| In the mid 1990s,
I was working for a photographic company here in the UK.
One day on the phone I just happened to mention to the
agent who dealt with our advertising that I had just
bought a pile of View-Master reels and he said that he
didn't think anyone still remembered View-Master. After I
told him of the interest there still is around the
system, he amazed me by saying that in the mid 70s he was
marketing co-ordinator in the Commercial Dept of GAF,
based near London Airport to the west of London. Whilst there he had specific responsibility for dealing with companies who wanted to produce their own View-Master advertising reels. As this was someone I knew very well, I had spoken to him practically every day for about 8 years, I really gave him the third degree! He went on to tell me that at the time there was a shortage of View-Master cameras in the UK but GAF had 3 or 4 models that could be hired out (he was not sure if these were US or Euro versions). He seemed to think that there wasn't a time limit on the "hire", but as they charged a whopping £500 deposit (around $800) and this was when £500 was a lot of money so the cameras came back fairly quickly! Interestingly, even with the high purchase tax around that time, they could have bought their own camera from a photo dealer for about half the hire charge! |
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As you would expect, the customer was told to only use Kodachrome film and to take several variations of each shot. When returned, the exposed films were sent off to the Belgium plant to be processed and mounted. The reels were returned in plain white mounts, but numbered for reference. They were then edited by the customer down to the required number of shots. The customer could then specify any printing or wording required on the finished reels. There was a minimum order quantity of 3,000 off each reel, but unfortunately my friend can not remember how much the customer was charged. Obviously I wanted to know if he had any of the reels left over and after much prodding on my part, he eventually managed to find a small pile of reels he had taken home for his kids, now grown up. Amongst the reels he found were several produced for the Ford Motor Company for an UK marketing promotion. Apparently late in 1975 Ford were about to launch the new Ford Escort (called Taunus everywhere else - and the name shown on these reels). They realised the Escort would be a new concept for a small, family car and were keen to do a special advertising promotion to whip up maximum interest. |
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The Ford factory in Braintree, Essex hit on the idea of using View-Master reels as a "teaser" campaign and set about photographing the new model. For the first reel they just showed as series of close-ups of various parts of the car such as the doors, outside trim and dashboard. |
| The first reel,
along with a standard viewer, but no accompanying
paperwork or explanation, was then posted to every Ford
dealer in the UK. A week later the second reel, with
close-ups of the bonnet, grill and interiors, plus a
pretty female model posing by an open car door, was sent
out. By now dealers were really puzzled at what they were seeing but, despite many of them calling Ford to find out more, they could not get any further details. Finally, the following week, the third reel arrived. This reel, showing the whole car was accompanied by full details and specifications of the new models. The car was well and truly launched! |
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