September is always a time of change. Summer is still hanging on and there are a couple of season-ending shows to attend. It has been a tough summer, Somethings just didn’t work out as planned and we were pushing ourselves and others to go faster to make up ground. Things got done, but it wasn’t fun. And fun is what the Farm Jeep experience is suppose to be about. So we are shifting gears.
Jammers
Sometimes you need an external signal or a nudge to let you know that a change is in order. Pictured above is one of the tour buses in operation at Glacier National Park. While visiting Glacier this summer, Barry became fascinated with the Red Buses. The history of these machines will make you smile. This was pure fun. Drivers were known as “Jammers” because they could be heard “jamming” gears as they tried to shift the transmission. But along the way, changes were made that improved the performance of the buses and made shifting gears and driving easier. It got him thinking,,,
We seem to have been jamming gears this summer. So we are stepping back and seeing how we can get back to having fun. The Jeep Spotters and Lift Registry projects have gone nowhere. We will work on those. We also will going to halt some research projects. We are learning to accept that somethings will never be known. While we won’t close them, we are going to report are findings and move on. To something fun.
How to shift gears
In the next few months, we are going to explore how Willys – and Monroe, for a they were a big part of it – went about selling the Farm Jeep. A key factor was the farm demonstration. It was so important that Robert Green of Newgren fame wrote a book about how to conduct a demonstration. Monroe would make the farm demonstration a key feature of their 1949 marketing campaign “Revolution in Farming.”
Willys would devote an entire section of its “Product Merchandising Manual” to “Demonstrations.” It even includes instructions on how to shift gears. You can check it out “Techniques of Shifting.” Just scroll down to page 11 of the manual.
Stay tuned!