Old Radio Crazy

There sure are a lot of "Walton" sets showing up on ebay these days. This got me thinking about just how may "Walton" sets Zenith made in 1938 & 1939. I did a little research today in some of my Zenith books and found out some interesting things.

First off, I wanted to know if overall table radio sales started to climb in the late 1930’s as a percentage of overall radio sales. The depression economy in the U.S. by 1938 was much better. People were starting to make more money and most homes had a radio by the end of the 1930’s; maybe as Americans came into more money they added a second radio to a kitchen or bedroom. Just look at the sales trends with computers today. Most Americans today have a home computer and now many of us are now adding laptop computers.

In order to look at these kinds of sales relationships I studied the Zenith finiancial statements in the book “Zenith The Glory Years.” I compared 1938 through 1945 Zenith’s sales figures, operating, advertising expenditures and net profits. I then looked at the number of consoles, table radios and chair sides’ offered by Zenith listed “Zenith The Glory Years Illustrated Catalog and Date base" book in order to see the relationship between sales and what was offered in the Zenith catalogs.

1938-45 Zenith’s Sales Figures, Operating & Advertising Expenditures

Year Income from Sales Operating/Adv. Exp. Net Profit
1936 $2,558,123 $1,072,743 $1,212,752
1937 $5,346,159 $2,556,395 $1,907,802
1938 $4,26,4323 $3,192,188 $2,116,815
1939 $3,621,180 $2,144,045 $2,699,605
1940 $2,615,896 $1,808,503 $2,945,224
1941 $4,859,281 $2,979,259 $3,689,198
1942 $6,002,437 $3,057,281 $4,833,783
1943 $15,152,903 $1,921,596 $5,848,246
1944 $10,067,860 $3,437,979 $7,145,096
1945 11,294,234 $4,719,333 $8,212,236

Zenith Consoles, table and Chair Side Radio Offered

Year Consoles Table Radios Chair Sides Other
1936 11 AC 2 DC 5 AC 2 DC NA 0 DC 0
1937 19 AC 2 DC 15 AC 5 DC 3 AC 0 DC 0
1938 23 AC* 4 DC 16 AC 7 DC 17 AC* 2 DC 0
1939 19 AC* 7 DC 20 AC* 13 DC 11 AC* 2 DC 0
1940 21 AC* 7 DC 23 AC* 10 DC 10 AC* 0 DC 13**
1941 23 AC* 3 DC 21 AC* 12 DC 8 AC* 0 DC 6**
1942 16 AC* 2 DC 25 AC* 10 DC 5 AC* 0 DC 4**
* Include phone/radio combination
** Includes portable radios, table stand and bookcase radios.

You can see that Zenith sales profits started dropping in 1938, 1939 and 1940. Sales did not start to recover until 1941 and really didn’t takeoff until after 1943; was the 1938-1940 sales revenue drop due to an industry shift in sales from consoles to table radios?

There is a really interesting trend toward the sale of more table radios when you look at the models offered by year. From 1936 to 1937 the number of table radios offered by Zenith tripled and by 1939 there were more table radios offered than consoles in the Zenith sales brochure. In 1938 the number of chair sides offered skyrockets as well.

This seems to show a trend of consumers adding more radios to their homes in better economic times. Zenith was really good at introducing new segments to the market. In 1940 Zenith came out with portable battery radios and they were able to rebound their console sales with the increase of console/phonograph models in 1940, 1941 & 1942. In this same period the number of table radios offered remain strong.

So, this may shed some light on why we are see so many “Walton” sets on ebay these days. There were indications of a strong consumer demand for table radios by 1937-38, if the number of table sets offer is any indication of sales, and Zenith offered three “Walton” models that year, two of which had the latest in radio innovations with shutter dials and motor tuning.

1936 to 1945, A Very Dynamic Time For Zenith and the Radio Industry by David Wilson September, 2007

1936 to 1945,
A Very Dynamic Time For
Zenith and the Radio Industry

by David Wilson
September, 2007