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THE:
MUSIC TRADE REVIEW
S
OME of the largest supply houses report a surprising activity
of trade even in midsummer. It is only a short time now
before fall business will come on with a rush, and the men who have
made preparations to take care of it will reap the fullest reward for
their business shrewdness. It pays to be in a state of preparedness in
business as well as in war, and everything indicates a fall of unusual
trade activity. It therefore behooves every one in that industry to
which The Review specially appeals to make preparations which will
insure the prompt taking care of their trade demands. There is
every reason to believe that business will be brisk and will start
in early.
I
N our own State the reports of the savings banks' deposits are
proof of increased prosperity and thrift. The total deposits
now in these banks are $1,252,928,299, or almost as much as the
aggregate assets of the Equitable, New York and Mutual Life In-
surance Companies. The total number of accounts is $2,513,570,
and the total amount of interest is $41,748,434, or an average of
about $15.00 for each depositor. The total number of depositors is
over one-quarter of the population of the State, and the interest ex-
ceeds the total expenses of the State government. This condition
of affairs goes far to disprove the statement of some pessimists that
the poor are getting poorer and the rich richer. It no doubt is a
fact that the rich are getting richer, but the deposits in the banks in
this State show that the working class, whose savings are repre-
sented in the savings banks institutions, are considerable, and it
shows that the reserve strength of the poorer people is very great.
It means that there is a good purchasing power there, and it is also
an excellent basis on which to reckon business plans for the future.
piano department, it is said, received $5.00 on each piano of a cer-
tain make which was sold under his direction. At the end of the
year he handed the entire amount in to the proprietor. This was
an honest employe, and his chief appreciated his services by giving
him a substantial advance in salary. The proprietor then wrote to
the manufacturing concern and demanded a reduction of $5.00 on
every instrument sold him. The concern demurred, saying they
could not understand why he should make such an unreasonable
demand when everything was going up in price. The dealer replied
that he did not question that part of it, but he felt he ought to buy
as cheaply as any one, and that when a rebate of $5.00 was made
to his manager he concluded that he was rightfully entitled to that
allowance himself. The members of the concern saw that they
were trapped, and rather than lose a good customer they concluded
to allow the rebate.
SALESMAN cannot be strictly honest who will accept a bribe
from outsiders for performing his work faithfully, and if
manufacturers can afford to pay him $5.00 for every piano which he
sells, they could afford to sell their goods cheaper, and the effect
of such work is to destroy honest competition, for-if this bribery is
to obtain to any great extent, salesmen will push only such pianos
as they draw a personal dividend from ; therefore, instruments would
not be sold upon their merits, but according to the desire of the
salesman to make such sales as accord him an individual profit.
In time this would destroy the entire fabric of the business system,
which would be run simply on the bribery basis, for values would
no longer come in for consideration. It would be simply a question
of graft, and how much ?
A
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HEY are having troubles across the water resulting from the
giving of tips to salesmen. In Germany bribing employes,
who act as buyers for mercantile houses, or who, in the capacity of
salesmen, attend to customers in retail shops, is an abuse which has
grown steadily for some years past. In fact, it has become so seri-
ous that the Chambers of Commerce and other mercantile bodies
have considered it necessary to discuss measures for relief. The
commercial traveler or representative of a manufacturer who wishes
to sell to the retail dealers will, in many cases, pay employes of the
latter commissions in consideration for giving the goods of the
bribing house the preference, showing them to customers in the shop
and keeping the goods of other concerns in the background.
HIS practice of bribing extends to many branches of business,
and a case has just been decided by the Supreme Court of
Appeals at Cologne, Germany, where the technical manager of a
car building concern was discharged by the company which em-
ployed him, because he accepted commissions from a firm for which
he procured orders. The manager claimed that such gifts—that is,
percentages paid him in money—were customary and worked no
injury to his employers, but the Court held that the action consti-
tuted a gross breach of trust, and that the manager was in duty
bound to study the interests of his employers and not to be in-
fluenced by selfish considerations. The lower court decided against
the manager and the Supreme Court of Appeals confirmed the
decision.
HE Chamber of Commerce and Trade of the province of the
Palatinate at Ludwigshafen has petitioned the Bavarian Gov-
ernment to introduce a bill in its legislature to suppress the bribing
of employes which seriously injures legitimate trade and hurts the
good repute of German manufacturers. The Chamber recommends
that the party giving, or attempting to give, a bribe, shall be pun-
ished as well as the person who accepts it. Other trade bodies have
adopted the same resolutions. The Chamber of Commerce at Leipzig
has petitioned the Saxon state government to have a law enacted
making such a bribery a criminal offense. The Chamber of Com-
merce of llerlin in its last report also inveighed against this nefar-
ious practice which, it says, corrupts business life and gives unscru-
pulous competitors an undue advantage over honest merchants.
I
T seems that this class of bribery is not confined to any particular
country or to any particular craft, and the retail department of
the piano industry has not been entirely free from its taint, for the
corrupting influences of bribery have been apparent for some time
past in this trade. We know of a concern, the manager of whose
HE salesman might try to square himself with his conscience by
saying the money did not come from his employer, but his
employer pays him to perform a certain task, and he should perform
that task honestly and with fairness to all or throw up his job.
It seems strange that there should be a desire to corrupt sales-
men to such a world-wide extent. It shows that our moral sensi-
bilities are becoming decidedly blunted, and that the question of
graft enters into almost every subdivision of business. It is bribery
everywhere, but this should be cut wholly out of piano retailing.
Instruments should be sold solely on their merits and not because
some traveling representative offers a bribe of a few dollars to a
salesman to sell his particular line.
ITH the unitibility of all things terrestrial, Horace Greely's
advice to the young men of his time to "go West" has
become retroactive, and to-day it is the young men from the West
who are coming to the East to do things. The young men of a gen-
eration ago went West and prospered, and it is the bright, expansive
ideas and tiresome energy to conceive and accomplish big things that
their sons are now bringing East. We now have piano manufac-
turing concerns invading eastern territory with enormous capital at
their backs. New York has attracted men in all lines of trade. It
is the magnet which is drawing the brainest men from all over
America. Its position as the second city in the world makes it large
in business possibilities of all kinds.
PEAKING of advertising, the Lewis and Clark Exposition,
which is being held at Portland, is the largest single piece of
advertising work ever conceived, and it bids fair to be the most suc-
cessful. It is a fair conceived almost solely for the purpose of ad-
vertising the country which Lewis and Clark added to the Union
and the sentiment which, for a time may have been considered a
reasonable basis for the expenditure of hard money on a sentimental
fair, has given way to a realization of the fact that the fair means
business for business men, settlers for unsettled communities, and
money for a land that needs money, with all to be gotten out of it
that it is possible to get. The faith in the fair project as a business-
getter and a booster for the country explains why Portland business
men in two days subscribed nearly one-half million dollars' worth
of stock in the Exposition corporation. ()ur reports from that sec-
tion show a splendid daily attendance, when the population of Port-
land and the adjacent territory is considered. The Review booth
has many attractive features which causes it to be the Mecca of
thousands of people. Our photographic display is attracting a good
deal of attention, and The Review souvenir is conceded to be the
most expensive one given away on the grounds.