Kiwi singing all the way to the bank after Oprah plug

By GRAHAM REID

You had to see it to believe it. Dozens of Americans in a television studio baying and applauding watches, body cream, Piper-Heidsieck champagne in softdrink-sized bottles, biscuits in fancy tins, the wireless phone with built-in digital camera ...

As the gift suggestions were rolled out on Oprah Winfrey's Oprah's Favourite Things show a month before Christmas the studio audience clapped, and actually stood to cheer some items, one of them the 10-CD collection Together which is the brainchild of Auckland entrepreneur Murray Thom.

"If you put a bunch of Kiwis there," laughs Thom, of Thom Music, "they'd sit back with their arms folded and go, 'That looks pretty good'. But the Oprah audience were giving standing ovations. It's so over the top you've just got to laugh out loud."

Since the show Thom has been laughing all the way to the bank. Winfrey heavily endorsed Together by describing the collection as "the perfect gift" and saying: "If I was only going to give one thing this year, this would be it."

On Winfrey's website she says, "This is my favourite of the favourites" and within 24 hours, Thom Music had done $1 million of business in orders through its togethercollection.com website and an 0800 number in the US. Within 10 days that figure had reached $3 million.

When the show was rescreened on December 23, Thom Music recorded $750,000 of business on Christmas Eve. As of yesterday, Thom Music had orders - most of them already filled in a four-to-six-day turnaround out of an Auckland warehouse - of around $6 million.

"This is the most amazing thing I've ever been associated with," says Thom from his Whangaparaoa bach where he is typically enjoying a Christmas of sailing. "Everybody talks about doing business on the world market and those other cliches, but she's a big world out there and when the Americans start ordering it's quite phenomenal."

On her show Winfrey raved about the collection of albums by pianist Carl Doy and guitarist Martin Winch, and the NZSO - "Doncha just love this?" she bellowed rhetorically - but she didn't dwell on the handsome packaging which includes images from the internationally acclaimed M. I. L. K. (Moments of Intimacy, Laughter and Kinship) photographic exhibition.

Thom says he has given away 600-1000 of the $149 collection as promotional items and to seed the market. There was never a huge advertising budget and Oprah's Favourite Things has done the initial job for them.

"For $6 million we should have spent approximately $1.2 million [in advertising], but the reality is we haven't spent a penny. We are going to, but at the moment we haven't."

The extent of interest from American customers - inquiries in record shops and other retail outlets - means Thom in association with Sony Music is gearing up for retail sales, not something they intended until 2004.

"The first wave through Oprah has passed but what has come out of it is a huge demand at retail. Sony has gone into high gear and launching in US retail in March.

"Retail always look bored no matter what you take to them," says Thom, who was managing director of CBS Music in Auckland until the mid 80s.

"They don't get too excited. So to have retailers contact us is different.

"The head buyer of Barnes & Noble tracked us down. Now she didn't do that because five people walked into their stores. I can only guess how many people must have inquired for her to do that. Same with the Virgin Megastore in Times Square."

Sony is already gearing up to link with Mothers' Day (in May) by selling through Together in March and Thom has been invited to make presentations of the product to gatherings of retailers using the Together DVD he made which previously impressed Sony heads and scored him the deal with them.

"We weren't planning to go to retail this early but now we're going as fast as we can because of the interest that's out there. DHL Worldwide Express, our distribution company out of here, was shipping 1000 parcels every day to the States."

Oddly enough, retail sales to individual customers weren't part of Thom's strategic marketing which saw the CD collection as the ideal gift for corporates to valued clients.

That marketing plan - he mentions Sony people talking to Mercedes-Benz in Germany and the States - is still going ahead as planned but the unexpected Oprah Winfrey endorsement has been icing on a very large Christmas cake this year.

There is also interest - "just talk without substance at the moment" - from Warner Bros Pictures who requested a copy of the collection with a view to including the music in a film or two.

Thom says the most promising thing about that was the Warners executive heard it at a dinner party, not through Oprah's Favourite Things, and tracked him down to ask for one. The company called again three days later to ensure it had been sent.

"So as opposed to some guy wanting one to stick in a music library and never referring to it again, he actually wanted to hear it."

Although Thom is obviously delighted by the success of the project, he says the best thing is people are pleased with the package. He shows an email from a DHL courier in Texas who had been regularly delivering the same-sized parcels from Auckland and was curious. A woman showed him the collection and so he got on the internet, had a listen and decided to order one for his wife's birthday - and cheekily asked if there was a discount "for poor DHL slaves".

"That was a laugh that the guy didn't know what he was delivering. So we actually just sent him one with our compliments."