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Chop-o-Matic. Veg-o-Matic. Dial-o-Matic. Smokeless Ashtray. Spray-On Hair. Mr. Microphone. Pocket Fisherman. These are just a few of the handy, dandy, kitschy, quirky products from the genius mind of one man… Ron Popeil (ok, that’s not entirely true. I’ll explain later) but what IS true is that Ron Popeil’s name is permanently etched into history as the man who could sell ice cubes to eskimos and produce the perfect gadget to make them with as well as being the founder and face of… RONCO! And THIS is THAT story! Time to Set it! Forget it! And Let’s step into the FUN HOUSE!
Hello and welcome to the Dandy Fun House Video Show, Podcast and Blog! I’m your host Neil Dandy and this is where we bring you the best in retromatic pop culture, toys and games and all the fun stuff! And what could be more fun than throwing back to the crazy, clever, quirky and classic as-seen-on-tv products from the legendary Ron Popeil and his namesake company RONCO!?
BUT FIRST! I want to tell you all about our amazing DANDY FUN HOUSE T-SHIRTS! They are the perfect attire for singing into your Mr. Microphone or relaxing pond-side with your Pocket Fisherman and best of all they are 100 percent cool-o-matic! But wait! There’s more! Buy one t-shirt and get a second one for ZERO DOLLARS OFF! Just visit the Dandy Fun Shop at the Dandy Fun House website at dandyfunhouse.com and Order yours today!
Oh and while you’re there, be sure to check out our new designs like GORILLATUDE, BODY BY DONUTS, MAYPOP TIRES, LED ROBSTER and more! They make great Christmas gifts! Just get to the Dandy Fun Shop at the Dandy Fun House website at dandyfunhouse.com today!
THE STORY OF RON POPEIL AND RONCO!
Ok! RONCO! It’s impossible to tell you the story of RONCO without also bringing you the story of its founder and pitch-man-in-chief, Ron Popeil. You may remember Ron as recently as the 2000s selling kitchen gadgets on tv, but his more amusing products stem from the 1980s,70s and from Ronco’s founding in the 1960s. But to really po-peel back the curtain on the iconic RONCO and the man who started it all, Ron Popeil, we need to go back farther! MUCH FARTHER!
The year: 1935. A little jewish boy named Ronald Milton Popeil was brought kicking and screaming into a world of many wonders to a mother named Julia and a father named Samuel Popeil who was an inventor and manufacturer of household products. Not much is known about the early life of Ronald Milton except that his parents divorced at a very young age and he went to live with his grandparents in Florida because… that’s where grandparents live.
Samuel Popeil
But in 1952 at the age of 17, Ronald went to work at his father Samuel and Uncle Raymond’s manufacturing facility, Popeil Brothers in Chicago, Illinois selling kitchen gadgets in the street markets. He was a natural and claims to have made over a $1000 per week before heading off to college for a whirlwind 6 months of higher education at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, paid for by his sales earnings but quickly ditched college to go back to earning money with the Popeil Brothers marketing his father’s inventions The Chop-O-Matic, the Veg-O-Matic and the Dial-O-Matic. That’s right! In fact, many of the most iconic and soon-to-be Ronco products were actually invented by Ron’s father Samuel and already had millions of sales before Ronco was ever even conceived!
But the products had a problem! In order for salesmen to conduct their demonstrations, because the products were so efficient at what they did, they had to carry around an obscene amount of vegetables everywhere they went! So Ron’s big solution was to film the products in action and broadcast it to the world as television commercials which were surprisingly more cost effective than anyone in the Popeil Brothers company ever imagined!
POCKET FISHERMAN
In 1963, the senior Popeil, Samuel knocked it out of the park again and straight into the rivers, lakes, ponds, streams and seas (if you’re bold enough) inventing the one and only POCKET FISHERMAN! Samuel thought up the concept for the Pocket Fisherman after almost putting his eye out with the end of a full-sized fishing pole. This was instead, a fishing pole you could put in your pocket (unless you’re wearing skinny jeans). Inside the handle was a miniature tackle box including hooks, lines and sinkers! You can still buy the Pocket Fisherman today at Ronco.com and the modern version can even extend to become a full-sized fishing pole!
