15 Minutes with Bing Crosby for radio as for recording, he's a cinch for ether popularity." The nationwide shows continued daily (except Sundays) on a sustaining basis until October 31, 1931 from station WABC in New York. Harry Von Zell was the announcer. Freddie Rich led the orchestra after the first week. Russ Columbo was broadcasting for NBC at 11:30 p.m. each night as competition for Bing with "Variety" noting "Scrap between NBC & CBS over Russ Columbo and Bing Crosby is getting warm." Crosby's popularity soon attracted a sponsor - the American Tobacco Company - and rather than Lucky Strike cigarettes, the company's president,
Bing Crosby Entertains nobody, had ever sung it before. And all of us watching him stood stone still. It was unbelievable. So moving. Bing shouldn’t have worried about it. Everything went off so beautifully, and even before we went off the air, the telephones started ringing.” However, the relationship between Crosby and the sponsor was under strain and on May 15, "Variety" announced, “Woodbury has not renewed with Bing Crosby for the fall. Primarily, standing in the way of a new contract is the refusal of the account to again allow the singer to have full control over the programme. Under the past