In late 1973 something motivated Murray Saul to apply for a sales position at WMMS. Nearly any promotion, contest or concert we co-sponsored or were involved in got response. Our audience was growing. We knew it and we could feel it. But this was the era of the generation gap. The WMMS sales staff was the same age and looked just like our audience: longer hair, wilder clothes. Most media buyers were older, conservative, and steadfast against wanting to buy an FM station that played album rock and roll with controversial and subversive lyrics. Murray Saul was in his late 40s. That was considered old - much older than it does today - if you were in the late teens to mid twenties in 1973. WMMS desperately needed a salesperson who could relate to the older media buyers to secure the big, blue chip accounts. WMMS was writing business - but most of it came from leather stores, boutiques, and head shops, which rarely paid their bills on time - if at all. And many of our clients couldn’t afford to pay what we were truly worth. I walked by sales manager Dave DeCapua’s office when he was interviewing Murray Saul. Later, I asked Dave who the “old guy” was. He replied, “I just hired him.” I said, “For WMMS? But what does he know about the format? Does he understand what WMMS is about?” Dave replied, “I think you’ll be surprised. I certainly was.” During the interview, Murray told Dave, “I smoke dope,” which translated meant that he could sell he format in spite of being 28 years older than the median age of the typical WMMS listener. And he liked the music he was hearing. He discovered and began listening to rock and roll only a few years earlier. This is the resume that got Murray the interview, which got him hired.
Posted on: Mon, 06 Oct 2014 10:30:23 +0000
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