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By Dean Adkins
“Where We Gonna Put the Piano” is an obscure song recorded by the Cathedral Quartet. Most Southern Gospel groups would agree that a more salient question is, “Where We Gonna Put the Product Table?” Although product table is a more appropriate term, many artists still refer to it as the Record Table.
If “location, location, location” is the key aspect of real estate, it is also extremely important to SG artists. A subpar location can have a deleterious effect on sales. Many times however, the location for the table is out of the artists’ hands and this can lead to some interesting scenarios and a few are described below.
Jamie Caldwell (Anchormen) stated, “Well, with the Dixies we set up on a Black Jack Table on a cruise. I suggested we have a “3 for $21” but the idea was vetoed. I also sang on a Riverboat years ago and we sat up on the deck while at the dock of course. We started singing as we were getting underway. Well, we did not think through to the fact that the boat would be traveling at about 20 mph into the wind so most of the items from the table ended up in the Ohio River.
Neil Enloe (Couriers) related, “In 1980 we Couriers disbanded for the first time and I went solo for about seven years. I was singing at a church in the outskirts of Toronto on a Sunday morning and there were two services in succession with only a short break for the first service to clear out and the second one to assemble. I knew that it was going to be a tight schedule for me to get to the product table, with one crowd pressing to get out and another pressing to get in. So I made the product pitch in the first service and attempted some humor. I say attempted because it didn’t work out to be funny. I told the first service crowd, “As you’re rushing out, ask an incoming friend to get one of my albums and hold it for you. And while you’re at it, tell them to pay for it . . . that way you’ll get it free.”
Ha-ha? Nope! All they heard was “free” and they cleaned me out at the table while I was not there. Uh . . . I’ll never say THAT again.”
Buddy Burton (Statesmen, Masters V and others) said, “Two come to mind: The Masters V had to set up outside at Opryland. There came a torrential rain that day, the wind was blowing and some our records were floating all over the place. Another time, the Southmen were in Atlanta and set up outside. Someone stole everything and we suspect some lady is wearing our beautiful Southmen tablecloth today.”
George Shelton Jr. (Dixie Echoes) stated, “The only thing I can think of is, one church didn’t want us to sell at the church so they let us set up across the street in the parking lot, also owned by the church!”
Duane Nicholson (Couriers) said, “We have sung in several Catholic churches. One in particular I remember. I asked the Father if I could place our product in the lobby of the church. He said, why not place it down front in the main auditorium by a door that leads to our eating area because everyone is invited for food after the concert. I protested that I did not want to put the product in the sanctuary by the altar area. His reply was. “Oh this is not our sanctuary, this is where we hold our services. The Holy Area Sanctuary is in another room. So I put our product table down by the altar area close to a side door that everyone would use to go to eat!
Another church, which will be unnamed, had a Christian book and Music store in the lobby of their church. A local businessman had a contract with the church and probably paid rent to have his the store in the church. The pastor informed us that we would have to run our sales though this store and give the store a percentage of our sales! We refused to do so and since it was warm weather I set up our table by an open bin on our bus and sold our product at curbside as the people left. We told the pastor that we would warn any group booking with this church about this. The bad thing was that they did not reveal this to us before booking the date. We have had to pay a certain percentage at concert halls but never to a in-house book store in a church.
Some churches would not let us exchange money. The people would order at the concert and we would leave the product and the peoples name and the people would stop by the church the next week and pay for the product. We had to wait, sometimes for weeks for our product check. Only one church did it another way. We took orders and names and the church wrote us a check immediately to cover all the orders. I think the sales were over $1,000. The church took the chance if people did not show up to pick up their purchase. That was a cool church that understood.”
McCray Dove (McCray Dove Band) closes the topic with his tale of woe, “Well once we paid 100 dollars to set one up and sold 75 dollars!”
This is the glamorous life of a Southern Gospel artist.
By Dean Adkins
The Speer Family picture was provided by John Crenshaw.
The Couriers picture provided by Dean Adkins.
First published by SGN Scoops digital magazine in October 2014. For current issues of SGN Scoops click on the mainpage.