John Winegard, Founder of the Winegard Company, Inducted into the 2005 Consumer Electronics Hall of Fame; Among 11 Distinguished Professionals to Join the Existing 87 Members.

BURLINGTON, Iowa -- Winegard Company is very pleased to announce that John Winegard, founder of the Winegard Company, has been inducted into the 2005 Consumer Electronics Hall of Fame.

The CE Hall of Fame program, now in its sixth year, recognizes the accomplishments of the consumer technology industry that provides the products and services that inform, educate, entertain and keep consumers connected. For this year's class, the voting took place on November 9, 2004 in New York City with a panel of media and industry professionals, who judged the hundreds of nominations that were submitted by manufacturers, retailers and industry journalists. This new class of the CE Hall of Fame members was announced during the opening keynote speech at the 2005 International CES held in Las Vegas, NV on January 6-9.

Winegard Company was founded in 1954 in Burlington, Iowa by John. He began designing outdoor TV antennas in 1948 to receive a signal from TV station WBKB (now WBBM) broadcasting from Chicago, two hundred miles east and north of Burlington.

This family-owned, multi-million-dollar firm was born in a basement from several lengths of aluminum tubing, a hand drill, a hacksaw and about $200 in capital. The Horatio Alger mystic is still alive and well in the stories told about the self-educated, engineer/inventor who founded the company and rode the wave of a video explosion that spawned hundreds of other companies at its peak. It took more than innovative genius, however, to stay on the crest of that volatile wave and emerge as a leader in an industry where less than half a dozen companies remain.

John Winegard died on Feb 19, 2002. Randy Winegard, the founder's son, became President of the Company in 1977, successfully bridging a transition from the school kid who sold candy bars to Winegard employees to a modern, innovative manager with a presence and a direction of his own.

John Winegard worked at what he loved, and it grew into a company beyond his wildest vision. In fact, he said he had no far-reaching vision in the early days. "In a sense, ignorance is bliss, you don't know you can't so you just go ahead and do it," said Randy Winegard. Randy credits most of Winegard's success to its employees and distributors who had worked hard and remained loyal through the years. He has a great deal of respect for his father and the company he built, and says his father had an instinct for managing people and always showed unbelievable patience. "He gave people the freedom to make mistakes and to learn," Randy continued, "and in return he was rewarded with loyalty. Many of the people that we have here have been with the company a long time. They've grown up with the company just like I have."

John Winegard's training wasn't formal, but he had always been an avid reader and a believer that if you don't understand something, there is a book that can explain it to you. As a child of the Depression, he knew what it was like to not have much money, but that didn't stop his interest in electronics. When he couldn't afford a toy telegraph set like a friend had, he constructed one from a Prince Albert tobacco can, a Model-T Ford horn and a battery salvaged from behind the town's telephone company. In high school, he built his own 14-tube ham radio receiver with five bands and stayed awake listening to voices from around the world, growing more and more fascinated with the technology that brought them. When he graduated from high school, World War II broke out, and he enlisted. It was the military that gave John his first formal training in communications.

Following the war, he returned to Burlington as a radio repairman just as television was developing. Two hundred miles east of Burlington, Chicago was broadcasting from TV station WBKB (now WBBM), and just as he had done years before when he wanted that telegraph set, he constructed his own antenna and installed it on the roof of a local appliance dealer's shop. Soon friends were giving him orders for similar antennas -- and Winegard Company was born.

In January 1954, the first month of the company's existence, Winegard introduced the world's first all-channel Yagi television antenna, known as the Interceptor. This antenna, based on the Japanese Yagi design, utilized the patented Electro-Lens director system which, like an optical lens, directed, controlled and strengthened the TV signal, focusing it on the driven elements. The traditional antenna was too large and bulky and easily knocked out by storms. The Yagi design was smaller and weighed only 3-1/2 lbs., but it was only sensitive to narrow bands. Winegard's improved Yagi worked on both high and lower bands of the VHF spectrum. It was highly directional and produced high gain but maintained maximum rejectionability from the back and side, thus eliminating co-channel interference. Small, lightweight and compact, it was the ideal fringe antenna. The Interceptor completely changed the antenna industry.

People say John Winegard was a brilliant engineer and that's true. One of his greatest strengths was engineering. Today, people talk about "manufacturability" and that is exactly how John Winegard designed his products back in the '50s. He would be asked why he designed a part a certain way and he would answer by showing why it would be easier to put together that way. He had a keen understanding of the process. What people don't realize is that he was an effective marketer too. He had an overall grasp of business.

The Interceptor was a good product, but John knew it would take more than a hot product to launch a business. Since it was too late to get a booth at the antenna and electronic parts show in Chicago, he reserved a room in the old Blackstone Hotel across the street from the convention center. Armed with aluminum and plastic parts that had been molded for him, he snapped his antenna together and propped it up against the wall of his room. Then, he went across the street to distribute simple catalog sheets stamped with his room number. He returned to his room to wait. It was several hours before the first curious distributor stopped by the room to look at the Interceptor, but when the show was over, Winegard had more orders than he knew how to fill. This was to be one of the first unusual, innovative marketing techniques the young entrepreneur would use to promote his fledgling business.

In 1956, consumer advertising in the TV reception field was unheard of, but Winegard placed advertisements in national consumer magazines. Life, The Saturday Evening Post, Better Homes and Gardens, Farm Journal and TV Guide carried ads with headlines like, "If You Can Hammer A Nail, You Can Get Fabulous New TV Performance For Just $17.95." Winegard used direct mail, newspaper advertising, radio spot announcements and a point-of-sale merchandising program that delighted dealers. In 1960, Winegard Company began sponsoring the Paul Harvey news program and over the years other celebrities like Loretta Young, Gale Sayers and Merlin Olsen endorsed the company's products.

