Museum Of Broadcast Communications Sold Out A Treasure Trove Of Memorabilia At Public "Garage Sale And Auction"

The Museum of Broadcast Communications (MBC) planned to move from its facility in Chicago’s Cultural Center to a new 50,000-square-foot, multi-million dollar facility in the city’s River North district.

To help ensure a smooth move and to contribute toward a $15 million capital campaign for the new facility, Bruce DuMont, national broadcast personality (“Beyond the Beltway”) and president and founder of the 17-year-old museum, led the sale of some of MBC’s surplus broadcasting memorabilia that spanned the past half century. The sale – a silent auction and garage sale – was planned for a Saturday in late winter.

PCI was engaged by the museum to provide counsel, media strategy and services to ensure members of the public were aware of this rare opportunity to relive their childhood memories and own a rare or one-of-a-kind item. The most popular items included: large wall graphics and signs autographed by such legendary broadcasting personalities as Bob “Captain Kangaroo” Keeshan and Steve Allen; matching Charlie McCarthy and Mortimer Snerd decanters; a Davy Crockett mug; a framed, original painting of a Cagney & Lacey episode in production; Nixon-Kennedy debate placards; and World War II broadcast exhibit pieces.

We created a media relations campaign aimed at generating attendance for the garage sale and auction, as well as increasing visibility for the MBC and its ongoing capital campaign. A media preview and heavy schedule of advance print stories and television live shots and in-studio appearances by DuMont was arranged during the run-up to the sale.

Positive local and regional media coverage generated significant public interest and enthusiasm for the nostalgia-filled event, which also raised funds for the museum’s capital campaign.

A total of 68 placements, including 43 broadcast segments, were secured reaching an estimated audience 11,590,104. Print coverage included several feature stories and columns in the Chicago Tribune and Chicago Sun-Times, as well as numerous news stories, news briefs and captioned photos in the Tribune, Sun-Times, Red Streak, Crain’s Chicago Business, Daily Southtown, Daily Herald, Chicago Defender, Waukegan News Sun, Northwest Indiana Times and Rockford Register Star. Broadcast coverage included substantive reports and interviews on WGN-AM, WBBM-AM and WSCR-AM as well as CLTV, WBBM-TV (CBS), WFLD-TV (Fox), WGN-TV (WB), WLS-TV (ABC), WMAQ-TV (NBC) and WTTW-TV (PBS).