A Look At Holidays Past - December 2009

Holiday Sales Promotions

 Today shoppers are incentivized to buy via special sales, shopping nights, and customer-reward coupons. Merchants of the last century worked equally hard to encourage sales.
 
Christmas ornament collector Bill Steely has several mechanical nodding Santas that were used in store windows at the turn-of-the-century to attract customers and were known as \"trade stimulators.\"     
 
In 1924 the fur industry was distressed that people were waiting for January sales to buy their furs.  The National Association of the Fur Industry organized a marketing plan complete with fashion shows in fifty cities to stimulate autumn and early winter sales.
 
In 1929 the Fifth Avenue store, Arnold Constable & Company was aided by the New York City Federation of Women's Clubs to kick off  \"sales week.\"  In return for a percentage of all sales donated to the Federation's building fund to erect a hotel for \"working girls,\" the club members worked as members of the sales staff, \"learning something, first hand, about the Christmas shopping rush, from the point of view of the regular saleswomen.\"
 
In 1948 retailers were experiencing a sales slump caused by \"consumer price resistance,\" \"greater selectivity,\" and \"sharp competition.\"  (Sound familiar?) The sales promotion division of the National Retail Dry Goods Association suggested promotions that sound very much like what occur today: Merchandise was placed on sale early, institutional advertising was replaced with product specific advertising, and advertising for \"weak sister\" departments was eliminated.
 
But if all else failed, there were always post-holiday sales, which in 1948 were reported as \"very satisfactory.\"


New Info About Old Toys

As children, we all anticipated getting a toy for holidays or birthdays...Here is some fascinating information about three toys from the past:

Lincoln Logs -In this year of the bicentennial of Abraham Lincoln's birth, it seems fitting to note a toy that seems reminiscent of the stories of Lincoln growing up in a log cabin. Lincoln Logs were actually created long after Lincoln by John Lloyd Wright, the son of architect Frank Lloyd Wright.  The toy was introduced in 1916, and it was well-loved because the logs interlocked firmly, and the buildings created were sturdy enough to withstand play by youngsters. Lincoln Logs were popular throughout the 1950s, and they were one of the first toys to be promoted on a television show, Pioneer Playhouse (1953).

 
Monopoly - Board games became popular in the 1930s, and Charles B. Darrow (1889-1967) of Germantown, Pennsylvania designed the game, Monopoly, based on The Landlord Game that had been created almost thirty years earlier by Elizabeth Magie (1866-1948).  When Darrow presented it to Parker Brothers in 1933, the company turned him down. Darrow persisted, enlisting the aid of a printer-friend, and the two men made handmade sets of the game. By the end of 1935, they had made and sold 5,000 sets.  When he re-approached Parker Brothers they were happy to take on the game.

During World War II the British government devised a way to use Monopoly games to sneak maps, money, and a small compass and tools to prisoners of war, according to a 2009 report on ABC News.com. The British secret service was searching for a company to make silk maps.  Silk was the desired material for military maps as it was light and didn't tear or dissolve when wet. Silk maps also could be opened quietly as they didn't rustle as paper maps do.  In learning that the company that excelled at printing on silk was also the printer of the British version of the board game, Monopoly, the secret service developed a plan. British soldiers were told in advance that if they were captured and became prisoners of war, they should be on the lookout for escape kits that would be hidden in Monopoly games distributed via charity organizations handing out food and comfort items.  There were at least six versions of the escape kits to provide accurate maps for different German prison camps, and it is speculated that several thousand prisoners were aided by these kits.
   
 
Madame Alexander Dolls - Before there were American Girl dolls, there were coveted dolls made by the Alexander Doll Company. The company was founded by Madame Beatrice Alexander Behrman (1895-1990), whose father, a Russian immigrant, ran a doll hospital in upper Manhattan. Beatrice created dolls with heads made from a mixture of glue and sawdust that was more durable than the fragile porcelain-headed dolls that were more common in that day.  These dolls had hand-painted features and \"sleep\" eyes. In addition to careful craftsmanship, Beatrice Alexander was the first doll manufacturer to obtain licenses to make dolls based on characters.  (The first was Scarlett from Gone with the Wind.)  In the late 1950s the Alexander Doll Company introduced Cissy, the first full-figured fashion doll; her wardrobe included haute couture outfits.
 
In the 1950s a Madame Alexander Club was formed by people who were taking a home study class in doll repair.  The group was so impressed by how well-made the dolls were that they formed a club and began scheduling annual conventions that are still held; the next one is scheduled for St. Louis in June 2010. The company headquarters are still located in upper Manhattan, and a gallery is open to the public with over 600 dolls on display.


Encouraging Candy Sales

In 1961, The New York Times (12-24-61) reported good holiday news for the candy industry, but noted that industry executives were worried that U.S. sales were not keeping pace with sales in Britain.  The industry attributed its woes \"to the increasingly popular American pastime of calorie counting.\"
  
The Candy, Chocolate and Confectionery Institute planned to conduct a public information program to bring to the attention of the public the positive aspects of candy consumption. The program planned to emphasize: \"that candy does not cause overweight if eaten in moderation, that it is a source of energy, and that it tastes good.\"  They anticipated that if all went well candy sales in the U.S. would stay strong the following year. 


Fast Facts about Black Friday

The term \"black Friday\" was first used in 1965 by the Philadelphia Police Department to describe the heavy traffic on the Friday after Thanksgiving and before the Army-Navy football game, which is played in Philadelphia.
 
Today the term is more commonly thought to refer to retailers \"moving into the black\" of profitability after months when they may have been operating \"in the red.\"  As of 2005, the National Retial Federation coined the term \"Cyber Monday\" to note the uptick in online sales on the Monday following the Thanksgiving holiday