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THE
TRHDE
REVIEW
There is reason in everything. The right
store equipment is the greatest kind of an
attraction, but it is hard to get some mer-
chants to understand that putting money into
things they cannot afterwards sell is a good
investment, they count money spent on store
arrangements as money lost, while nine times
out of ten every dollar comes back to the
house again and again in profit.
Wideawake retailing means progress, and
progress is constant development.
Wideawake retailing; well, if you want
to see it well illustrated, when you are in
Y\7 E cannot speak right out loud in favor Chicago drop around to Lyon & Healv's,
of our Assembly at Albany for its Kimball's, and a few other well-known piano
action in dealing with the State appropriation emporiums, and while you are on your way
for the St. Louis Exposition. If New York East drop into Heppe's. in Philadelphia and
is to be represented at all, it should be by a you will see that Florence Heppe has got
display which is in accordance with its su- some pretty well defined ideas on wideawake
premacy in wealth, population and resources. retailing", and then when you get to New
An appropriation which would indicate York possibly we may have a few points to
that we hold the exposition in slight esteem interest you here..
would be misplaced economy, not only un-
Wideawake retailing; well, the subject
worthy of the State, but positively injurious is a great one!
to its interests. A number of foreign nations
HP HE foundation of commercial success is
are already pledged to make displays surpass-
in giving the value for the money ex-
ing any previous effort, and no European na-
pended, and in treating customers honorably.
tion will be absent. New York has treated
If a merchant cannot do that competition
the matter mighty niggardly. No chance
will drive him out of business, and it should.
for argument about that in its little, measly
If a piano merchant asks for an inferior
appropriation for an exposition which is to be
piano a price which should entitle the pur-
alike international and universal.
chaser to become the owner of an instru-
C TRANGE, is it not, how Blumie never ment of a much higher grade, then he is not
touches upon the affairs of firms which delivering the value to which the customer
he has not gathered within the fold without is entitled. A man who is selling pianos out
frothing at the mouth and showing a set of of their class should understand that a con-
ugly fangs. Sometimes he seems to exist fiding public cannot be continually deceived,
for the satisfaction to be derived from vili- and that the public is becoming pretty well
fying certain firms and individuals. His posted upon piano values.
bark, however, is not the bay of the mastiff,
A dissatisfied customer will work an irre-
but the rasping yelp of the cur.
parable injury to a business institution. He
expects
the full value for his money, and he
A SUBSCRIBER from Missouri writes:
"Have been interested in your prize is entitled to receive it. Cheap pianos are
topics. Why not make one on wideawake all right, in their class, but they should be
religiously kept there.
retailing; it is a pretty broad subject."
We would say to the hungry man from I I OW do you like the new Easter coat of
The Review?
Missouri, it is one which we are handling
The
Springtime has come, and in colors
—at least we have something to say "touchin'
on an' appertainin' to" nearly every week in there is a strong tendency towards the cadet
blue, and of course The Review must be
the year.
Wideawake retailing means discarding old fashionable and up-to-date in every thing.
A CONNECTICUT Judge, named Bald-
fogy notions and applying intelligent and sys-
win, may be an able lawyer, but he is
tematic methods. It means snappy, attrac-
tive advertising; it means having the right a mighty poor political economist. He says
kind of fixtures, windows, delivery system that "the American workingman spends too
and installment collections, cleanliness. Lord much money in furnishing his dwelling;
bless you, friend, the list is endless regard- lace curtains are too common in working-
men's homes," and the Judge is as fiercely
ing wideawake retailing.
Up-to-date store, intelligent and system- opposed to porterhouse steak and other crea-
atic methods are among the best advertise- ture comforts as he is to lace curtains, for
he prances into the subject warmly and says,
ments that a store can offer.
There is good advertising in everything "the whole American nation is spending too
much in eating." Presumably the Judge
well done in a business establishment
and honestly wins credit, and after a while
wealth.
It is character, and character only, upon
which a journal or a business can build en-
during success. There may be many hard-
ships and drawbacks, but no man can stay
down when he has been successful in inspir-
ing the world with confidence. Integrity is
the thing you can't play shuttle-cock and
battledore with. A man who juggles with
the truth soon shows it. , .
The truth, though the heavens fall.
would like to have Americans live like China-
men and hoard the bulk of their earnings,
and if this were done, where would the work-
ingman get his money to hoard?
Without consumption there would be no
production.
The consuming power of the American,
feeling that nothing is too good for him, so
long as he can pay for it, has been one of
the chief factors in the development of this
country.
What would become of the great American
piano market if the American people were
to decide that pianos are appropriate only
for men of large means ? The more meat,
pianos, clothes and other necessaries the
workingman consumes, the more employ-
ment he gives to his fellow producers. The
legal luminary of the Nutmeg State should
again read Robinson Crusoe and find out
what the lonely castaway said on finding a
bag of gold. How utterly useless it was to
one in such a condition. It is really surpris-
ing how cramped and narrow some men are
in their views.
• j .
department stores in New York,
A LL save the one,
have been handling a lot of
cheap pianos with no definite or traceable ori-
gin, and coming under the colloquial term
known as the "stencil" piano. The word
stencil, however, is entirely misapplied,
for all piano* are stenciled with legitimate
as well as illegitimate names ; therefore, when
we say a "stencil" piano, it is an absurdity
without the prefix, illegitimate.
The term stencil should be kicked out the
back door of pianodom, and in its place
should be. substituted the word irregular.
To say that such and such a piano is an
irregular piano would mean that it had no
traceable origin. It might be made by half a
dozen different manufacturers during the
season. It would be a pretty good point to
revise some of our piano vocabulary. Let us
begin with the work stencil. There are two
kinds of pianos—regular and irregular.
IN another part of The Review will be found
some interesting figures based upon the
census report of the manufacturing and me-
chanical industries for the State of Illinois.
While census statistics are not to be relied
upon absolutely, yet in this instance they
give a fair idea of the development of the
music trade industry during the past dec-
ade. The increase in the value of the prod-
ucts of Illinois for that period is placed
at $4,610,106, or 130 per cent.
TT is the nimble piano sixpence that makes
the wealthy piano dealer, and the present
is a pretty good time in which to exploit that
theory. More cash, larger installments—
healthy business,
.
, .