Gary James' Second Interview With The Author of NEMS And The Business Of Selling Beatles Merchandise In The U.S. 1964 - 1966
Terry Crain



Terry Crain, like so many people, has this never ending interest in The Beatles and the merchandising of the group in particular. And so he's come back in 2020 with a Second Edition of his book, NEMS And The Business Of Selling Beatles Merchandise In The U.S. 1964 - 1966. If you think the first edition of Terry Crain's book was filled with photos and information, you just have to see this second edition!

Q - Terry, the one thing I noticed about the second edition is its soft cover. The first edition was hard cover. Why would that be?

A - Well, it's very simple. I went with a different printer for the second edition. The consumer can actually choose. Do they want a soft cover or a hard cover? I guess what they do for the press is they automatically send you the soft cover. I like the soft cover. It's pretty cool. I do have a hard cover also and it looks just as good. This site now that I'm using to print, and I never use the words game changer. That's not a word I use very much, but I went with this new site and they are a game changer. My book is now in sixty-plus countries, like Amazon Japan, Amazon Canada. I found 'em on sites in Sweden and Spain. This new printing company has allowed me to expand that way, so it's really cool. I'm really excited to be with this new company.

Q - I'm not surprised that there would be this interest in your book. Fifty-six years later people are still talking about The Beatles.

A - Exactly. And you and I are having an interview about Beatle items that came out fifty-four years ago. (laughs) It's odd, but it's still cool as heck, isn't it?

Q - It is! I saw merchandise in this second edition that I'd never seen before.

A - (laughs)

Q - I'll give you an example. The Beatles' Bongo Drums. I don't believe they sold them at Woolworths.

A - (laughs)

Q - And I don't think they sold them at music stores. So, when someone got a licence to manufacture Beatle Bongo Drums, where did that merchandise end up being sold?

A - It's an interesting question. When I would give presentations I would always have these people, especially ladies, come up to me who were in their late 60s or early 70s and they would go, "Terry, I was a big collector. I was 14 at the time and I collected everything I could find, but I didn't know they had half of this stuff in your book!" So, I did some more research along that line and besides being a little bit regional, probably the New York, Chicago and Los Angeles area, a little bit more than Southern Illinois. Besides that, I think one one of the main reasons is that Woolworths and all those places were locked into whatever the manager on Friday night after he locked the doors, whatever he wanted to order to get there Monday morning is what your local Woolworths was going to have. If he looked at this catalog and he saw he could order a hundred Beatle buttons for ten cents each, "I can justify buying those. But if I want these bongo drums on my shelf at Woolworths I've got to order a case of them and I don't think I can sell a case of Beatle Bongo Drums at my Woolworths. So, I'm just not going to order them." So, you're at the mercy of whatever the local guy ordered that night. And that's what I'm finding happened in a lot of instances. The bongos and the banjo and the ukulele that maybe came in a case of six or eight, the local guy wasn't going to order it 'cause he knew he couldn't sell it. So, that had a lot to do with it.

Q - A Ringo drum? I never saw that.

A - Yeah, I know. What's funny to me is when I did the book and did all of those items, I didn't really think about what you and I are talking about. I didn't really think about that people never saw half of 'em. It wasn't until I started giving presentations about it and time and time again people would come up afterwards and say, "I didn't know they did all this." Then I realized not only is it cool to have a book about all these items, but a lot of people didn't know all of these existed. So, that was an additive part of this book that I didn't even think about until the book was over. I think it's pretty neat.

Q - And skate boards? I never saw a Beatle skate board either.

A - Exactly, and that skate board is so mysterious. It's an item they made. They P.R.'d it. They took out ads in the trade magazines and no one has ever found one on a shelf yet. So, somewhere between this good idea... (laughs) They made a bunch of 'em and somebody pulled the plug and they never got out. I talk to these big collectors and their collections are massive and one of the things they always say is, "Boy, we'd sure like to get a hold of the skate board, but we've collected forty years and never seen a skate board." So, I can't find the story yet of why they never made it from the warehouse.

Q - Maybe it never got to the warehouse. Someone had an idea. They took out an ad to see what the interest would be and when there was no interest a decision was made not to put it out.

A - It could be, but it was the Surfer Skate Board Company out of Norfolk, Virginia. They went through the process and got the licence for it. It was a licensed item. So, when you go through that process of getting a licence and you go through the process of designing and making 'em and shooting actual photos of them for the ad, you'd think somebody would have a couple of 'em on the shelf, ready to go. So, something happened. It's one of those mysteries. I've been looking for that and I've asked other collectors and nobody has an answer yet. It's one of those cool things that's hanging out there.

Q - You have in the back of your book the names and addresses of all the manufactures of Beatles merchandise. Those companies are no longer around, are they?

A - No.

Q - They're long gone.

