Ice Renaissance

Of Ice & Men was the title of a play they staged. A gold loving cup was conferred upon Ted Barnick--and the title of Chicago's Handsomest Iceman. So in Chicago last week the National Association of Ice Industries convened to celebrate a four-year-old renaissance.

In 1929 the U. S. ice business sold 58,000,000 tons for $345,000,000--a record. Six years later only 60% of its business was left and the electric refrigerator had doubled its sales. Then, in 1935, paunchy Robert Carl Suhr, president of 24-State, $44,000,000 City Ice & Fuel Co., was less scared than most icemen. He had jumped the rest of the industry five years, had brought his company out of the drippy-wagon, pickerel-pond stage, had $25,710,324 sales and $2,972,997 net income. By the end of 1935, other icemen put Suhr at the head of newly organized National Ice Advertising, Inc., to see what could be done to rehabilitate the industry. Changes followed:

>N.I.A.'s promotion budget was $400,000 in 1935, $600,000 in 1936, this year is $750,000.

>Ice companies began replacing old ice wagons with enameled delivery trucks, streamlined and enclosed. Instead of open collar and rubber backsheet, icemen began to wear natty uniforms and bow ties; to use instead of ice tongs drip-proof canvas carriers; to wipe up water when they accidentally spilled it on the floor, to shun the honest word "icebox" and call it "ice refrigerator."

Significance. All this merchandising effort was not in vain. The adverse trend up to 1935 was definitely checked. This year's ice sales are estimated at 9% above 1935's. But the effort that checked the trend has not reversed it. In 1926 some 1,500,000 iceboxes were sold; in 1936, best recent year, only 600,000, and in 1936 2,000,000 electric "iceboxes" were sold.

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