Music Trade Review

Issue: 1901 Vol. 33 N. 22

Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
THE
TWENTY-THIRD YEAR.
EDWARD LYMAN BILL,
EBITOR AND PROPRIETOR.
J. B. S P I L L A N E , MANAGING EDITOR.
Executive Staff:
THOS. CAMPBELL-COPELAND
EMILIE FRANCIS BAUER
WALDO E. I. ADD
(JEO. W. QUERIPEL
A. J. NICKLIN
HWM Eiery Satnnlay at 3 East 14th Street, New You.
SUBSCRIPTION (including postage\ United States,
Mexico ai"l Canada, Sii.OO per year; all other countries,
$4.00. «>
ADVERTISEHENTS, $2.00 per inch, single column, per
insertion. On quarterly or yearly contracts a special dls-
count is allowed. Advertising Pages $50.00; opposite
reading matter, $75.00.
REniTTANCES, in other than currency form, should be
made payable to Edward Lyman Bill.
Entered at the Neiv \'ork Post Office as Second Class Matter.
NEW YORK, NOV. 30, 1901.
TELEPHONE NUMBER, 1745-E1QHTEENTH STREET
On the first Saturday of each month
The Review contains in its "Artists' De-
partment" all the current musical news.
DEPARTMENT This is effected without in any way tres-
passing on the size or service of the'trade
section of the paper. It has a special circulation, and
therefore augments materially the value of The Review
to advertisers.
DIRECTORY OF
The directory of piano manufac-
PIANO
turlng firms and corporations found
MANUFACTURERS o n pn-ge 24 will be of great valutas
a reference for dealers and others.
THE
ARTI8TS
7VtUSIC TRKDE
sold at a price approximating that which is same to the Executive and to Congress for
asked for a good upright, will be in in- guidance in negotiating reciprocal trade
creased demand as the wealth and musical agreements. And then, further, by a unan-
taste of the country develops. And both are imous vote the convention adopted a reso-
developing at an astonishing rate. To the lution urging Congress to create a new de-
Northwest and central West large shipments partment to be called the Department of
of grands and of the highest priced uprights Commerce and Industries, the head of which
have been made this fall—larger, by far, than shall be a member of the President's Cab-
ever before—and the report of the great inet, and that this reciprocity or tariff com-
prosperity of those favored sections is not mission be created as a bureau to this de-
partment.
exaggerated in the slightest.
This is the key to a very perplexing sit-
It seems that Kansas wheat, in spite of
uation,
and if the resolutions passed by this
the great drought of last season, only dropped
eleven per cent, below the total value of last convention were acted upon favorably by
year. The total yield of wheat alone is es- Congress, the tariff as a future disturbing
timated in dollars at fifty-one millions, and element to business would be largely re-
of corn, its home value is twenty millions. moved from politics. There could be no
With this phenomenal record, added to the general upheaval of business if the tariff
fact that there is piled up in the banks of the arrangements between countries were han-
States deposits averaging sixty dollars for dled by a permanent commission whose duty
every man, woman and child, Kansas will it should be to carefully investigate all affairs
be able to worry through the winter and buy between countries. Their recommendation
should be accepted by Congress, and in that
a few more pianos at that.
way
there would be no tariff issue during the
In Minnesota, Nebraska, and in fact all
through the central West, it is a sort of a next Presidential campaign.
It seems to us that, while disappointing to
piano man's perennial picnic these days, and
many,
this convention accomplished a great
there is every reason to believe that the good
times will continue; in fact, there is no deal, and if its actions were accepted, the
AN ALL AROUND PIANO YEAR.
cloud on the horizon which portends any interests of the country would be materially
T^
men
who
are
al-
dropping off. This is a specially favored improved when the time for the election of a
The year the best
in piano history—Un-
ready figuring on country, and we seem to be enjoying the new President comes around again.
usual
demand for
the total output of pianos good things of life, pianos included among
grands and high-priced
And the business interests are to be con-
uprights — How t h e
for 1901 all agree—for the rest, with a sort of a gusto that is en- sidered more than political interests.
west is absorbing good
instruments.
we have not heard a couraging, to say the least. The voice of the
THE TIME TO HUSTLE AND HOW
dissenting voice—that it will be the banner grumbler is no longer heard in the land; his
TTHE holidays are al-
year in piano history. This year, the in- plaint is hushed.
