Our History

Anecdotes from a Traveling Ceiling Fan Salesman

In the Beginning

Hello, my name is Dennis Wild, I am one of the partners at Wilcorp. We are a small, family owned business (SME) and very Canadian. It seems people want to know more about who we are, our history in ceiling fans and perhaps where we are going after 45 years in business.

So, I'll attempt to recount a few of my experiences selling ceiling fans while the Ginkgo Biloba still works. We are talking about history from another century.

After my father imported the very first ceiling fan shipment into North America, way back in 1965, I was eventually charged with going out to sell the fans that remained from the original shipment. It was a leap of faith when he sent $1000 to an unknown ceilling fan manufacturer SMC Ceiling fans from Chai Wan, Hong Kong. But that's just the kind of guy he was, he trusted people even if they were on the other side of the planet.

I get ahead of myself right here because our story and family involvement in ceiling fans really started one evening when my dad, Wally as he was known to family and friends, was reading a newspaper at our night club. The Avenue Road Club had become popular with many new immigrants arriving from England, Scotland and Ireland. We were one of a handful of dance clubs in Toronto in the 1960's. Our many patrons were looking to connect with fellow new Canadians from over home. The Friday and Saturday night dance with a live orchestra, provided the social envelope so many of them needed as new comers to a vast new land.

In those days many people smoked cigarettes. Smoking in clubs, bars and restaurants would not be outlawed for another thirty five years. So imagine a large room filled with as many as one hundred and fifty people all of whom were ballroom dancing in counter clockwise protocol, while the band belted out all their favorite tunes. Oh, it's worth noting that women wore dresses or skirts, nice blouses and usually colorful scarves and men were required to be attired in a jacket and tie.

The evening always started off with everyone dressed up and on their best behavior.

In the early years the club was not air conditioned.

By ten o'clock on sweltering summer nights the Avenue Road Club began to morph and a little while later it was rock'in, smok'in and layered with pungent overtones of perfume, beer and liquor in an amalgam laced with traces of ode de human.

Since the club opened it's doors at 8pm, the hopefuls had pretty well established a social pattern by ten, such that thems that wanted to socialize with the opposite sex, were, and thems that needed a bar to lean on were already holding it up.

So it was when most had settled into a civilized exchange of sorts and noise levels had edged off especially while the band was on break, that my father made a discovery. One of the waiters also a new arrival in Canada was not from Europe, he and his family lived in Chinatown. He had with him that night a Hong Kong newspaper which changed our lives irrevocably. As my dad would recount the event, the waiter, wiped his brow, turned to him, pointed at an ad and said "hey Wally, this is what you need here, a few of these punka fans to get the air moving."

Anecdotes from a traveling fan salesman

"We're skating around circles".

By the 1970's Wilcorp Ceiling Fans, a division of our parent company Willow Manufacturing Company Limited had sold fans to thousands of commercial and industrial establishments across the country. Our sales team of twenty, was still discovering new applications for these slow moving, low cost fans. Customers started to ask "well do they come in different sizes and colors". I felt like Henry Ford when the answer given was " you can have it in any size or colour you wish, as long as it's 56" in diameter and white"! Each week we documented new applications discovered which eventually found their way into news bulletins circulated to companies in similar industries.

One day I found myself talking with an arena manager who was wondering if these large ceilling fans could disperse the fog which developed in their arena on warm days. Unwittingly I agreed to perform a test. We were always eager to help people solve problems so a few ceilling fans were sent and installed above the ice. Two days after the test began I received a call from the same manager "We're skating around circles" he barked at me. "your f%##:9)) fans have melted three large circles in my ice"!

Soon after receiving the test ceilling fans back at our factory we began experimenting with wiring connections and blade designs that could reverse the ceilling fan's direction and lift air up.

Thus, the 'reverse ceiling fan' was born at Wilcorp.

We don't think of these events as 'mistakes' we think of them as 'learning opportunities'

Since the 1970's we've had many learning opportunities.

 

Anecdotes from a traveling fan salesman

Walking The Beat

Way back in the 1970's our sales team built Wilcorp's fan business the old fashion way, we earned it by walking the beat. Each week our twenty or so salesman loaded up their vehicles with as many ceilling fans that would fit, headed out to their territories and started walking through each town. In those days almost every retail store, every garage, every place of worship and many small businesses were prospective customers. The ones who installed a ceilling fan soon discovered the many benefits of slow turning over head fan. The quiet circulation of air kept people much more comfortable while they worked in the stores, offices and warehouses. Their comfort was achieved without the use of air-conditioning thus saving energy dollars. The ceilling fans were easily installed, consumed very little power and could be operated by a five speed wall mounted control.

Countless testimonials ensued, which powered our news bulletins, originally entitled The Tycos News. By this time I was spending less time selling, and more publishing. Each month I collected the stories that salesman shared with us in bi-weekly sales meetings, then translated what we had learned about new applications into short stories which appeared in the next issue of Tycos News.

I learned that you build a business 'one customer at a time' and until the ceilling fan was installed and the customer was happy nothing could be taken for granted. So, a process was developed such that the sales person had to follow up with each new customer and ask if the ceilling fan was working to their satisfaction, and if it wasn't, we offered to take it back.

That practice of asking customers to share their experience has continued today. For many years now we have contacted each and every customer. We ask them about their experiences with our company and then the all important question. "Would you buy from Wilcorp again"?

In this new electronic and fast paced life, our sales follow-up by snail mail may seem old fashion, but at least we care enough to ask.

 

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