meet one of this reporter's best friends and use real camera cost about three thousand dollars worth every penny of it with it reports come alive again meaning bring the world to your doorstep have had this one out visiting photo dealers of all kinds we poked it into stores all across the country from boston to san francisco and a lot of places in between we talked to dealers and the dealers talked to lots we even hit the camera so we could see life as it really is yes and we managed to get the camera into places where it wasn't supposed to be why what is all this about very simple we have been getting together a report on polaroid corp and its products during the exciting year just passed and for the year that nine hundred sixty five will be your reporter lowell thomas and it's a real pleasure to make this report to you like millions of others i've watched polaroid from afar unlike them i've had a chance to dig in and find out about it and it's quite a story here to help me today with a man many of you who've seen in your story take a bow he and i will share the platform spontaneous kick people get out of seeing a finished picture on the spot i saw it wherever i went you see it every time you take demonstration pictures and store begin to use a polaroid business a steady rise until now the curve shows about one hundred and forty million dollars a year how does the size of polaroid stack up against the rest of the photographic industry i think you'll get a surprise out of this this bar represents the yearly dollar value of all thirty five millimeter camera sold in this country this one shows the year the dollar volume of all eight millimeter movie camera sold in this country now have a look at the yearly dollar volume of polaroid lan camera just the camera not including film and accessories tells  own story doesn't it for the average dealer polaroid cameras are a big piece of his hardware business let's look at it another way total sales of imported cameras contrasted with polaroid camera body begin with the import of german still camera add to that the imported japanese still cameras plus all the miscellaneous imports include every still camera from toy cameras out of hong kong to the most expensive like figure the dollar volume at the dealer level including import duties and distributor markup this is what you get the polaroid camera figure here it is also at the dealer level unbelievable well there it is in black and white this position in the marketplace is no accident i found that out it has been carefully hundred to four hundred to three thousand even to ten thousand to say nothing about a lot of films for special use transparency films both continuous tone and line fo and more recently the color pack camera it's quite a product story one of the major reasons for polaroids fabulous growth but only one of the reasons i found there were others that ladder ties in for small wonder they have carried all some of the most coveted awards advertising can w of course the oh lord for one hundred sixty four haven't been made yet but let me nominate a couple that can't miss they are two commercials in color in my opinion some of the most sensitive and powerful advertising i've if you're not taking color pictures with a new polaroid color something left out of your life argos something creating product lines brilliant advertising those mean a lot but it takes even more to account in for polaroids growth and the folks at polaroid more to bit shy in naming that most important ingredient in fact they asked me to tell you how well they know and appreciate how important dealers support your support is in all its aspects whether it be your skill and knowledge behind the counter your newspaper your window display ads yes polaroid does know and appreciate what dealers are doing to make such a success of instant photography because they do they're going to try  unheard of experiment they're going to share with you in great detail their plans for the coming year plan that you'll learn about in a little while for the new model one of all three and one of the four color pack cameras the forthcoming model one eighty pack camera using an f four point five lens that one will replace the old one ten b it's being put on the schedule right now as these plans are spelled out i'm convinced you'll feel just the way i do the polaroid growth story in the past is just a taste of what is to come successful as polaroid has been it has only scratched the surface let's see just why i say this here's a pie chart that shows the total number of still cameras sold each year in the united states about six million one hundred sixty five it has been cut into two major segments this piece represents variable focus cameras the more expensive ones every steeler price fifty dollars it represents only about thirty percent of the total with cameras at a dealer price near one hundred dollars twice the average polaroid has done very well about thirty five percent of the units and sixty percent of the dollars what will happen when the two new pack camera hits the market for polaroid to gain an even larger share of this upper end of the still camera market and with the coming of the twenty dollar camera in july polaroid will move for the first time into that segment that represents the fixed focus camera let's not forget seventy percent of camera buyers fall into this group any guess as to how large a share of this market polaroid will take is just that a guess but don't be too surprised if in time it amounts to one third perhaps even want to half of the units in any event there doesn't seem to be much question that polaroid product sales are going to continue to grow and grow a lot one thing i'm sure of polaroid hope you will join them in the massive growth that lies ahead but they know you will join only if it means profitable business for you their marketing people do not assume that every dealer is making a big profit on the for oil line as we poked around with our news reel camera late last year we found too many places where profits must have been low on the other hand there were many dealers who were at respectable margins even amazing margins in this day of heavy discounting one mighty interesting things showed up in the analysis polaroid made of last year's business in many areas there has been a change of attitude at the retail level more and more dealers find if they can set prices at a profitable level and hold even increase their share of the local market all the answer seems to lie in shifting the focus from price selling to promotional selling and the facts seem to bear out this finding for example during one nine hundred sixty four the average increase in photo id sales across the nation was about thirteen percent but when some fifty dealers who ran three or more promotions in one nine hundred sixty four were stacked against this average well here's the increase thirty two percent more than twice the average game did they do it at a profit polaroid things they did these dealers repeated and repeated and repeated they spent their own money for ads direct mailings demonstration pictures special locally done it's in addition