The Batboom

Holy hatrack! Batman is moving into the retail trade. Television's terrible, twice-weekly Batman series is intended as camp--meaning it's so bad that it's good, at least in the view of some (TIME, Jan. 28). The four-to-twelve age set continues to marvel while Batman and his protege, Robin the Boy Wonder, rout such Gotham City scoundrels as the Penguin and the Mad Hatter. Teen-agers and the college crowd still consider it sophisticated to snigger at Batman's wildly exaggerated plots and cliche-cluttered dialogue. As a result of the show's high ratings, merchants are anticipating a $50 million sale this year of Batman toys, clothes and other accessories.

The Batboom is V-RROOMing onto the retail stage just in the nick of time; after a $40 million splurge, the sale of James Bond 007 products is tailing off. Gimbels of Philadelphia, the first store to carry Batman T shirts, sold out its shipment of 360 in a day, ordered 2,400 more. Sales of all kinds of Batman merchandise would be still bigger except that manufacturers mistimed the impact, have fallen as far as six weeks behind in deliveries. "I've seen maybe 50 items in hand samples," complains Charles Lucas, Chicago-based buyer for 495 Walgreen drugstores. "But we've only got about ten in our stores."

The Batmania delights no one so much as Licensing Corp. of America, which holds the licensing rights to the TV--comic-strip hero (as well as to 007). Since Batman went on TV in January, LCA has signed up 53 major companies for Batman products, and 45 other contracts are being negotiated. The licensees make every kind of item to which a Batman insignia can be stuck, sewn or stapled. Colgate-Palmolive is marketing Batbath bubble soap. Hallmark is bringing out Batman greeting cards. Toy companies, including Mattel, Ideal, Louis Marx and Remco, are turning out Batman toys. There are Batmasks, Batcapes, Batkites, Batbuttons, Batpuppets and Batguns as well as jackets, pajamas, towels, quilts, wallets, bathing suits, lunch boxes and pencil cases with Batman insignia on them.

For a while some comfort could be taken from the fact that apparently none of the Batman products would be able to talk--or sing. No such luck now. Eight record companies, including RCA and MGM, are selling Batman disks.

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