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Baums away!

Two well-dressed athletes leaned against the lobby wall of a swank L.A. hotel. It was December 6, 1949, and Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the Shah of Iran then, was enjoying a swim in the hotel’s pool, unaware of the athletes’ insistence on meeting him. Those two young men were no ordinary jocks. Glenn Davis, a West Point U.S. army football star, had just won the 1948 Heisman trophy, and Bob Mathias would soon be a two-time Olympic Decathlon gold medallist at the 1948 and 1952 games. They were there to present an illuminated scroll that was signed by a dozen prominent athletes to the 30-year-old Shah, along with an invitation to a party in his honour at businessman Russell Ernest Baum’s Philadelphia mansion.

Hobnobbing with the rich and powerful was the centrepiece of Baum’s extraordinary private life. However, it was his business acumen that took on legendary proportions. Baum was a fantastic salesman and promoter of graphic arts machinery, notably the paper folder known all over North America as the Baumfolder, which commanded a significant market share for over 50 years in the continent.

Baum could sell sand to the Bedouins

Born in 1885, Russ Baum was a gifted marketer. In 1917, he was listed as a ‘supplier of labour-saving machinery for offices’. He usually made calls around Philadelphia and hustled up business. When he heard about Liberty Folder, a new company in Sidney, Ohio, he saw the chance to make a fortune. Incorporated in 1918, Liberty manufactured hand-fed machines with buckle and knife folds. The Models 90 and 289 were nothing special compared to the ones from larger competitors such as Dexter, Cleveland, Chambers, and Mentges. All of these early contraptions would have been ideal film props in Charlie Chaplin’s 1936 movie Modern Times when viewed through the prism of today. European machinery might as well have been on the moon because no American would go for a Brehmer or Cundall (Stahl and MBO, both leading players today, didn’t exist until 1949 and 1965, respectively). However, what Liberty lost in technology was counterbalanced by price; it was the cheapest. Baum quickly cut a deal with Liberty’s owners for exclusive sales rights in eastern U.S., followed shortly by all of America and Canada. Then he got to work liberally using nationwide print ads, extolling the incredible virtues of his aptly nicknamed ‘Gold-Mine,’ Baumfolder. Another unique ploy was organizing multi-day demonstrations followed by hitting the road to close newfound leads. No wasn’t in Baum’s vocabulary. He outworked his competitors, latching onto potential buyers tighter than the shark in Jaws grabbed hold of Robert Shaw. It didn’t take long, and by 1927, Baum had succeeded in carbonating a once staid and ignored segment of bindery. Baum outsold all competitors while dropping Liberty’s name, thus creating the impression that he, Baum, was the manufacturer.

In late 1929, Baum held a show at King Edward Hotel in Toronto. The directors of Sears, then a newly formed machinery firm, struck a deal with Baum that would change their fortunes. In March 1930, Sears held a show in Montreal, which was a hit. A young 23-year-old Tom Sears listened to Baum, and they both worked long days to rack up 23 orders in the Montreal area. It is a phenomenal lesson that Baum and Tom would never forget: Hard work trumps everything. In an April 1930 memo to his staff, Baum wrote, “Believe me, it has been an inspiration to me to see what enthusiasm and plenty of fast work can accomplish.”

During the dark days of the Great Depression, Baum forged ahead, never taking no as an excuse. He soon found it beneficial to hire well-known athletes to sell products. Glenn Davis, Charles Nash, and George Guida were well-known and well-disciplined.

Then, there would be a constant barrage of advertisements in all printing publications. Baum wrote most of the ad copies, arguing why having a Baumfolder would turn a bindery into a profit centre. He kept up these messages, posting attractive prices and lay-away plans printers could easily understand: Buying a Baumfolder was a license to print money! Meanwhile, trouble was brewing at Liberty Folder. In 1949, a lawsuit brought by a minority shareholder accusing the manager, C.R. Anderson, of fraud and embezzlement caused Liberty to go into receivership. Baum had already held 90 per cent of Liberty’s shares since 1947, and the whole arrangement could have ruined him. To complicate matters, Liberty had only sold to Baum’s company. The scandal was resolved by 1952, and Baum took complete control of Liberty.

In 1961, Baum sold his interest in Liberty to Chicago’s Bell & Howell, and the Baumfolder company would deliver over 30,000 Baumfolders. This indicates just how successful Baum was. He amassed a fortune of close to $100 million in today’s value. Plenty of ownership changes took place after B&H, including a brief management buyout in 1985, a sale to East Asiatic Company (EAC) in 1987, a sale to Stahl GmbH in 1991 and finally, Heidelberg in 1999 (with Heidelberg’s purchase of Stahl). With Stahl breathing down their neck, Baumfolder tried to update and modernize their machines, but to no avail. Stahl was a much superior machine. The introduction of the Auto-Set in the early 1970s sealed Baumfolder’s fate. The Auto-Set attempted to emulate Stahl with tool-less roller settings but failed. Once MBO arrived, the die was cast, and the Baumfolder, although still in business today, is a shadow of its former glory.

Russ Baum was 75. A lifelong bachelor when he sold to B&H in 1961, he was still hosting spectacular parties with celebrity guests, including the Shah of Iran.

Baum’s ability to sell the Baumfolders and himself provides a master class on personal branding and doing extraordinary things by sheer will. In 1979, at the age of 95, Russell Baum died. He was a superstar in selling and offered a lesson for everyone wanting to achieve great things.

Nick Howard, a partner in Howard Graphic Equipment and Howard Iron Works, is a printing historian, consultant, and certified appraiser of capital equipment. He can be reached at nick@howardgraphic.com.

This article originally appeared in the Mar./Apr. 2025  issue of PrintAction.