Boxoffice-July.01/1950

Screen Cowboy Proves
Star Popcorn Salesman
The Best Drive-ins Are Featuring
It
the ONE popping oil
DOES
that
EVERYTHING!
pops America's Best-Selling
Popcorn! . . . adds butter-like flavor,
It's America's Most Useful
color and aroma that make
Frying Oil for Drive-ins!
people ask for more.
Made by C. F. Simoiiin's Sons, Inc. phna. 34, pa.
Convenient warehouse stocks and distributors from coast to coast
POPPING OIL SPECIALISTS TO THE NATION
A horse, a six-shooter and a ten-gallon
hat, according to one popcorn observer,
make the best sales combination to keep
the golden kernels flowing from that vending
machine in your theatre lobby. Leo
Wolcott. board chairman of the Allied
ITO of Iowa and Nebraska, two of the
biggest popcorn-producing states, recently
proclaimed Roy Rogers the top popcorn
salesman in middlewestern theatres. According
to Mr. Wolcott's observations, it's
the talent on the screen, rather than the
man behind the counter, who makes most
of the popcorn sales.
The average national consumption of
popcorn, which, as a food product, dates
back to pre-Columbus days, has doubled in
the past six years. According to one expert,
the American public consumed enough popcorn
last year alone to fill more than two
and one-half billion of the regular tencent
size popcorn boxes. More important
yet is the fact that motion picture theatres
all over the country have kept pace with
this expansion. Nearly one half of all
packaged popcorn was sold through the
theatre lobby outlet.
This surge in sales volume is largely
traceable to intensive research on the cultivation
of popcorn and increased efficiency
in the production of popcorn seasoning oils.
Expansion rates for good hybrid popcorn
are now as high as thirty-five volumes and
the result is a larger, lighter, fluffier
kernel. Refined vegetable oils, actually
bland in taste, impart the necessary
smooth, moist texture to the finished
product. Best Foods, one of the country's
leading refiners, is engaged in constant
research to improve production methods
for popping oils through laboratory tests
and scientific control at every stage of the
refining process.
To Specialize Appeal
Of NAMA Meet
Three major branches of the automatic
merchandising industry, candy, beverage
and cigaret vending, will be honored with
their own special days at the National
Automatic Merchandising Association's
1950 convention and exhibit to be held in
the Palmer House in Chicago.
Ernest H. Fox, 1950 convention chairman,
said the reason for designating the
three full "business days" of the convention
was so that concessionaires who operate
more than one type of equipment may
take part in all the sessions.
Each session will open, however, with
general subject matter applicable to all
branches of vending operation. Thus there's
no need, said Fox, for any operator whose
business Is exclusively devoted to one
branch to feel that only one day of the
convention applies to him alone and that
the other sessions will therefore be of no
direct interest to him.
34 The MODERN THEATRE SECTION