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Published Weekly
FEDF.RATKU BUSINESS PUBLICATIONS, INC.
420 Lexington Ave.
New York
Number
Magazine
March 9, 1929
Vol. 88
No. 10
"Big
Unit
Radio
Sales
Single Copies
Ten Cents
Annual Subscription,
Two Dollars
A. J. Kendrick
Mean More Profits
An Authorized Interview With
A. J. KENDRICK
Vice-President and General Sales Manager, Sonora Phonograph Co.
J. KENDRICK, vice-president and gen-
eral sales manager of the Sonora Pho-
nograph Co., in the accompanying inter-
view gives some particularly interesting
views regarding the handling of radio receivers
and radio-phonograph combinations by music
merchants of the country. Mr. Kendrick is par-
ticularly well qualified to speak on this sub-
ject because of his long contact with the music
trade, coupled with his experience in the radio
Held, and The Review feels it is a privilege to
publish his opinions.
Approximately ninety per cent of the music
merchants of the country are at the present
time handling radio receivers of one type or
another. Some of them are making a real suc-
cess of it; others are doing a heavy business
but not realizing proportionate profits. Still
others are frankly at sea. Mr. Kendrick's views
should prove of distinct value to all these
classes. He says:
"To borrow a term from our automobile
friends, the music dealer who has been estab-
lished for some years and has the proper sort
of headquarters may be classed as the Cadillac
agent in the radio field, for he is in a position,
through the medium of his musical contacts and
the high caliber of his sales organization, to
gather the cream of the radio business if he is
so minded. If he will just stick to his recog-
nized policy of going after big unit sales rather
A
Listed at $930—and it Sells
than capitulating too much to the lure of quan-
tity turnover, he can do a big radio business in
dollars and cents and at the same time enjoy
a profit that will compensate him for his
efforts.
"Not long ago there came into my office a
music merchant, one who for years has devoted
his chief energies to the sale of pianos, and
who has for some time past been greatly inter-
ested in the radio business. This dealer was
doing volume business in radio, was actually
patting himself on the back over his success
in this new field. He recently took occasion,
however, to analyze the situation carefully and
found that although his radio business alone
amounted to nearly $200,000 in 1928, the net
profit on that business was in the neighborhood
of only two and one-quarter per cent. This is
less than bank interest and makes no allowance
for the individual effort expended.
"What did this dealer do? He thought the
matter over carefully, talked the situation over
with prominent men in the radio field and final-
ly came to the conclusion that he was paying
too much attention to fighting competition in
iow«-priced radio lines and not enough to select-
ing his prospects from among the class in a
position to pay as much for a first-class radio-
phonograph combination as they would for an
ordinary piano, and would make the purchase
(Continued on page 65)