Playlist creation

[jd]

When the old 45 jukeboxes were initially installed for commercial use, was there a science to how to order the playlist for maximum profit?

For example, are all the country, rock, jazz etc songs grouped together or were they randomized? I can see the advantage both ways of quickly finding a type of song you want or having to read a bunch of titles to hunt and peck for what you want. I will be setting my R81 on freeplay when I'm done fixing it, but I want to order the songs I picked out in a way that would have been more authentic to the time when it was a money making machine.

I'm changing up the playlist that I found in my box to re-orient it for home entertainment with kids around and less bar-like.

[Ron Rich]

Hi JD,
Seeburg attempted to do so with the introduction of the 100 play phono-- they had "classification headings" that fit on the title strip holder, but the operator could change them in any way he wished. This fell by the wayside shortly after stereo records came out-- don't believe any other juke mfg's tried it ?? Ron Rich

[Ken Layton]

Back in the day, we programmed by the type of location and customer requests. For instance, a country-western tavern would get a load of country music including "standard" country songs (Hank Williams, etc) and modern country songs (Dolly Parton, etc). If the tavern employees and tavern customers had any requests for certain songs, we would try to accomodate them. Every two weeks our route collectors would be given 5 new records to put on the jukebox. They would look at the popularity meter in the jukebox to see which songs had the lowest number of plays and swap in the new records. During holidays we'd put on 5 records of the appropriate holiday music. Like at Christmas we'd put on a Gene Autry Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, a Bing Crosby White Christmas, a Guy Lombardo Auld Lang Syne, etc.

During January, the route collectors would be installing the latest Jukebox Copyright License on EVERY jukebox to keep the copyright police at bay.

All jukeboxes on our route (Capitol Amusement & Vending Co Inc) got a Grady Martin "Happy Birthday" as the last record on the machine.

[Ron Rich]

Ken,
You did not stick Copyright licenses on in Jan. ! Copyright licenses are never issued prior to the end of FEB--Our programing was much the same, except for one, very busy, "country bar" where the owner liked "Opera". We used a WurliTzer in there with a "gold bar", programmed with all his opera music-- Jukebox made TON's of money !! Ron Rich

[Ken Layton]

I could be wrong about the month, but it was the early part of the year those things arrived in the mail.

I remember the boss paying for all those licenses. It wasn't cheap. We had about 100 jukeboxes on the route.

[Ron Rich]

Youz is rong--LOL-- and it'z even more worse-er (est ?) today --Last year's license for the FIRST phono, was--drum roll--please --
$508.00--- ( can't recall what 2nd and more costs are ?-- will try to remember, to post it next year, when I getz my bill !) Ron Rich