Hillbilly marketing legend Cas Walker
Posted by Mike Harris on Tue, Jun 01, 2010 @ 01:19 PM
When I was a kid growing up in Knoxville, TN, there was a gruff, grizzled millionaire grocer named Cas Walker. A former coal miner and pulp mill worker he opened his first Cas Walker's Cash Store at age 22 with $850 he'd saved doing hard labor.
Born in 1902 into a scrappy dirt farming family, Caswell Orton Walker was one of 12 children. Calling himself "the youngest, the meanest and the prettiest" of the boys, Walker was the original "brand me". Nobody knew how to draw a crowd like this man. Half P.T. Barnum, this hillbilly marketer was a master at engaging and converting audiences, which he accomplished by breaking just about every single rule of southern propriety that existed at the time.
Walker was always his own 'interim marketing VP'. He understood the power of television before even JFK and he knew public relations better than anyone on Madison Avenue. Branding himself "the old coon hunter" he made himself a television star. He made himself mayor of Knoxville. He launched the career of 12-year-old Dolly Parton. He hired and fired the teenage Everly Brothers. He staged a publicity stunt that landed him on the cover of Life Magazine. He buried a man alive in the parking lot of one of his stores. He created a salve that would cure skin cancer (he said). He created store brands at a time when they were unheard of. He was one of the first cause marketers.
One day in the early 70s some "gypsies" invaded one of his stores and wreaked havoc. Check out Walker's response in this advertorial:
Is it any wonder Walker's customers loved him?
Early in his career Walker positioned himself and his stores as friends of the working man's family. He took every opportunity he could to poke fun at the country club set in Knoxville so he could entertain his shoppers. He was highly outspoken about his political views, which favored working people. He inserted himself into the local political scene and fought for the working class.
To promote his chain of stores Cas established a local variety TV show called The Farm And Home Show. It was on this show that a 12-year-old Dolly Parton, from way back up in the hills, made her television debut. Walker also gave the Everly Brothers, students at Knoxville's West High School, a place on his show and once famously booted them off mid-performance for too much 'heavy metal'.
When Cas was a member of the Knoxville City Council, he was photographed punching a fellow council member during a city council meeting. The photo landed on the cover of Life Magazine and garnered Knoxville some bad publicity. But you can bet Walker's customers were howling with laughter all the way to the grocery store. Late in life Walker admitted the whole thing was staged for publicity.
A generous community benefactor, Walker was also a curious study in southern racism for his time. Walker provided assistance for many in Knoxville that needed it but thought nothing of advertising watermelons on billboards and TV showing young black kids eating watermelon while proclaiming "mmmm, mmmm, thumpin' good" long after the civil rights movement was under way. To Knoxville's credit, Walker took a lot of heat for these ads and eventually did away with them.
Legend, urban folk hero, original MAD MAN...Cas Walker died in 1998 at the age of 96. Even in death Walker remains a revered pitchman and is alive and well on the internet, which he would have loved. Ad agencies (in San Diego and all over the world) would do well to study Walker's tactics and, somewhat less crudely, deploy them for their clients' benefit.
Walker's genius was that his positioning was authentic, no matter whose feathers it ruffled. He was a tireless promoter who absolutely, positively knew his products and customers. He embraced new technology and to his and his customers' benefit. A grade school dropout, he tried all manner of different tactics and figured out what worked.
For today's marketing agencies, even in San Diego or Los Angeles, Walker's "to hell with the box" positioning and tactics still carry valuable lessons in how to engage an audience...and convert them.
Except for the watermelons of course.