Name: William Sunners on Letterman, June 14, 1983
Uploaded: 2016-06-02T06:12:24.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'William Sunners on Letterman, June 14, 1983' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2016-06-02. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'William Sunners on Letterman, June 14, 1983' from Don Giller on Comedy Buff. Published 2016-06-02. Transcript available.

My next guest has been called the king of 25 words or less. He has been
entering contests for over 60 years and has won several cars, several encyclopedia
sets, and over $50,000. This is his latest book. I'm sorry, this is his latest
of 20 books, How to Make and Sell Original Crossword Puzzles. Welcome, please,
William Sunners, ladies and gentlemen.
Thank you, William. Nice to meet you, sir. Have a seat, if you will. I was
excited, well, not excited, but interested to learn that you are the creator of
a very famous, well-known slogan.
I am the creator of a few famous slogans.
All right, tell us the ones.
Which one do you want?
Well, just start out with the most famous one.
All right, I created a slogan called, A Winner Never Quits and a Quitter Never
Wins.
That's one of them.
Was that in conjunction with the contest?
No, there was a meeting of the National Contestors Association in 1937, and
they wanted slogans for the newly formed organization.
And there must have been at least 200 people who competed, and I submitted two
slogans.
And they selected both of mine to be on the masthead, the letterheads, and the
publications of the National Contestors Association.
What was the other slogan?
The other one was, Every member a winner, and every winner a member.
So it's actually similar to the other one, yeah.
They called that a balanced slogan.
All right, let's talk about entering contests and so forth.
What is the difference now between a contest and a sweepstakes?
In a sweepstakes, luck wins.
90% luck and 10% know-how.
In a contest, it's the reverse.
It's 90% know-how and 10% know-how.
And every winner a member, every member a winner.
Right.
Yeah.
All right.
Now, there aren't many really contests left, are they?
Very few today, because sweepstakes are very popular.
And they're easier to facilitate, aren't they?
It's not only easier to participate in, but it's easier to pick a winner.
Yeah.
And the reason why sweepstakes are popular, those who have no education, no
experience,
they can win in a sweepstake.
All right.
I want you to give us some tips now.
I see Ed McMahon talking about he will personally award this giant prize in a
sweepstakes.
Now, what are some ways to improve your chances in a nationwide sweepstakes?
Well, I wrote a book called How to Win Prize Contests.
And in there, I touch on sweepstakes.
I also have a correspondence course.
I'm giving myself a plug.
If you don't mind.
No, go right ahead.
Go right ahead.
And in my correspondence course, I tell people exactly how to win in various
contests.
Okay.
Now, there's the first lesson.
Lesson number one, read every word of this lesson carefully.
All of the information and material contained herein is included so that you
may become
proficient in the art of competing for prizes in various types of contests in
all sections
of the country.
Ed McMahon will personally award this giant prize.
All right.
But give some folks who want to enter one of these a couple of tips now.
A contest of skill or a sweepstakes.
Well, the first thing you must do, number one, obey all the rules.
As insignificant.
Oh, you'd be surprised how many entries are discarded because people do not
obey the rules.
Yeah.
They overlook something obvious?
If the rules say, use a three by five piece of paper, don't use four by six.
Simple as that.
Now, what about when somebody is like, I don't know, a million people enter a
sweepstakes?
How can you make sure that your card might get chosen?
Well, there are various ways to outwit or outsmart or overcome the laws of
chance.
Don't mail all your entries at one time in one mailbox.
Scatter them in various mailboxes in different parts of the city.
So your entry is placed in different mail bags.
Because you never know from which mail bag your entries may be selected.
You must also understand the mechanics of selection of entries.
Yeah.
Okay.
And they're very complicated at times.
So would you want to explain the mechanics of selection or did you just do that?
Well, there are...
No, I don't mean it to be funny, but it can get very complicated, can't it?
It's not as complicated as you think it is.
Okay.
The idea is to get your entry into different mail bags because...