Plenty of chance 1
now for the bright
most here, a n d
terest that people are taking in high-class
piano
man — Don't
wait until about Christ- every day from this time
WOULD BENEFIT BUSINESS.
goods, luxuries, articles of beautiful home
mas, but improve each
"THE action of the shining hour — How on should increase the
What the Recipro-
accessories, is apparent all along the line,
about the quality stan-
city Convention ac-
number of visitors to
dard?
Reciprocity Con-
from paintings and high-grade pianos to
complished-—The ap-
pointment of a per-
increased trade in the jewelry business and manent tariff commis- vention recently held in the thousands of piano warerooms through-
sion—The removal of
Washington was disap- out the country.
expensive furniture.
tariff from
politics
would be beneficial.
pointing to many of the There is plenty of good piano business
Just now there is a generous re-order trade
flowing in to the piano manufacturers which advocates of pending reciprocity treaties ready to be corraled, so the two things for
keeps many of them in somewhat of a dis- But, as a matter of fact, the convention ac- you to do now, Mr. Piano -Merchant, are to
tracted condition, owing to the fact that they complished as much as it was possible under steadily and earnestly push the high-grade
have to divide up their stock, sending pianos the circumstances, for there is no mistaking pianos, which naturally attract customers to
the fact that this is a protection country, and your stores. Don't get down to the Phila-
here and there to tide along, so to speak.
Returning traveling men bring back large high protection dominates. Reciprocity is delphia level and use the high-grade pianos
orders, and many factories are working over all right when it strikes the other fellow, but to sell the cheap as "the just as good."
Put the pianos out to the cash buyers as
time in order to keep in sight of the orders when one's own interests are affected, the
nearly as possible, and to the good paying
which are pouring in upon them. And the present tariff is infinitely satisfying.
The key to the situation has long been installment customers, using every effort in
Grand business—there never has been a time
advocated
by some able men in Congress, your power—advertising, show-making, sell-
in the history of the business when there has
been such a call for grand pianos. Some of notably Chas. G. Conn, who urged the ap- ing force and trade argument—to attract the
our largest warerooms are completely de- pointment of a permanent tariff commission right class of trade and to fasten them right
nuded of grand stock, which shows that the whose duty it should be to investigate and to you. Don't wait until the week before
people have plenty of money to buy high- recommend certain duties between various Christmas, but hustle the last week in No-
vember and the first week in December, and
countries.
priced instruments.
The recent convention at Washington, you will reap the biggest profits and get a
The small grand is now playing a very
important part in the piano output, and, in among whose members were Gen. J. J. Estey better price as well.
Get things down to a good live moving
the opinions of those best posted in the trade, and W. R. Farrand, recommended the establish-
point.
ment
of
a
reciprocity
commission
which
shall
it is destined to occupy a larger share of trade
Just now, by the way, is a pretty good time
be charged with a duty of investigating the
patronage in the near future.
to
clean up a goodly share of your outstand-
The small grand, a piano which can be condition of any industry, and reporting the
EDITORIAL
Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
THE
7V^USIO TRKDE
ings; collect all of your dubious accounts
right now; clean out your business house
and get ready for next year's business with
clean warerooms, so to speak.
To make customers is to make money,
and it requires aggressiveness and shrewd-
ness to hold them, and the piano merchant
must get new customers to build up his trade,
and the way to get new customers is to give
correct values. Sell pianos in their -proper
class. Don't put out a hundred dollar piano
for three or four times more than it costs, be-
cause that is not fair treatment to the cus-
tomer, and sooner or later he is bound to
learn that he has bought a piano gold brick
and it will react upon your business. Keep
the quality standard well in the foreground,
and to sell pianos in their proper class should
be the watchword of every piano dealer, whe-
ther in large or small towns.
. . THE ASSASSINATION OF TRADE CREDIT.
. .
Wouldn't it jar you if you saw an article like the subjoined in one of the
financial papers ?
Would you not say that it was born in the mind of an assassin of trade credit
who sat up late at night to originate some scheme by which he could stab the
music trade industry in a vital spot ? Read it!
There are evidences already accumulating that this insane activity in piano manufacturing is
somewhat artificial. The piano houses are not endowed with a surplus of cash. They have put lots of
money into material and into manufactured goods which are not yet finished, and they have taken a
whole lot of finished goods and thrown them out in the market among the dealers, and they have rilled
the banks with notes, and some of those notes are not going to be paid, and many of them are under-
stood as not to be paid when they come due. They are really not notes in the commercial sense of the
term, because when they are given it is. understood between the dealer and the manufacturer that they
are not to be met at maturity.