BIRTH OF RONCO! Success Out of the Gate!
Mel Korey, co-founder of Ronco
Ron continued working for his father until the mid-1960’s when he decided to branch out on his own along with a brilliant friend he met during his brief stint in college, Mel Korey and establish the now-historic company known as RONCO in 1964. He continued to distribute his father’s products but also brought on goods from other manufacturers like the Ronco Spray Gun. This was a nozzle that turned an ordinary garden hose into a high pressure spray gun which also incorporated various tablets for different purposes like soap for washing surfaces, wax for your car and insecticides and herbicides for insect and weed control. The genius behind the product was that once the consumer purchased the nozzle, they would continue to come back and spend money for the consumable tablets long after the initial sale. With the help of some late-night television commercials, guaranteed-sale promise to the retailers (meaning Ronco agreed to buy back any merchandise that didn’t sale) and “trade support marketing” meaning that the retailers would receive the added promotional benefit of having their store listed in the television ads, the Ronco Spray Gun sold almost 1 million units within 4 years. An undeniable success right out of the gate!
RONCO GETS HOSED!
For the first decade of Ronco’s existence, the company did not offer a single product over $20 and the vast majority were under $10. This was their niche in the marketplace. But over half their revenue in the late 60s didn’t come from a kitchen gadget or any sort of quirky novelty item, but instead came from pantyhose of all things! London Aire Hosiery to be exact, with Ron Popeil himself on late night tv commercials doing what he did best, conducting a master class in salesmanship! You see, these pantyhose were guaranteed in writing not to run. So Ron put them to the test with a scouring pad, nail file, scissors and a lit cigarette to prove that these pantyhose would indeed not run! This increased Ronco’s gross sales in 1969 to over $14 million!
RONCO GOES PUBLIC!
In 1969 Ronco decided to go public under the moniker of Ronco Teleproducts selling 22 percent of its shares for $5.5 million. The following year they raised an additional ¾ of a million dollars selling even more shares on the American Stock Exchange.
THEN CAME THE 70s!
The 1970s and 80s are largely considered to be Ronco’s heyday and with good reason. This is the era in which they were firmly sewn into the fabric of American pop culture with their unique and never-ending parade of quirky as-seen-on-tv gadgets! Like the Miracle Broom, Miracle Brush, Glass Froster, The Roller Measure, the Salad Spinner and a whole lot more!
BUT THE DECADE ACTUALLY STARTED WITH A DIFFERENT KIND OF HIT! MURDER FOR HIRE!
1972 included an absolutely bizarre occurrence in the world of the Popeil family but unfortunately, this was neither cool, quirky nor amusing in any way! Samuel Popeil’s estranged wife, Eloise (not Ron’s mother) whom had separated from him in 1965 had run off to California, met a new boyfriend, Dan Ayers and together they attempted to put a hit out on Samuel offering tens of thousands of dollars to two of Mr. Ayers’ coworkers who ultimately got cold feet, went to Samuel Popeil himself and divulged the murder-for-hire plot to him. This resulted in the arrest and conviction of both Dan and Eloise who were sentenced to just one to five years in prison. Eloise ended up serving only 19 months, was awarded a quarter of a million dollar divorce settlement in 1976 and then even more bizarrely Samuel and Eloise remarried several years later (this according to an article by the Daily Pilot.)
SMOKELESS ASHTRAY! Ron’s first invention!
1974 found Ron Popeil keeping himself busy with an invention of his own: The Smokeless Ashtray. This was an ashtray with a built-in vacuum that would suck smoke in, route it through a charcoal filter and exhaust out clean(er) air.
Then you had the Inside-the-Shell Egg Scrambler which featured a slightly bent pointed pin on a base that you would insert into the bottom of a whole egg through the shell. The pin would then spin inside the egg, whisking the contents.
MR. MICROPHONE AMPLIFIES AMERICA!
