Ginsu

Ginsu is a brand of direct marketed knives that was made popular in the US by being sold on television using infomercials characterized by hawker and hard sell pitch techniques. The ads fueled sales of between two and three million Ginsu sets between 1978 and 1984.

History

Ginsu knives were originally called Quikut, made by a company in Fremont, Ohio. Since "Quikut" lacked panache, Ed Valenti, Barry Becher, and copywriter Arthur Schiff created a name that alluded to the exceptional sharpness and durability of Japanese Samurai swords (known as katana).

As Valenti told the Palm Beach Post in 2011, "We were mindful that the last thing anyone wanted was another set of knives. The challenge was to position the product so that it made every other knife you owned obsolete."

The resulting Ginsu ads copied the hard sell direct marketing techniques of carnival hawkers pioneering TV pitchman Ron Popeil had adapted to the medium in the 1960s. In the process, they helped solidify the formula for the modern infomercial. Equally voluble and ubiquitous, late 1970s U.S. television advertisements for the "amazing" Ginsu knife asked, "How much would you pay? Don't answer!", urged viewers to "Call now! Operators are standing by!" and included the signature "But wait! There's more!", which became a popular infomercial catch phrase ever since.

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This page contains text from Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia - https://wn.com/Ginsu

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