket seller. He isn't the one to make the -proposition a success, nor is the wiping out of the entire sales force of the theatre of today going to bring victory, but the retention of those who in a sale of tickets realize that they are just as much the servant of the buying public as the man behind the counter in any department store. Those men realizing the public is entitled to courteous treatment when they are spend- ing their money are the ones that should be divisional heads in the sales organization, responsible to the executives for the .conduct of their subordinates and for the tickets that they handle. * ■■\^'^%-''■■■■ ^.^ . ^--^ ■;■■:■.-".:-^/ ^ ^ Broadway Treasurers Qualify There are many treasurers of Broadway theatres who'are capable and who really qualify as salesmen of the first rank. There are some who .are arrogant and abrupt and without the slightest sense of obligation that they should have toward their employer or public. They are not ticket men and they are not wanted. Sales people fi'om other walks in business under the direction and training of those that are capable should be re- ' cruited and thus the counter work of the Centralized Agency would become a real service to the public. Atop of all there must be a realization in the minds of all of those connected with the innovation that their attitude toward the public must have as its slogan, "Courtesy, Efficiency, "Courtesy."