A - If you look through those, there are a couple like Colgate Palmolive and Bassett that made The Beatles mirror, but a lot of them are long gone. What I didn't know until I started going through this research on some of these things is the family tree of some of these companies is just weird as heck. It might say this company started making Beatle items in '64. Then in '67 they were bought out by X and then in '73 they were bought out. Sometimes these companies were bought out five or six times. There were a couple of companies that I followed all the way through to the present day company and I would contact this present day company. I would go, "In '64 there was this company and you owned it." They'll get back to me and say "No, we don't." (laughs) I'll get back and go, "Yeah, you do." I'll take 'em through the family tree and they'll write back and go, "Yeah, you're right, but we don't have any records back then." I find that more and more. Back then there's no Excel spread sheets. There's no Quick Books or whatever. So, sometimes these records are just tossed in the trash after the company decides not to do them anymore and that's what's so interesting.

Q - Back then with that 90/10 split for a merchandiser, within three months a lot of people became millionaires and then a year later they were out of business.

A - Yeah. Hopefully they got their initial investment back. There are some that maybe only made it for a year or two and then they moved on or whatever. That's one of the things you had, businesses that rolled the dice and thought, "Well, let's go get a licence for this 'cause these guys are only gonna last six months. Let's hurry up and put out an item. We're not too worried about the quality 'cause in six months it's gonna be gone anyway." So, some of 'em had those ideas. Some of them in the memorabilia world just rolled the dice and said, "You know what? We don't even want to mess with going through and getting a licence. Let's just make in anyway and put it on the market. Maybe nobody will catch us for six months." (laughs)

Q - I remember seeing a Beatles sweatshirt being sold in a store with the name Beetles.

A - (laughs)

Q - That must have been bootleg merchandise.

A - Yeah, I think.

Q - When we were talking last year, you told me the hardest Beatle memorabilia to find was the record player because of the cost, $29.95. They didn't make many of them. In the second edition of your book you have another Beatles record player.

A - (laughs)

Q - That has to be really valuable!

A - What a great story! You've got Lionel thinking we're gonna go ahead and make it and they went ahead and made it and they didn't get the licence. The part of the story I just love is the guy sitting around the big, corporate table, looking out the window going, "Well, you know we got these record players. Let's sell 'em anyway. Let's change the picture on it. Let's make The Beatles in silhouettes 'cause nobody will recognize them and let's take one of 'em out so there's only three of 'em, even though one of the silhouettes looks exactly like Ringo and one looks exactly like George. Even the silhouette that we're leaving in there of the bass player, he's left handed, but nobody will know that." (laughs( So, they put it out for a couple of weeks and finally somebody sitting around the big table says, "You know what? Probably people know that's The Beatles and probably we're gonna get in legal trouble, so we better pull those off the shelf." So, that's what they did. So better heads prevailed on that one. Even they didn't get the licence and probably it's only going to be six months that this thing is going to be hot, so let's put it our anyway and it'll be okay, But they finally figured out they better not do that.

Q - How did you find out about a lot of this merchandise? Did people come to you or did you have to put an ad out in a paper or online?

A - It works both ways. Now that the first book is out there and the second edition has gone out there, I get a lot of people now who will send me a message or an e-mail and they go, "What in the world is this?" And it's a photo of something and it's like, "I have never seen that." I got pictures just a couple of days ago of pillows that I had never seen. So, I started going out on my resources and go, "Who in the world has ever seen these?" And they just keep popping up! I'm getting pictures of Beatle items that somebody just runs across and it's fun to try and track those down. Most of 'em now that I get are not legit. It is cool what keeps popping up.

Q - I couldn't help but notice that towards the back of the book you have an ad from Julien's Auctions. They sold Ringo's Ludwig drum set for $2.1 million.

A - (laughs)

Q - I would've thought that Ringo kept all his drum sets. Do you know how they acquired that drum set?

A - Well, a guy had that, a personal collector had that and he decided to buy it. I can't remember his name off the top of my head, but when I was at a Beatlefest in Chicago last year, he came up to my table and bought a book. I finally put two and two together and figured out who he was after awhile. So, I'm thinking, "Oh, this the guy who had the drums."

Q - But where did he get those drums? How did they fall into the hands of a private collector?

A - That exact story I do not know. I read about it. I can't tell you verbatim what it was. I've even read articles about that, but it's just amazing stuff like that, whether it's a jacket they wore at Shea Stadium or it's something else. That stuff just keeps getting into the hands of collectors. They're verified. They're documented. Except for a couple of items, I don't think there's too many of those things that we think are really rare and how in the world could they ever get rid of, I don't know how may of those are still in Paul's possession or Ringo's possession. I see stuff from Heritage's Auctions or Julien's or some of these auction sites every now and then that are the legit drum set from Ed Sullivan. I'm thinking, "How in the world did they get those?" But it just takes time and somebody who doesn't want them anymore or needs the money. But I think a lot of that stuff is out there.

Q - We know that Paul and Ringo don't need the money, so it must be an assistant or associate who got their hands on these rarities.

A - It's just mind boggling. Where have these things been? I'll see the "I Am The Walrus" suit that John wears in Magical Mystery Tour and you think, "Where has this been for fifty years? What closet has this thing been hangin' in?"

