Mediaboss Marketing

MANCHESTER-BY-THE-SEA, Mass.Before there was Ronco and the Veg-O-Matic, way ahead of George Foreman and his grill, back when infomercials were a gleam in a pitchman's eye, Chris Nahatis of Manchester was showing New England TV audiences how to chop, peel, grate, slice and shred as fast as he could talk and bang pans.

Anyone who watched local television from the `50s into the `90s couldn't miss the mustachioed Nahatis, who turns 90 this year, hawk the Saladmaster wares.

The great-grandfather recently celebrated 60 years selling the "not sold in stores" cookware from three-minute spots on pioneering TV stations in the 1950s to 30-minute pioneering paid presentations, and now, online marketing.

Still displaying his patented energy, charm and talkativity (minus the mustache and apron), Nahatis said he is "going strong" as president of the Saladmaster sales and distribution network for New England and six European countries, with an assist from his daughter, Stephanie, the sales director. He declined to disclose sales figures.

"Business is unbelievable," said the man who personified getting the proverbial foot -- and mouth -- in the door. During his career, Nahatis broke all sales records for the Texas-based company; his sales in 1956, for example, topped $5 million, earning a legendary spot in the annals of direct marketing and racking up 2.5 million miles in the air on behalf of Saladmaster.

Nahatis invented the infomercial in 1954, refining his spiel for the Saladmaster device on stations in Poland Spring, Maine -- where he appears to this day -- and Providence.

"I'd show up with a potato in one pocket, an apple in another and cut like crazy," he says.

Later that year, producers of the flagging "Daily Almanac" show on WBZ in Boston offered him a three-minute spot for $50.

"It was supposed to be their last show," recalled Nahatis. "The program director told me to fill the air. `Take your time, Chris,' he said. If management complains, I'll tell them my watch stopped."

The gambit worked. The show received 196 letters the next day about Nahatis, he said, and Saladmaster became a prime sponsor.

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