Music Trade Review

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THE MUSIC TRADE
facts are before us. No man can produce a finished product at the
price of a few years ago, and the constant advance has not only cut
the old-time profit, but wiped it out completely.
W
ITH still another month to roll up the sales score it is certain
that this will be the banner twelve months of piano trade
history. The record reached by the "best year" will have been passed
when we reach another milestone, marking the line of passing years.
Trade during the first part of the year was somewhat inactive, but
the fall and holiday trade has developed surprising activity, and the
men who have not done business this year may as well figure that
they are out of their line in making or selling pianos. Because any
enterprise which has not shown some progress during the past
twelve months is out of the race unless the conditions are easily
explained why advance has not been made.
More pianos have been made and sold this year than in any
previous year since Jonas Chickering started the industry in a mod-
est way in the good old town of Boston. We may say also that more
better pianos have been made and sold because the demand has been
well emphasized for the better instruments and all manufacturers
of,; high grade pianos have been extremely busy—a fact which shows
the desire of our people to purchase better instruments when they
have the means.
O
RDERS are now coming-in to manufacturers by telegraph
from all over the country to rush orders for particular styles.
The dealers will learn, however, that they cannot rely upon the
manufacturer to carry the entire burden, and when trade conditions
were generally promising they should have followed the advice
of The Review during the summer months and placed many advance
orders.
The manufacturer is not justified in creating a big surplus of
stock to supply a hurried demand which possibly may come later.
The dealers should share responsibility with him, and some of them
have learned that they have lost a good many sales by not having a
stock on hand to supply immediate demands.
From present appearances it would seem as if the warerooms
would be pretty well denuded of instruments at the end of the holiday
season. That being the case we will start in the new year with a
pretty clean slate. Our own reports indicate an increased activity
during the past week in the larger cities. This condition of affairs
will probably be maintained up to the end of the holidays. Collec-
tions, too, have been unusually brisk recently, which shows that the
little pinch in the money market has been entirely relaxed.
SALESMAN recently remarked to The Review that he found
it extremely difficult to sell his pianos to the dealers, and
that the objection was frequently made that his concern did not
follow out a progressive advertising campaign either in the trade
papers, magazines, or daily newspapers.
It is short-sighted policy in any business house to-day to attempt
to do business without working along up-to-date lines of publicity,
and one of the great problems confronting energetic merchants and
manufacturers in America is how to advertise. Tt is not a question
of whether they should, or should not, but simply the best means
to advertise, and when a salesman is sent out on the road to represent
a house to-day that does not believe in publicity, he has struck a
mighty hard proposition, and he can hardly hope to win a very high
position if his house is standing still. Water will not rise above
its own • level. The larger and more progressive the house, the
greater the opportunity.
A
GOOD house gives the salesman confidence, and, no matter
how strong and progressive it may be, it cannot long main-
tain a position of strength without using various lines of publicity.
And a salesman who is out representing a non-progressive house on
the road to-day has a disheartening task before him. Dealers are
naturally influenced in making new arrangements by the forces
which are behind the traveling man who solicits their patronage,
[f the name on a piano is familiar to them, and they know that
through the various sources of publicity its makers have kept their
ware's intelligently before the people, they are interested, because
they know if they make a business alliance with a house of modern
views that there is a helpful force behind them. Therefore, manu-
facturers should consider that all kinds of advertising has its effect
upon the dealers, and there are few concerns to-day who can afford
to throw aside the dealer and use the slogan, from factory to home.
REVIEW
The dealer is a force to be reckoned with in this or any other indus-
try, and any system which has as its ultimate aim the elimination of
the dealer is liable to fail. The dealer is a force—that is the pro-
gressive dealer—in every community, and his means of distributing
any product which he may take on are very large, and it is a dan-
gerous move for any house, whether selling pianos or any other
line of goods, to adopt the policy which strikes at the dealer rather
than working with him. -•
T
H E R E is a tendency, sometimes hardly apparent, but neverthe-
less 1 existing at all times, to go over the dealer's head and
cater to the larger market which lies beyond it. This we see evi-
denced in many trades, but in the piano business it would hardly
meet with a satisfying degree of success, for people do not buy
pianos in the same way that they purchase some little trifling article
of modest cost. They consult with their friends, and they visit
various warerooms before making a purchase. This" gives the local
piano merchant an opportunity to make his best arguments in favor
of a home purchase, and in nine cases out of ten he wins the battle.
There are one or two exceptions in this trade where a business
has been worked up to a fair degree of success without the dealer
being taken into consideration, but what was possible to accomplish
years ago is not possible to win to-day, because conditions have
changed, and there is no piano house than can afford to eliminate
the dealer out of the business proposition. Tt may come some time,
a long ways off in the dim and shadowy future, that from factory
to fireside will be a general slogan in all trades, but by the time that
it arrives most of us who are figuring in present history will have
passed to that peaceful land where the blumeubergs cease from
troubling and the "weary music; trade is at rest. It is true that some
of the catalogue houses have developed a sale for cheap pianos. But
this trade has been confined almost wholly to remote country dis-
tricts, and it will be found the trade of none of the larger dealers has
been cut in any appreciable degree by the work of the catalogue
houses.
C
ONDITIONS have changed, of course, and we must adjust
ourselves to the changing times, and every progressive busi-
ness concern to-day understands the value of publicity in all lines.
In olden times a man had a store on a crowded corner, and waited
for the people to come to him and send others by talking about him.
But now he operates on a different plan. Through various mediums
he sends news of what he is doing directly into the homes, into the
stores, into the offices. He reaches millions of people through the
power of printer's ink. He spreads the news in all directions, as the
electric dynamo working in one corner of the city sends its light
everywhere. The dynamo is judged by the quality of the light it
sends out. The little bulb of glass is a small fragile thing, but upon
it depends all the prosperity of the big heavy machinery over in the
power house. So it is with the advertisements. It may be a passing,
flimsy thing in appearance, but upon it is what depends all the
product of the distant factory or the great store. Of course the
factory and the store must justify by performances the advertise-
ment's promises, and piano merchants should in their advertising
matter live up squarely to every promise made in their advertising
statement. They should not advertise pianos for stool pigeon pur-
poses. They have got to live up to their statements. No matter
how good a product a man may have, or what splendid merchandis-
ing- quarters he may enjoy, unless he informs the people in a persis-
tent and in a consistent manner, he cannot expect to be made rich by
simply having a good factory or pleasant warerooms. He must
do more than that; he must acquaint the people, the dealers, and
the purchasers with what he is making, and he must impress them
in such a manner that they are interested, because therein lies the
whole value of an advertisement.
S
OME of our lesser contemporaries have recently made an
astounding discovery. They have "discovered that the talk-
ing machine business has grown to immense proportions," and one
of them hysterically shouts that "there are many piano houses deal-
ing in pianos and music who do as much business in talking ma-
chines as in all their business besides, including pianos, organs,
players, sheet music and band instruments." What marvelous jour-
nalistic progressiveness is here developed! The Review printed
these statements over a year ago. Our little contemporaries are
just learning that the talking •machine department has grown into
an important branch of the music trade industry!