The first IBM 2991 was installed in the reference laboratory of Blood Services in Scottsdale, Arizona, the largest network of nonprofit community blood centers in the US, serving more than 900 hospitals and 14 million Americans. “We think IBM has produced a superb piece of equipment,” John B. Alsever, vice president at Blood Services, said at the time. “The demand for frozen blood is increasing rapidly, and the IBM blood cell processor does a superior job of washing thawed blood.”
From there, a small team in IBM’s Information Records Division, members of which had spent most of their careers in punched cards, set out to expand the market. “We’re going into medical technology in the same way IBM went into other new marketing areas,” said Larry Myrick, manager of the blood cell processor group in Dayton, New Jersey, “with a quality product supported by the very best in service and technical assistance.”
A caravan of 26-foot-long motor homes, each with two beds and a kitchen, toured the machines around the country. Salespeople would sleep in motels four or five nights a week and set up makeshift demonstrations in the parking lots of hospitals, the Red Cross, nonprofits, commercial blood banks and pharmaceutical firms. “It was rough going at first,” a salesman named Bill Macnamara told THINK magazine in 1978. “I’d walk into a hospital and say, ‘Hi, I’m from IBM.’ And the doctor would say, ‘Fine, but we don’t need any typewriters.’ Then I’d tell him why I was there, and he’d ask a million questions.”
Research soon indicated that washing blood didn’t just accelerate the glycerol-removal process. It also reduced the chances of allergic reactions and fevers. As this realization grew, so did sales. The roving salespeople suddenly found their demonstrations surrounded by gawking administrators, doctors and technicians, and the machine, priced from USD 10,000 to USD 17,000, would all but sell itself.