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THE MUSIC TRADE
conditions, or circumstances offer an inducement in the shape of a
bribe to obtain business, but the matters are not always presented to
them in that positive Way by their traveling representatives. It
comes in the way of expense accounts which they do not examine
too closely.
There is no doubt that this question will be thoroughly ventilated
and short work can be made of this system of grafting which has been
gradually creeping in.
RIVATE graft was vigorously denounced during a recent de-
bate in the Senate on Senator Saxe's bill which shuts off com-
missions or gifts to agents who make purchases for their employers.
It is no tthe varnish trade, or the piano trade that stand alone in this
system of commissions and gifts, but it is a fact that many who dis-
approve corruption in public business are parties to the same thing
in ordinary business. The system of gifts and commission eliminates
merit from competition entirely. If a salesman is receiving five dol-
lars to push the piano that he knows is worth less, and is costing
more than another make which stands on his floor, is he doing right?
Is he delivering his whole services in the best interests of his em-
ployer ?
It is simply a question of private graft, and all piano worth and
merit are cut out of the question entirely. After a while the ware-
rooms will become auction parlors, and the questions, what is there
in it for me, or I can get more from so and so, will obtain. Graft-
ing was very cleverly described by a diplomat who was asked if
skin grafting was a very late discovery. He replied, "No, it is only
a new branch of a very old art, all grafting is a skin process."
P
A READER asks, "What is the outlook for business in the music
J~\ trade in Porto Rico? You are familiar with the situation
there, I believe."
While it is true that great progress has been made in all depart-
ments since our first visit to the Island, yet it will be a long time be-
fore Porto Rico will form a market for any appreciable number of
pianos. While the entire population approximates a million yet in
actual purchasing power in the piano line, it will fall far short of one
of our second rate cities in the North. There are only two concerns
on the Island who pay cash for pianos and these two houses together
sold less than thirty pianos last year.
REVIEW
9
F course competition is commercial war, but it should be honest.
Unrestricted competition carried to its logical conclusion means
death to some of its combatants and injury for all, and it is this prin-
ciple that seems to actuate many piano men in competitive battles.
It will take a long while to heal some of the wounds that are made in
this kind of conflict. Of course, let there be competition. On with
the dance, let joy be unconfined. To stamp it out, were such a
thing possible, would mean stagnation and death. It would mean
that there would be no further progress, but why not let it be fair
competition? Yes, let us have it—competition—lots of it. If there
were no prizes to be obtained, men would cease to put forth the effort
which makes for progress and growth. If there were no larger vistas
ahead of the young men than the mere office boy or drayman, the
likelihood is that few would put forth the effort to advance. But
because there are prizes to be gained by competition, why should men
be willing to practically ignore rules of decency and fairness in the
conduct of their business or profession?
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HE prizes are to be sought for and they should be honorably
won, and in gaining them they make larger contributions to the
sum of human progress and happiness. We need competition if we
would grow. We need it in the newspaper line. Competition has
made the music trade papers the best of any line in this country. If
we go back to a period of fifteen or twenty years, The Review, then
twelve or sixteen pages in size, was then published twice a month.
That was not often enough. It was at that time the only exclusive
music trade paper in this country, but all of the musical papers had
trade attachments, and in two weeks a portion of the news presented
by The Review was old. We had to get closer to the band, nearer
the music or we would be forgotten in the march. When The Re-
view was issued every week its real progress was begun. It was
competition that bettered its service and brought it up to fifty or
sixty pages weekly. And in building up none but clean methods
were ever used. W'e need honest, intelligent competition, and that
is not what is being had, under conditions which prevail in this trade
in some sections of the country at the present time.
F course it pays to have a system in business. Buy the best
goods at the best prices, know what it costs to sell them, and put
prices on them intelligently. People cannot be fooled as in the old
days. Most of them refuse to be Chadwicked. They want the real
HERE are great possibilities, however, for American invest-
goods at the proper prices, and there is no reason why in presenting
ments as the splendid resources of the Island are being de
the people with what they desire, and what they pay for, that certain
veloped at a rapid rate.
dealers should violate the rules which are recognized as correct in
To illustrate: Two years ago the output of sugar was five mil-
all polite circles. Confine trade to its proper channels, and there will
lions; last year, it was seven, and this year it will exceed fifteen. The be no rank abuses which now exist in business life.
same enormous increase is found in many of the other staple products.
There are fifteen thousand acres of cultivated orange groves, which
NE cannot help feeling proud of the trade press and its com-
will be bearing in a few years and they are all owned by Americans.
parative cleanliness. There may be black records here and
These require more men and of course the purchasing power of the
there, but the readers of trade papers are not compelled to have all
Island under such conditions is steadily growing. Porto Rico has
of the local and national scandals served up to them spicing hot with
a wonderful future. It will be the orange garden of this country,
sensational sauce. We have had this wife beating preacher, the gay
for its possesses admitted advantages over any portion of the con-
Lothario of New Jersey, pictured in cell and out of cell, calling his
tinent. The climate, too, is most enjoyable almost a perennial June,
wife a liar and his mistress an angel in court, and we have had him
it being cooler than Cuba and Jamaica, and even of the southern por-
painted in every possible mood until it is refreshing to turn to pages
tion of the United States. As a health resort, too, it is already much
that are clean and decent, pages which depict something of the edu-
favored by physicians. While its future is undoubtedly brilliant,
cational and inventive side of life, not pages which reek with sensa-
Porto Rico cannot be said at the present time to possess great attrac-
tional matter, and in which there is an absolute ignoring of events
tions for piano men. There are, however, many small goods sold
which mean intellectual and educational advance for millions of peo-
there, and there is a largely increased call for them. Talking ma-
ple. Not ten lines daily were given for the news of the great St.
chines as well come in for a good demand, but the articles which
Louis exposition, which denoted the high water mark of human ef-
mean a large sum of money involved in the individual sale will nec-
forts in arts, the sciences and manufactures, an occasional reference
essarily be limited in sales.
to the world's greatest achievements in all the ages, as a great edu-
cational force and pages and illustrations of the dirty scum of our
municipal and suburban life. Thank heaven there are trade papers,
S a piano merchant acting fairly in disposing of instruments which
and if they are not all progressive, if some of them are unspeakably
he may have on hand, after an agency has been withdrawn from
stupid, if some are filled with pages of bombastic "slobberations" of
him, to smaller agents throughout adjoining territory, so that they
a decadent, they are in most cases respectably clean. One does not
may be a constant thorn in the side of the new representative in the
have to turn the hose upon them before carrying them into our
larger city?
residences.
This, we understand, has been done on the Pacific Coast, and in
this way instruments have been supplied to dealers scattered through
HE piano merchants have now inaugurated all kinds of sales,
a large extent of territory who use them to the disadvantage of the
from "exhibition" down to "slaughter sales," and about some
great piano name in competitive sales. As long as such methods
of the advertising which has reached us during the past week there
obtain it cannot be truthfully said that all the evils are exterminated
is a spice and warmth which is decidedly peppery, and presages
from the piano business. There are many ways in which the ethics
some wordy combats, which will quicken the pulse of the piano
of trade could be upheld, but why prate about ethics and go deliber-
man, even if it does not bring dollars to his pocket.
ately and perform some deed that would shame a peanut vendor.
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