Q - Something like that was most likely a rented costume. When The Beatles did their video, the costumes were returned and the owner of the shop just put them away and now they're worth a small fortune.

A - Exactly. Good stuff though.

Q - Those Beatle binders were selling at Grand Union Supermarket and they were white. You have those binders in all different colors in your book. I don't know where they sold all those different color binders.

A - Yeah. I think the white one was the most popular color. It's the one they mass produced the most. I'm like you, I'll turn the page on something and there's six more colors. I'll look at it and say, "Isn't that cool?" That's what I find in my research that I find I really like to do is when something says there was a Beatles binder and there were several colors made. As soon as I see that I gotta figure out how many colors. I gotta know they were made in white, red, dark blue, stuff like that. That's the kind of stuff I like to list. The stuff I think is kind of cool is actually giving a listing of that.

Q - Maybe in the case of The Beatles binders they were sold in different colors in different countries.

A - You start getting a fine line right around '64. The wallpaper is a perfect example. The wall paper was sold in J.C. Penny's. It was sold at the local interior store in downtown. It was sold all over the place. And yet, it was not made in the U.S. It was shipped in from the U.K. Just a couple of days before The Beatles played the second Ed Sullivan Show, 24,000 wallpaper rolls were shipped into the U.S. and Canada and just flooded the market. So, they looked like a U.S. item or a Canadian item, but they actually came right from the U.K. So, you start getting into, oh, alright. This wasn't made in the U.S.A., but it was all over the place. So, it was easy to think it was a U.S. item.

Q - Your first edition has sold pretty well, hasn't it?

A - Yes.

Q - Last year you told me you were working on a book about the second wave of Beatles merchandise to hit the marketplace, the "Yellow Submarine" merchandise. How far along are you in that book?

A - Not very far, and I'll be honest. I find that I research every day. I can't go by a day without looking for something. The stuff from '64 to '66 is such a cool genre and it's turned into such a neat little passion for me that I can't go very far into the "Yellow Submarine" stuff because I just keep finding out more and more cool stuff about the 150 items before. I keep going back to that. So, that's probably my passion of choice, that first wave of 150 or so items. "Yellow Submarine" I'll look at some day. I'll get back to that. I just can't stop getting into the other group because I keep finding stuff that is so cool. In the book I interviewed the lady whose dad designed The Beatles' postcards that are in the book. I interviewed the lady whose dad designed the Remco dolls, the famous Remco dolls. Now I'm finding stuff like that. I'm finding more and more people who have a connection and they'll go, "I remember when my dad did that," or "I remember when grandpa designed this." That even makes it cooler when you get into those kinds of stories. When I talked to the lady whose dad designed the Remco dolls, she was telling me all the cool stuff. She sent me a picture and it's a picture of about two or three Beatles albums, the first two or the first three. She had them lined up against her wall. She goes, "Terry, here's my first Beatles albums that I ever bought back and in 1964 and believe it or not, that my dad would pick up and look at very closely to get an idea of how to design the Remco dolls." Now, how cool is that? They still exist. And the postcard story that I wrote in there. She said when her dad sent the information off to NEMS about trying to get The Beatles postcards; he had designed The Beatles on the four individual postcards. He had put them in an envelope and sent them to NEMS. The envelope came back about a month or two later and he opened 'em up and he got a letter that said, "Yes, you've now been granted a licence. You can go further to make these postcards." She said her dad kind of looked at that and was excited, but they sent the four postcards back to him. He looked at it and thought, "Okay. I thought there'd be a little bit more fanfare than a simple letter and sending my four postcards back." So he puts the postcards in a desk drawer, tucks 'em away. The next few months he gets the postcards printed and now they're out in mass production. She was probably seven, eight or nine years old at the time. She remembers a couple of months later in 1964 and her dad goes back to the desk drawer and pulls that letter back out and pulls those postcards back out and was looking at 'em again. She was watching him do that. This time he takes the postcards and turns them over and on the back of each postcard, each Beatle had signed the back of the postcard for him. Now, how cool is that story? (laughs) That's pretty neat.

Q - I maybe asked you this last year, but do you know if Paul or Ringo has seen your book?

A - I do not know. You just can't put it in the mail and send it to them. I've done the research on that and wondered about trying to send them that. When people send them stuff like there's probably a double secret, 007 address you send them to that gets through. If you just send a book to their estates it'll just come back. It'll come back unopened with some kind of stamp on it, Not Asked For. I don't know yet, but I still research how to get them in their hands.

Q - How much Beatle memorabilia do you think Paul and Ringo have?

A - I think they have some, but we may be surprised how little or how much they have. You always wonder. Any time I see a Beatle with a memorabilia piece I really make sure I save that photo. You can see 'em wearing the sweat shirts. You can see 'em holding up a ukulele one day, maybe a button. Maybe a couple of other things. But other than that, you don't seem then very often back in the '60s where they're holding a piece of jewelry or holding a doll. It's very rare to find them with one of those things and being photographed with it in their hands. That's always a really cool item to find something like that. So, I' not sure how much they've got right now.

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