Big Marketing Man on Campus

Can you make money by selling things that are usually available free? Yes, you can. At any rate, James J. Harris, a former salesman for a photoengraving firm, is doing it.

Harris concentrates on the college market, which is not only vast--5,570,000 students spend $4 billion annually beyond tuition, board and textbooks--but also articulate and highly susceptible to experiment. As such, it is a prime target for the fiercely competitive package-goods manufacturers, who consider the campus the place to establish brand loyalty. By acting as a middleman bringing salesmen and students together, Harris has built a million-dollar business.

He gathers samples of toiletries and tobacco products that manufacturers usually give away free, boxes them into "Campus-Pacs," and distributes them through college stores. His Guest Pac Corp. recently sold its 10 millionth box and, with the obvious inspiration of a public-relations man, celebrated by giving a $250 scholarship to the M.I.T. coed, Laura Miller, 19, who got it.

One to a Customer. Harris receives a fee from both sides of the operation. Manufacturers pay him 3 1/2-c- to 5-c- for each of the samples that they give him to distribute. The campus stores pay 150 for a package of samples worth $2 or $3, then charge their customers about 290 for it. The eight or more items in a men's pack currently include Old Spice lotion, Gillette blades and Alka-Seltzer; the women's pack has, among other items, Pond's cream makeup and talcum, Colgate's Lustre-Creme shampoo and Grove Laboratories' NoDoz. On large campuses, bargain-happy undergrads have grabbed up as many as 8,000 one-to-a-customer packs a day.

Harris, 61, got into the business by chance. Curious in 1950 about the valu able samples a friend received through the mail, Harris wrote to 100 companies for free samples. He got back 82, including a twelve-can carton of tooth powder and a soda-fountain dispenser of headache powder. Harris conceived a toiletries pack, sold the idea to hotels as a convenience for guests. He eventually signed up 4,000 hotels, sold more to banks looking for new-account come-ons, others to airlines (which give the packs to grounded passengers). The Guest Pac Corp. also sells packs to the Salvation Army and the Red Cross for disaster-area vise and for distribution to Viet Nam wounded in Army hospitals.

The New Class. The company's fastest growth is on campus. College stores now do a $260 million annual business.

They use Campus-Pacs as traffic builders. To receive a supply, college stores must advertise the packs in campus newspapers, also stock regular sizes of the samples. After the packs are introduced, surveys inevitably show a rise in student preferences for the sampled products. Harris' potential clientele will continue to grow, reach 7,000,000 students by 1970. And every year there is a completely new freshman class that can be tempted to use the products in the pack.

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