John Winegard believed in advertising to the end consumer as a way of supporting his distributors, but he also knew that customers were the key to his business. Customer service became a byword at Winegard Company long before it became a buzzword to American business. In one of the more innovative campaigns, black and white advertisements in Life magazine showed John Winegard and a telephone. The headline read, "Call Us And We'll Call You Back," and he did. He believed the telephone was the lifeline to the customer, and it was company policy long before the WATTS line to accept collect calls from anyone, anywhere.

Randy says his dad was a self-taught businessman. "He has a very open mind and very few preconceived notions about things. He taught himself everything from costing principles to marketing strategies to engineering."

In 1955, when the government opened up the UHF spectrum to TV broadcasters, Winegard introduced the first 82-channel antenna, the Twilight. He also introduced the electrical-chemical process, anodizing, which creates a coating that protects the antenna against corrosive deterioration from weather, salts and gases. Although anodizing was implemented for practical reasons, Winegard also developed a way to add color to the process. He introduced color into the Winegard line. Colored antennas, especially the gold ones, became a marketing tool and helped Winegard antennas stand out from the competition.

In the '50s the number of color sets in this country was very small and there was little color telecasting. No one knew if color TV was here to stay, but John Winegard decided it was and began development of color television antennas. In 1956, Iowa Governor Leo A. Hoegh presented a citation to Winegard Company for outstanding industrial growth. By 1959, the company was making 156 different models of antennas and selling them to parts distributors in all 49 states plus Canada, Sweden and Belgium. The '60s brought more growth, new inventions and patents including the Powertron, the first electronic antenna with a built-in preamplifier that could handle multiple television sets.

In 1964, when UHF reception remained a problem area for antenna manufacturers, Winegard invented a collapsible parabolic antenna for use on Channels 14 through 83. In 1968, the industry was to be largely affected again when Winegard invented the first transistorized antenna preamplifier, named The Red Head.

In 1969, Winegard was again recognized for service when the company received an award for its contribution to the success of the Apollo II space mission. The '70s brought the advent of cable TV, satellite-to-home reception and other video reception methods. The industry was changing and in order to maintain a profitable share of the market, Winegard had to change with it.

Expansion beyond the home base in Burlington began in 1971, with the construction of the Evergreen, Colorado research and development laboratory. An additional assembly plant was added in 1973 in Matamoros, Mexico and an antenna assembly facility opened in Chariton, Iowa in 1980. In 1981, the firm acquired a cable TV products firm in Colmar, Pennsylvania.

The '70s also marked the decade of space-age technology, and Winegard entered the satellite TV reception market. Product lines were expanded to include amplifiers, outlets and related products for master television systems in motels, hospitals and schools as well as home satellite antennas and cable TV distribution equipment. Special antennas for medical telemetry and monitoring systems were also developed during the '80s.

In the early '70s John Winegard began spending more and more time in Evergreen, Colorado. And in 1975, Randy came to work at Winegard fulltime and John moved to Colorado. The Winegard Company is much different to manage today than it was 30 years ago, but Randy has remained steadfast in his father's commitment to quality and customer service. He admits it wasn't always easy making the transition from founder's son to manager at first.

"I feel comfortable in this job now," Randy says, "and I have a direction, and because I have a direction, the company has a direction. My father believed in quality, and we have a historical strength based on that, but the responsibility for maintaining and improving quality rests with current management. You can't just say you're committed to it. You have to get involved."

Having held 60 patents over the years, 26 current US and 2 current foreign patents, Winegard Company has accomplished many "firsts" in the industry. John Winegard designed and built the world's first all channel Yagi antenna which completely changed the antenna industry. Winegard is proud of its founder and the Company's reputation for quality products and has great appreciation for the customers who have used Winegard products for over 50 years. Under the direction of President and CEO Randy Winegard, Winegard Company will continue to grow with new products and new customers proving without doubt that they are "Clearly the World's Best!"

If you'd like more information about this topic, or to schedule an interview with Randy Winegard, please call Michael Sherman at 319-754-0604 or send an email to [e-mail].

About Winegard:

The Winegard Company is widely considered an innovator and pioneer in product design, performance and assembly and has consistently adapted to meet the challenges of the ever-changing electronics market. It remains committed to continuous improvement in the quality, cost and delivery of its products and services to effectively meet all of its customers' needs and currently designs and manufactures more than 1,000 different products in four product lines distributed in all states and worldwide, including:

--Satellite Antennas and Mounts: Residential antennas ranging in size from 46 cm to 1 meter.

--Mobile Television Reception Products: RV, Trucking, and Marine applications. Satellite systems ranging from manual crank-up models to automatic satellite tracking systems with GPS/DVB. Off-air antennas including bi-directional and omni-directional VHF/UHF/FM antennas. Ground Antenna Mounts and Accessories.

--Off-Air Antennas: From DC to 5.8 gigs AM/FM/VHF/UHF Antenna Systems, Distribution and Pre-Amplifiers, Power Supplies and Accessories

--Telemetry: Medical and Data Antenna Systems, Distribution Amplifiers, Power Supplies and Accessories.

--Two-way Fixed/Transportable Mobile Satellite Internet Systems: offers real-time IP, video, voice, audio and data communications virtually anywhere, anytime.