The first Trumpet

It was 1964, not long after television started in New Zealand, when the very first Tip Top Trumpet TV advertisement appeared. So long ago, that when we enquired, Tip Top themselves no longer had a record of it.

In December 2014, I had a conversation with a stranger at a Christmas party, mentioning my interest in the history of ice cream. He immediately introduced himself as ' the original Trumpet boy!', and it was his memories of an advertising campaign 50 years ago that led us to this fascinating story.

In April 1964, General Foods Corporation (Tip Top Ice Cream) had launched the Trumpet, New Zealand's answer to the American Drumstick and Europe's Cornetto, and our first ice cream-in-a-waffle-cone frozen novelty. It was a major leap forward in technology and sophistication, and the launch was supported by an extensive advertising campaign, including a live-action television commercial.

The boy who featured in the TV commercial, and in other advertising material, is Aucklander Michael Yalland.

Michael, 11 years old at the time, was cast as one of the members of a junior marching band, led by a trumpet player. He also featured solo in the print and marketing campaign, complete with blue band uniform.

He has vivid memories of a particular scene filmed for the television commercial in Myers Park, Auckland, where he was supposed to be eating ice cream on a swing - the "takes" being repeated to the point where he was physically sick!

And just as the famous "VW Beetle" TV commercial helped launch the career of super model Rachel Hunter twenty-one years later, the first-ever Tip Top Trumpet television advertisement starred another soon-to-be-famous Kiwi.

The trumpet player was a young singer and musical performer who would go on to become one of our best-known faces on television over the next few decades - TV and radio presenter, TV producer, language expert, quizmaster and author, Max Cryer, MBE.

Michael's mother was a choreographer who had been involved in a musical production with Max, and Michael thinks that this is how he came to be involved.

Max remembers:

"That particular commercial was inspired by the hit Broadway musical 'The Music Man' - which had won five Tony Awards and an LP of its songs had topped Billboard charts for over 200 weeks.

In 1961-62 the musical was playing in London (starring Van Jonson) and in 1962 the movie came out (starring Robert Preston) and was a huge success especially its hit song "Seventy-Six Trombones" - this was the inspiration for the Tip Top commercial and its new product: Trumpet.

By 1964 I was appearing on TV in NZ, and was contracted to play the lead in the Tip Top commercial as a uniformed leader of a junior marching-band - not with a trombone, but of course with a trumpet.

It was in black-and-white, but the print offerings (posters, print adverts. etc) were often in colour.

Shortly after that, "The Music Man" musical was produced in Auckland, and possibly on the strength of the impact the commercial had, I was offered the leading role of the music man (and his trombone) but alas, commitments had started piling up, and I was already booked for something else."

Max remembers that the original photography was done by Robert Steele - Auckland's most famous photographer and film-maker of the era.

Sadly we haven't been able to locate a copy of the film.

However, by complete coincidence, 8 months later I stumbled on a copy of one of the print advertisements in one of my old school yearbooks (below):


                 Tip Top Trumpet print advertisement, dated 1964. Probably reproduced from a poster.
                  - Edgecumbe College school yearbook - Chris Newey.


Max worked on the Trumpet project with another famous Kiwi, author, food writer and television cook Glynn Christian, who in those days, worked in advertising.

Glynn, a descendant of Fletcher Christian of "Mutiny On The Bounty" fame, and these days based in London, remembers the Trumpet advertising campaign very well - it involved a TV commercial, print spreads and posters, and a radio commercial (which won a prize in the annual advertising awards).

Glynn produced the TV commercial for top advertising agency J. Inglis Wright, whose account executive for Tip Top was Brian Couldrey.

Glynn became Head of Radio and TV Advertising at the agency in 1963, so he dates the commercial as being made in late 1963 or 1964.

Glynn confirms that the commercial was inspired by 'The Music Man' and filmed on 16 mm film, with Max's 'band-leader' uniform made in light blue (which showed as white on black-and-white TV without blurring).

The jingle went:

It's got nuts
It's got chocolate
Smooth vanilla ice cream
And a brand new waffle cone
Four-in-One, ice cream fun
Tip-Top Trumpet.

The price of a Trumpet was one shilling (10 cents).

The campaign included this impressive giant Trumpet in the centre of the Panmure Roundabout:


                 Tip Top Trumpet promotion, Panmure Roundabout, Auckland, ca. 1964
                  - Tip Top archives via FMCG magazine and longwhitekid.

The advertising and promotion obviously worked well - Tip Top sold two million Trumpets in the first month!

Michael has kept one of the original point-of-sale, stand-up counter-top advertisers in which he featured:


                 Tip Top Trumpet point of sale advertising (re-colourised), 1964.
                 - Michael Yalland

The top of the Trumpet is shown as rounded, not the flattened rosette shape that is produced when the circular cardboard lid is applied, so probably the photography was done before production samples were available.

Robert Steele's production company also made a documentary film for Tip Top in that same year, 1964, called "All About Ice Cream".


                 Tip Top Trumpet production line, Auckland, 1964.
                 Stills from the documentary film, "All About Ice Cream", Robert Steele Productions, 1964.
                  - Nga Taonga Sound & Vision

It shows extensive footage inside the then-new Tip Top Mt Wellington, Auckland factory, including a brand-new Trumpet production line (10 minutes 30 secs into the film):

"All About Ice Cream" (1964) Robert Steele Productions - Nga Taonga Sound & Vision.

A couple of other very famous Kiwis were involved in production of this film - the voice-over is by legendary "It's In The Bag" quizmaster Selwyn Toogood, and the cartoon characters are voiced by Auckland radio & television personality Merv Smith.

So an almost-forgotten piece of our ice cream history has been rescued, thanks to a chance meeting, and the sharp memories of some of the key players in that ground-breaking campaign 50 years ago.

And amazingly, Tip Top's legendary Trumpet is still going strong.

- Chris Newey.

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