close study of these outstanding dealers show they get used about every promotion polaroid came up with they went in big for trade in for motions and the six point camera chats they made use of professional football star polaroid camera girls and back them up with that and cashed in on the trip to rome promotion they ran plenty of ads and kept the polaroid name out front in their windows and counters when it came to price selling they concentrated on the model one hundred one but at the counter the prospect was traded up to the model one hundred and sold a bag full of accessories what was the overall result this group of promotion minded dealers found they had sold the one hundred at a ratio of four or five to one compare that with the national average of two for one and it makes quite a picture do they feel it paid all will they spend their own money and one hundred sixty five to keep it up only one way to answer those questions send some staffers into the field and find out and that's just what we did first let's talk to a man who sold about eighteen dollars and accessories for every camera he sold in one nine hundred sixty four year i'd say so our units were up over thirty percent how many promotions did it take to get that kind of game we ran thirty four promotions during the year averaging about three  or how did you do so well on the accessories well for one thing we had the polaroid accessory trade in every store people were taught to take it and demonstrate before the final tally was at about accessories a surprisingly easy to sell if you show them anything else boost your accessory sales yes we made up some special kits here's our number one executive  what did that go for we saw this for a one eighty eight eighty eight and we saw a lot of them too and when we couldn't we drop to our executive hits number two it contains less but brought us one fifty nine eighty eight one final question did you sell many one on ones no more than we had to we found it easy to trade up we sold more than ten model one hundred for every one  what about size and location do you have to run a big city story to make promotions pay all this is look tony in new hampshire population sixteen thousand people when the skiers aren't in town people here see polaroid camera commercials and they read life and look just like the folks in the city they also respond to promotions as human wilson of alric photo found out in one nine hundred sixty four in this small store with his first six point check jim wilson moved out ten cameras what do you think about that i was amazed before it happened i would have bet anyone that i could sell ten cameras of one hundred fifty nine dollars in a single day but i did which just proves you never know so what did you do after you so many in one day lab that's another one just as fast as i could the promotion plus the fact that it was just before christmas moved out another fifteen cameras i never saw anything like it those twenty five cameras were one third of my total polaroid volume and how did nine hundred sixty four stack up against the previous year although i did twice as many cameras any complaints yes sir i started promoting two late this year i know better i'll be off and running this spring well  how will this be your story in one nine hundred sixty five what do you do when the competition all around you has driven prices down to rock bottom level some dealers like charlie wells down in fort worth the camera shop have an answer ignore them and promote heavily at a price level that makes it all worthwhile charlie how many polaroid promotions did you run this past year about eight or nine  we began last june with three ads in the local newspapers on the new model one o one cam run then we ran one a month to the fall and step it up to two months to monthly in november and december what kind of and where your price is high enough and never quite had enough of course but we're getting one hundred thirty nine and a fab for the model one hundred and that's about twenty dollars higher than the local market and more than most camera stores around here could you sell at those prices we sure could in one nine hundred sixty three we sold one hundred twenty two polaroid cameras and due to promotions we increased cash sales hundred fifty nine cameras this past year about a thirty percent increase and what was the mix of one hundred to one hundred one about nine one hundred cameras or so for every model one zero one going to promote in one hundred sixty five you ben sometimes in this business almost unbelievable things happen out in north hollywood california jack williams of hooper cameron exchange got so excited about the success of his promotions he paid a tribute to polaroid in a very special way just what was well after jim moran set up several promotions and helped me sell a lot of cameras i agreed to give him an endorsement you mean you wrote a letter for him better and that he was running a training session for what i was camera over england and i showed up yesterday for the group and told him how well we had done and how we did it that was a crazy thing to do wasn't it go help a competitor i know it but then i owed polaroid a big favor you see my camera sales jumped over thirty three percent last year and best of all the dollars were higher all but four percent of the cameras went out as kits if i roll like this in one hundred sixty five i've told jim i'll address another meeting for him for a competitor's door oh no not again i don't mind sharing my secrets but the next time i want to do it forty miles down the freeway now that we have heard from a cross section of us theaters let's visit one of our canadian neighbors over in windsor ontario this is frank once burroughs camera shots what kind of a year did you have tremendous we move studied the cameras a competitive canon one hundred sixty three and that's up to one hundred percent increase only thirty cameras i know it doesn't sound like much compared to the states well you've heard it for yourself that about winds up this report for myself the deeper we dug the more exciting the prospect speaking on the basis of what i see it sure seems as if the success by many dealers in one hundred sixty four will be overshadowed by what can happen in one hundred sixty five now you want the details i promised you a few minutes ago so i'll turn the meeting to your hosts the best of luck to you in the coming year it's all in yo if you are wishing for it way back last father's day and you had to go through the whole summer without it you kept your fingers crossed on your birthday with no luck and she didn't even come through on your anniversary and then you kind of look forward to christmas but the best or maybe your time has come at last polaroid announces an economy model of the famous color pack camera for half the price of the original same great film same fast loading the same electric eye you get the same beautiful color prints and sixty seconds black and white in ten seconds and the same big size yet polaroid has figured out a way to bring it out for only half the price of the original model who knows maybe she's wrapping it up right now