Imperial's Gazooks Special Lots for Special Sales
G&S Thistlewood July 2024
Gazooks catalogue extracts are all thanks to and courtesy of Glass Paper Fanatics.
Cover page of the Imperial Gazooks catalogue
What are (or is) Gazooks and the connection with Imperial Glass and Carnival? The Gazooks banner was on the cover of a small Imperial catalogue offering “Special Lots for Special Sales” – in other words, a sales promo catalogue with reduced prices for combined lots. The full cover is shown on the right. Imperial often used catchy words and phrases in their advertising, obviously intended to be attention-grabbing and memorable. So, for this sales promo catalogue, they introduced the word “Gazooks” and this is how they explained it. We have tried to verify if there actually was the “Order of the Gazooks” as a fraternal organisation of glass workers, but we have not yet found anything. Perhaps it was simply part of the “wholesome fun” that Imperial were offering? Their low prices were evidently part of the “fun”, and they even called it a “radical Imperial experiment” (sales and marketing speak in full flow).
Our main interest, of course, is in the items they were offering, and this Gazooks catalogue had plenty of Carnival on offer. Nine pages of the little catalogue had cut price crystal (clear glass) items and four pages featured their Iridescent lines in Rubigold (marigold Carnival), printed in pink. |
It is hard to establish the actual date of this catalogue as many of the Carnival pieces shown in it were introduced into the line by Imperial before 1915, and subsequently had long production runs into the 1920s (especially in "Rubigold" / marigold, the Carnival colour being offered in the Gazooks catalogue). Our belief is that the Gazooks catalogue dated from the c. early 1920s. Why? In NetworK #109 we showed Imperial's Second Bargain Book which was issued in c. 1924, which also had Carnival Glass "Special Lots" offers. They included two of the items we now see in Gazooks - an Imperial Rose 9" bowl and an 8½” Double Dutch footed bowl - and the offer price was exactly the same, $1.65 per dozen. Furthermore, Imperial added a "per barrel" charge on its sales; in 1915 this was $0.50 per barrel, increasing to $1.00 in Imperial's First Bargain Book. In the c. 1924 Second Bargain Book it was $1.25 per barrel, which was exactly the same per barrel cost charged here in the Gazooks catalogue! So, unless and until we get any better information, our belief is that the date of Gazooks was around the same time as the Second Bargain Book, c. 1924. 
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GAZOOK LOT No. 16 - all in "Rubigold" Carnival (marigold)
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The pieces on offer in the first page of the No. 16 Gazook Lot (above left) were: M5141B - Double Dutch 8½" salad / bowl
M512C - Star and File footed bowl (which we would call a comport today) * M452/3 - Eastern Star 7½" comport (with Scroll Embossed interior pattern) M4897C - Imperial Rose 9" orange bowl (OMN American Beauty Rose/Open Rose). The pieces on the second page of No. 16 Gazook Lot (above right) were: M505 - 8" "Bouquet" (which we call an Octagon (OMN The Bellaire) vase today) M5057B - 8½" berry / bowl Octagon (OMN The Bellaire) M404 - Fieldflower pitcher M471/3 - Ripple tall vase. * The No. M612C Star and File piece is often reported as being introduced in the early 1920s or perhaps 1918. However, we have a Lee Manufacturing catalogue dated 1915-16, featuring this very pattern, indicating an earlier production date than many formal sources suggest. The Gazook Lot No. 16 was 8 barrels of Carnival Glass! That’s 38½ dozen / 462 items in total - seven different patterns and 5 different shapes. The total cost of all this including the barrel, was $73.52, being around 16 cents apiece at that time (or about $1,400 today). To put these 8 barrels into context Imperial stated that they had a weekly production capacity of "Over 5,000 Barrels of Glass"! |
Gazook Lot No. 16 Price List
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GAZOOK LOT No. 17 - all in "Rubigold" Carnival (marigold)
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The pieces on offer in the first page of the No. 17 Gazook Lot (above left) were:
M7003/4 - Heavy Grape 10" fruit bowl M4898C - Imperial Rose 10¾" crimped berry/bowl (OMN American Beauty Rose, aka Open Rose) M481/3 - Ripple vase 14" - 18" ** The pieces on the second page of Lot No. 17 Gazook Lot (above right) were: M4742 - Four Seventy Four 10" vase (OMN La Rochelle) M4892B - Imperial Rose 10" footed bowl (OMN American Beauty Rose, aka Lustre Rose) M737C - Fancy Flowers 10" crimped fruit bowl (or low comport / stemmed bowl) M484 - Tiger Lily large pitcher. ** The M471/3 Ripple vase in Lot No 16 was also described as “Tall Vase” but had no height shown. The height of the M481/3 Ripple is shown – 14 to 18 inches. The Lot No. 17 vase was “packed 2½ dozen in barrel” while the Lot No. 16 Ripple was “Packed 3½ dozen in barrel”, clearly indicating that M481/3 was a much larger Ripple vase, possibly the mid-size or the funeral size. The big surprise on this Lot 17 second page M4742, a 10" Four Seventy Four vase. They come in 3 sizes - 8, 10 and 12½" and generally, they are all hard to find vases. Also, M737C, Fancy Flowers is not an easy piece to find in Classic Carnival (but is found in Revival Carnival, marked "IG". |
Gazook Lot No. 17 Price List
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The Gazook Lot No. 17 was 7 barrels of Carnival Glass! That’s 17½ dozen / 210 items in total - six different patterns and 4 different shapes. Including the barrel, the cost of Lot No. 17 was $67.37 - around 32 cents per item. Compared to Lot No. 16, there were fewer items per barrel in Lot No. 17, which was was mainly larger items. This was also reflected in the per item price - 16 cents in No. 16, and double that here in No. 17.
The Gazook Lot No. 17 was 7 barrels of Carnival Glass! That’s 17½ dozen / 210 items in total - six different patterns and 4 different shapes. Including the barrel, the cost of Lot No. 17 was $67.37 - around 32 cents per item. Compared to Lot No. 16, there were fewer items per barrel in Lot No. 17, which was was mainly larger items. This was also reflected in the per item price - 16 cents in No. 16, and double that here in No. 17.
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Smart Sales and Marketing
A clever sales ploy was used by Imperial – they illustrated water pitchers in the Gazook Lots without tumblers, and then offered the matching tumblers separately, as you can see in the catalogue extract right. Not only does this show us that pitchers and tumblers were sold separately, and not always parcelled up as full water sets, but also, it was a clever marketing strategy. The "catch" was that the price of the tumblers was not indicated, and the buyer would have had to contact Imperial or their agent to arrange purchase - perhaps presenting a wider sales opportunity for the agent? It's interesting to appreciate the skill in the packing: they could get 15 dozen Tiger Lily tumblers in a barrel, but for Fieldflower, they could get 17 dozen. Presumably it was the flared shape of Tiger Lily that restricted the number that could be packed into a barrel. 
Who could resist adding tumblers like these to their order from Imperial!
On the left, our Fieldflower, and on its right, Tiger Lily (courtesy Seeck Auctions). |
Gazooks Lot No. 16 had this special offer to purchase tumblers that matched the pitchers that were included in the main Lot.
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