In 1978 Mr. Microphone was unleashed upon the world allowing anybody to amplify their voice over a common radio. The tv commercial became a pop culture mainstay and even featured Ron’s daughter in a car full of hooligans using Mr. Microphone to cat call women on the street as they drove by broadcasting over their car radio. It was a very different time!
And the kitschy, quirky products rained from Ronco practically nonstop during this era with the Bottle and Jar Cutter, Rhinestone and Stud Setter, The Record Vacuum where you would place a vinyl record into a slot and this device would spin it while brushing the dust and supposedly static from it. Personally I would NEVER put one of my records into this thing!
RONCO RECORDS
And speaking of records! Ronco also went wild with their own record label releasing mainly compilations of hit songs giving K-Tel a run for their money! With all this combined by the time 1980 rolled around, Ronco’s gross sales had reached almost $37 million!
But then Ronco made a fatal mistake with the release of the Clean-Aire Machine. This was basically the Smokeless Ashtray on steroids and was one of the early home air cleaners on the market. I say “one of” because there were others with similar products such as Remington and Norelco whom Ronco vastly underestimated. Simultaneously they grossly overmanufactured for the 1983 Christmas season and got burned by the retailers on their “guaranteed sale” policy forcing them to buy back over two thirds of the inventory they placed into stores.
RONCO DECLARES BANKRUPTCY!
It was also during this time, the price of television commercials sharply rose and to make matters worse a $15 million line of revolving credit was called in by Ronco’s bank forcing a Chapter 11 bankruptcy which soon turned into a Chapter 7 and Ronco was 86’d right out of business practically overnight.
BUT RON! (who did not declare personal bankruptcy himself) repurchased the inventory from the bank and continued under a new partnership agreement with one of Ronco’s top salesmen, Malcolm Sherman. Together they focused on selling off the inventory of the Clean-Aire Machine and the Electric Food Dehydrator before parting ways in the late 80s. Sherman received full rights to the Clean-Aire Machine while Ron took over Ronco once again along with full ownership of the Electric Food Dehydrator. And by taking over, I mean he slipped into semi-retirement for the remainder of the 80s going back to his roots and demonstrating products at street markets once again.
AGE OF THE INFOMERCIAL!
Fast forward to 1991: Ron Popeil got the television bug once again signing an agreement with the USA Direct Shopping Channel owned by Fingerhut where he would go on to sell 200,000 of his Electric Food Dehydrators.
It was the new age of the infomercial and Mr. Popeil was once again right there in his element which set the stage for his new company, Ronco Inventions. He also had a new line of products like the absolutely weird Spray-On Hair (GLH Formula #9 Hair System) which I desperately tried to find for this episode to no avail as it was discontinued long ago. I was seriously going to have someone spray hair onto my head. It would have been amazing! The other products during this time were the wildly successful Automatic Pasta Maker which spawned a flurry of patent lawsuits but ultimately Ronco Inventions was allowed to continue selling it.
AUTOBIOGRAPHY
In 1995, Ron Popeil at 60 years old, released his autobiography “Salesman of the Century” which he toured the United State promoting.
SHOWTIME ROTISSERIE AND BARBECUE OVEN!
Then came what was to be pretty much Ronco Inventions’ last big hit in 1998: The Showtime Rotisserie and Barbeque Oven selling more than 2.5 million units for a total of over $400 million by the year 2001.
SALE OF RONCO
In 2018, Ron Popeil decided it was finally time to put his beloved Ronco under new stewardship and sold the company to Fi-Tek VII, Inc. for a whopping $55 million. The new ownership promptly changed the name of the company to Ronco Corp but Popeil remained involved as a consultant overseeing inventions and sales and continuing to personally promote products on television.
DEATH OF RON POPEIL
Sadly on July 28, 2021, Master Marketer of the Century Ron Popeil passed away at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, California. No cause of death was officially given but secondary family members reportedly stated that he had been admitted to the hospital a day earlier with a brain hemorrhage. He was 86 years old and left behind a legacy of American cultural influence on a level that very few could ever hope to achieve.
Mr. Ron Popeil, the DANDY FUN HOUSE SALUTES YOU!
And THAT’S the story of Ron Popeil and his legendary company RONCO!
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