All right, William, we have to go away for a commercial, but we'll be right
back and we'll
continue talking at this point.
We're back with William Sunners, who has...
Now, could you make a living entering contest like this, William?
I don't think anybody makes a living at entering contests.
You've done quite well, though, haven't you?
Oh, I did very well over the years.
I started way back when I was a kid in high school.
What was the first contest you entered?
The first contest I ever entered was a sort of slogan writing contest.
And it had to do with various items.
Do you remember the slogan that you sent in?
Well, it wasn't exactly a slogan.
It had something to do with...
Gee, I forget the particular item.
Well, it's not important.
Whatever.
Just any aspect of the slogan.
Your first submission.
My first submission, if I remember correctly, was about...
Oh...
It had to do with...
It's totally blank.
That's all right.
We'll come back.
We'll come back to it.
But, yeah, you just recently won a contest for a recipe, right?
Oh, I won the...
It was a sort of recipe.
Yeah.
And what was the recipe?
It had to do with...
Gee, I'm sipping up.
It was...
This is the tuna.
Oh, the tasty tuna.
Yeah.
It was a recipe.
And I won a set of carvings, knives, a complete set.
There's more than that.
Now, but what do you...
Now, the point is, you probably don't know a lot about creating recipes.
How can a person who enters a contest like this give themselves advantages so
they can win?
You take an old recipe and give it a new title and submit it.
Yep.
And that seems to work pretty well, huh?
It works all the time.
Now, you've actually been barred from entering certain contests, haven't you?
I've been barred.
Yeah.
Why...
Now, how do they find out that it's you, and what do they tell you when you
enter?
I don't know, but there are magazines that publish stories about winners, and
they publish
stories about me.
And evidently, the sponsors of one contest heard about me, and when I entered
that contest,
they barred me.
Is that fair, legal?
Can they do that?
It may not be legal, and it may not be fair, but it's done.
Yeah.
Now, what about a contest that you see?
There is a famous brand of whiskey that, in a print ad, indicates that they
have buried
a case of the same whiskey someplace, and then they kind of give you little
clues and so
on and so forth.
Is that anything that you could tell us about?
There was a contest of that nature.
They...
It wasn't whiskey exactly, but they buried it.
They did bury it.
And they expected you to find the place where they buried it.
Right, right.
And I guessed that they buried it near...
Oh, what's that place where they gambled out there?
Las Vegas.
That's...
That's the place.
Yeah, yeah.
How would you know?
I don't know.
Now, again, let's go back to this.
If somebody really wants to improve their chances in a contest, which is some
skill required
in winning a contest, or a sweepstakes, give us a couple of pointers that folks
who may,
you know, enter them all the time.
Well, I always have three pointers, and I hope I don't forget them right now.
Now, one pointer is, there are three of them, they all begin with the same
letter.
It's a mnemonic device, and I'm trying to recall what they are.
And this is certainly an embarrassing moment.
I know what you're talking about.
It's, uh, it's, uh, they begin with the letter O.
That's right.
It begins with the letter O.
That is correct.
One is obey the rules.
Obey the rules.
Right.
And, uh, the other is, letter O, obey the rules.
We had, I had them this afternoon.
One is often, enter.
Enter often, that is correct.
Yeah, often, enter.
And the third one?
It slipped my mind.
You didn't do your whole thing.
No, I, it slipped my mind.
Uh, what is the third one, Gerard?
Organize your material.
That's right.
That's right.
Now, I'm a pretty good kid, sir.
We'll be right back, William.
We gotta go away, but we'll be right back, sir.
Now, William, it was, uh, a pleasure meeting you, sir.
Uh, continued success with your, uh, contests.
Uh, the book is called How to Make and Sell Original Crosswords and Other Puzzles
by William J. Sunders.
Come back and see us again.
Nice talking with you, sir.
Uh, also, uh, uh, Mr. Michael Binder, who is to be with us tonight, will be rescheduled.
My apologies to Michael.
We'll see you tomorrow night, folks.
Thank you.
Thank you.