Now what is going to happen?
No one,, even possessed of the most vivid imagination could credit the state-
ment that such an article was penned by a man who owned a music trade paper
and was bidding for music trade patronage; and yet, though we dislike to say it,
such is the melancholy fact. Further, it was followed up, in the same music
trade paper, by plenty more of the same sort served piping hot, with the same
rich sauce.
Wouldn't it jar y021 to know that some bank officials had received, from some source
We know of a house—and a good many
or
other,
marked copies of the paper containing this article ?
of them, for that matter—but one particular
Read it ! And read again the mass of stuff which followed, and you will not
house in a Western town that started in with
hardly a dollar behind it, but its founder had be long in figuring out the reasons behind this, which constitutes the most
a clean-cut reputation. That gave him credit. malignant stab inflicted on an industry that has ever appeared in any trade pub-
He sold good pianos at honest figures, and lication in this or the past century.
to-day he is long on the bank account, and
7he trust promoter evidently is trying a new scheme to force an industry into a
long on business results, too. He is -all trust by attacking its credit. "Filled the banks with notes" thai "it is understood
right; he is the real thing, as they say. He are not to be met at maturity."
Could any stronger tvords be used to undermine the
is a mighty good customer of some of the faith of bank men in piano paper ?
big houses, and a good payer as well.
The good nature of American piano manufacturers is proverbial, but we
We may say that he is a good advertiser, question whether they will tamely submit to this latest attack upon their honor.
for that is one of the ways bright piano mer-
It is not a question whether piano manufacturers will continue to give even
chants do their business. They needn't ad-
a weak support to a man who has not only insulted their intelligence, and whose
vertise all sort of fake sales, because regular
work will have the effect to prejudice financial institutions against the stability of
goods need not be chopped. This particular
man has a very clever way of presenting his the music trade industry. It should not end there even, for a move of this kind
statements in the columns of the daily papers, should not be permitted to pass without the most emphatic condemnation.
Attacks upon individuals are infinitesimal and in fact are the merest by-play
so that his wares are very accessible to the
as compared with this insolent assassination of the credit of the industry by one
pocketbooks of the average buyers.
While the satisfactory business of 1900 is of the papers which has long fed upon it. The whole plan was carefully
being pretty well distributed, don't fail to conceived and was developed with the idea of obtaining certain results, and the
get a goodly slice of it, for if you are not results in this case may prove a mighty sight more far-reaching than the origin-
getting it now, you can make up your minds ator anticipated.
that you never will, because it is doubtful
The trust can not be formed by ruining the credit of this industry, even if it
if general conditions will ever be made more
were possible for the trade Judas to do that.
satisfactory than at the present time.
What shall his punishment be for the offense ?
Hustle now, gentlemen, and you can sit
Shall he be permitted to hide behind dummy editors ? It is up to the piano
down and smile broadly after Jan. 1st with
a clear conscience and no troubles on your men to decide. The mask is torn off.
brain.
Piano men, as a whole, are liberal adver- every opportunity to belittle the trade press—
tisers, and it is an historical truth that the a press which, in the main, is clean and which
THE RIGHT KIND OF A LEVER.
I
T
was
Archimedes,
men who have been the most persistent pa- is working not only for the personal gain of
The value of adver
tisinj — Piano m e n
the mathematician of trons of the trade and the daily press, have the publisher, but for the advance of the in-
who are successful—
old,
who said, "Give me been most successful in their business enter- dustry it represents; because if placed upon
Phenomenal record of
theHobartM.CableCo.
—Men who patron- a lever long enough and prise, hence the statement that advertising a purely selfish basis the advance of the in-
ize the trade press.
a fulcrum on which to is a powerful factor in the development of dustry must mean the advance of trade jour-
rest it and I will raise the world." Outside modern business is a truth which should nalism.
the domain of mechanics, the advertising not be overlooked by any business man.
There are some men who question the
lever resting on a fulcrum of good value,
It is true to-day that we have some men in value of trade publications and some of them,
raises an unknown business into a proud po- this industry whose business horizon does too. who owe much to the trade press; but
sition. And advertising as a raising power is not include advertising of large proportions, you will invariably find it to be a truth that
appreciated by all firms who are endeavor- They take a narrow and prejudicial view of the men who speak slightingly or sneeringly
ing to raise their properties into the upper the use and value of trade publications, and of trade publications as a class, and who
realms of success,
there are some, too, who delight to embra.ee patronize them in a, half-hearted, way supply

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