Weekly television digest (Jan-Dec 1963)

TELEVISION DIGEST-7 i NEW SERIES VOL. 3, No. 43 MANUFACTURING, DISTRIBUTION, FINANCE ! i! i ’FORM FREEDOM’ EXPANDS HI-FI MARKET: This year's most important trend in stereo hi-fi I j business, from where we sit, is not transistorization, but new ’’freedom of form,” which is broaden. ing the phono market. Trend is still in infancy, should expand considerably in next few years. Here’s what we mean. In stereo's beginning there were hi-fi components made by so-called i ’’audiophile” manufacturers. These were then joined by consoles & portables— ’’package” goods built i ;by big mass manufacturers. Consumer’s choice was limited by these designs and his pocketbook. j Big change— several years in making— was most evident this year. One phase of it is flexibility in package units— such ’’fvmctional furnitiire” pieces as coffee tables, end tables, room dividers, hutches, jl window seats. Add to this the table-model phono— one which drops all pretense of being portable, and is gradually becoming a new breed of instrument. 1 Perhaps most significant is realization that decision of components -vs .-package is not matter of I quality but matter of form. Thus last 18 months have seen tentative forays into ’’component concepts” by traditional package manufacturers. Component packages are now being offered to conventional nonj audiophile buyer by V-M, Webcor, Magnavox & GE. Other side of coin has been recognition by audiophile manufacturers that there may be market for i (packaged versions of their equipment. This trend really started many years ago, when these manuj. facturers began combining tuner & amplifier (once considered an impardonable sin). Today both FishI er & H.H. Scott have extensive console lines, and KLH has highly successful portable phono at$199.95. I j It's all part of what was called the ’’quality revolution” by Vp-Gen. Mgr. Roland J. Kalb of Pilot ii; Radio, which has long been in both component & package hi-fi fields. Discussing with newsmen his ji' observations on swing through major markets in last 2-1/2 months, Kalb insisted last week that quality ! is now more important to consumer than price, submitting EIA 8-month phono sales figures to back up ji; this view: $300-&-up category, 26% increase over 1962;' $400-&-up, 42% increase. ! By same token, Kalb sees decline of discoimt selling in high quality stereo field. In addition, he ! thinks audio components have outgrown Ma-&-Pa and ’’enthusiast” stores, and that they will more & more be important item for ’’major merchandisers,” particularly dept, stores. Although Pilot's components can be classed as "audiophile” merchandise, Kalb— by backgroimd & ( disposition— shies away from engineering salesmanship. Major merchandisers will handle component 1 ; goods, he says, when manufacturers make it easy for them. By this he means the "component packI age” approach, permitting sales of matched component ensembles, which do not require extensive ; inventories. With the bookshelf speaker and the exposed tuner -amplifier becoming important status symbols, j it was inevitable that mass-product manufacturers would try their hands in "component ensemble” , business. Traditional "phonograph” has fled confines of its rigid console -or -portable format. We think new wide choice of forms— with expansion of this trend to come in next year or 2— will do more than any other single innovation to increase sales of middle-& higher-priced phonos. ) * ♦ ♦ ♦ 1 That long-pending hi-fi definition is being "held in abeyance” for several months in hopes that more suggestions will be received, we were told last week by FTC spokesman. FTC has received proposals from EIA and several individual manufacturers, but audiophile manufacturers' principal j spokesman. Institute of High Fidelity, has not yet been heard from formally. ”We may eventually 1 make a recommendation to the Commission on the basis of what's already in our file,” spokesman * told us. On other hand, there seemed to be slight indication that FTC might be disposed to drop entire project.