Hello
ODK members,
This story is definitely
left-of-field.
R. Tijou would have been one of the first appointed
Victa Dealers in
Victoria.
His store operated from
440 Burwood Road, Hawthorne, Melbourne.
He did advertise heavily but his advertisements were rarely illustrated, nor elaborate.
The store appears to have sold Victas from about late
1955 to the
early 1960s. Then R. Tijou disappears...
I do not know what the 'R' stood for in R. Tijou, but I cannot believe that a '
Harry Tijou', who
makes an appearance in the Melbourne papers in
October, 1956, was not related. Both came from Hawthorne.
[I have since discovered that the 'R' stood for 'Ray' - ed.] In the news of
24 October, 1956, Harry was reported as being a "lawnmower engineer" and then a "consulting engineer."
It is what Harry did, though, that made the headlines. He cut down a tree with a Victa Rotomo! Why?
Harry said, "I cut down the tree to demonstrate to clients that the mower was really tough."
I reproduce that article below. It shows a
Rotomo chopping down a tree. Victa was not just a toe cutter -
it was a tree cutter!
Assessment:-They say that there is no such thing as bad publicity. Mervyn was a marketing genius but this was
FREE publicity, arguably contributing to Victa's reputation for ruggedness and dependability.
Did Victa approve of this stunt? We're not likely to ever know.
It's one thing to claim in advertising that a Victa will cut any height of grass (as Victa did say),
but it's another thing to present ruggedness via Harry's extreme demonstration, particularly
when Victa were offering a 'lifetime warranty'.
The rest is history.
------------------------------------
JACK