Boredom Relief: Old Salesman Training Films

[Skylark4367]

One way I've recently found to relieve boredom while cooped up in the house is to watch old sales training films on youtube.  If you search, for example, "Chevrolet (or other make) salesman training film" on youtube, some interesting titles come up.  Another good search term is "Jam Handy".  If you haven't heard of Jam Handy, they produced industrial training films.  Chevrolet was a big client of theirs.  

 

The films I enjoy the most are the comparisons between makes.  Whichever brand commissioned the film always has the best car and the competition's cars are severely lacking.  A good one if you're a Chevy fan is "Duel in the Desert" from 1962.  Don't try some of the stunts at home.

 

Someone has posted some of the training film strips too.  They've taken the trouble to synchronize the soundtrack with the film strip which makes watching them enjoyable.  Listening to the beep that cued the trainer to advance the film strip to the next frame brings back school day memories.  There's a good 1962 Mercury Comet film strip on youtube.  

 

These old training films and film strips are a good way to pass time and an interesting window into the times they were produced.

 

I hope everyone is managing to stay well.

[Guest]

Thanks for the tip.

Just watched Duel in the Desert, they are absolutely brutal to the competition. Very different from advertising today.  One film leads to another. Very addicting! 😄

[35cz8]

I have several of the large records from Ross Roy that are training records for Dodge Trucks - models WC, WD-15,WD-20, WD-21.  I don't know what years these are for and I don't have a phonograph that will take a recoed this large but they are a neat part of automotive history.  I hope to find a player some day to see what is on them.

[rodneybeauchamp]

I used to teach Automotive Parts Interpreters (Countermen) and we used a late 1960’s early 1970’s GM Training video called “Getting Organized” (or similar name). It was a great video with a known actor play a comedy role. It showed an early Corvette in the New Car Make Ready section with the gas cover taken off and other GM cars in another part. Never tired of seeing it, it was funny and for a  car enthusiast, always interesting!

 

We also used another GM film called Up from Clay, interesting but was a poor quality copy and was getting dated. 
 

Another was a Chrysler Australia video about Parts Department Merchandising using known actors in a comical role.

 

Was always difficult to find these resources, being relevant to my students, they were diamonds!

Rodney 😀😀😀😀😀😀