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6
THE
MUSIC TRADE
MEW
EDWARD LYMAN BILL, - Editor and Proprietor
J. B. SPILLANE, Managing Editor
Executive and Reportorlal Stall:
GBO. B. KBLLEK.
W. N. TYLER.
F. H. THOMPSON.
EMILIB FHANCES BADKH.
L. B. BOWERS. B. BRITTAIN WILSON, Wir. B. WHITE. L. J. CHAMBERLIN. A. J. NICKLIN.
BOSTON OFFICE:
CHICAGO OFFICE:
E. P. VAN HARLINQEN, 195-197 Wabash Ave.
TELEPHONES : Central 414 ; Automatic 8G43,
PHILADELPHIA OFFICE: MINNEAPOLIS and ST. PAUL: ST. LOUIS OFFICE
BBNEST L. WAITT, 278A Tremont St.
R. W. KAUFFMAN.
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NINA PUOH-SMITH.
Published Every Saturday at 1 Madison Avenue, New York.
Entered at the New York Post Office as Second Class Matter.
SUBSCRIPTION, (Including postage). United States, Mexico, and Canada, $2.00 per
year ; all other countries, $4.00.
ADVERTISEMENTS. $2.00 per Inch, single column, per Insertion. On quarterly or
yearly contracts a special discount Is allowed. Advertising Pages, $50.00; opposite
reading matter, $75.00.
REMITTANCES, In other than currency form, should be made payable to Edward
Lyman Bill.
Directory ol Piano
~
: ~
Manufacturers
The directory of piano manufacturing firms and corporations
found on another page will be of great value, as a reference
f o r (j e a i e r B a n a others.
Exposition Honors Won by The Review
Grand Prix
Paris Exposition, 1900 Hilv< r lfcd«f.Chfirlostcm Exposition, I'.loJ
Diploma. Pan-American Exposition, 1901 Gold Medal. . St. Louis Exposition, 1904
Gold Medal.Lewis Clark Exposition, 1905
LONG DISTANCE TELEPHONE-NUMBER 1745 GRAMERCY
NEW
YORK,
JUNE 30,
1906
EDITORIAL
F
REQUENTLY the statement is made that while a certain piano
man may be making a good many sales, he is doing business
without profit. Now of what avail is trade if goods are persistently
sold at a loss to either the producer or retailer? Trade must be
conducted along profitable lines else the business may as well be
abandoned, and there is nowadays a tendency on the part of modern
business men to go more exhaustively into the actual cost of selling
a product than ever before. We know of the head of one piano
concern who some years ago found his trade steadily declining.
His yearly output had shrunk materially from the high water mark
and the members of the firm stated they could not afford to sell
pianos below a certain figure, because their instruments cost them
so much to produce. There came a change in the management,
and it was decided to introduce new methods in the manufacturing
department, and first of all it became expedient to increase the
factory output, fixing a certain number of instruments annually,
which must be manufactured and sold.
T
HE modern forces determined that the selling cost of each in-
strument would decrease materially according to the output,
and the first year the business came nearly up to the sales schedule
arranged and planned by the reorganizer. The next year the num-
ber of pianos was reached and passed. To do this required simply
the application of sound business system. And there are a good many
people to-day whose selling expenses are enormous for a limited
business, and many who do not know actually what it costs them
to sell pianos, but the history of the industry shows that successful
concerns are all familiar with the producing and selling costs.
They can tell within a five-cent piece what a piano costs when it is
placed in the car for shipment. And the big retail houses know
what it costs to sell a piano with every expense figured in. A man
who fools himself in these times through ignorance of the situation
is liable to lose ground rather than to forge ahead.
HE astonishing growth exhibited by the figures published by
the U. S. Census Department first appearing in The Review
two weeks ago, furnish an interesting summary as to the growth
and development of this industry. According to this report the
T
total capital invested in 1904 was $72,205,829, divided as follows:
In the manufacture of pianos, organs and attachments, $56,853,013;
in the manufacture of piano and organ materials, $11,618,997; in
the manufacture of miscellaneous musical instruments and mate-
rials, $3,733,819. The total capital invested in 1900 was $47,751,-
582; increase in 1904 over 1900, 51.2 per cent.
A NOTHER interesting fact revealed by the figures lies in the
A
following, which we extracted from The Review statement:
The total value of the product in 1904, including the five establish-
ments heretofore referred to, was $69,746,209, of which $52,964,-
315 was in pianos, organs and attachments, $13,128,315 in piano
and organ materials, and $3,478,8(10 in miscellaneous musical in-
struments and materials. The value of the product in 1900 was
$44,514,463. making an increase of 56.3 in 1904 over
CHAS. N. VAN BUREN.
SAN FRANCISCO OFFICE: ALFRED METZGER, 425-427 Front S t
CINCINNATI, O.:
REVIEW
S
URELY the report shows a phenomenal growth in the music
trade affairs of this country, and the end is not reached by a
good deal. We have men, of course, who now cry over-production.
We had the same kind of men twenty years ago who said that by
1900 the entire piano business would collapse. We can name a
number who stated that the entire demand for pianos would be
supplied, and that the sale for pianos for 1900 would diminish so
that many factories would have to be closed or go into other lines
of manufacture. On the contrary, there has been a marvelous in-
crease, and while we do not believe in the minute exactness of the
Government reports on special industries, yet they furnish interest-
ing data which may be assumed to be fairly correct.
T
HERE is no reason to believe that we are approaching the
over-production point in musical instruments for America,
for when the home market is fully supplied, there is an opportunity
to cater to a world-wide trade in a systematic manner, which will
be bound to bring about desired results.
T
HE national unification of prices will be of the greatest benefit
to the trade, and manufacturers and dealers are rapidly being
brought around to the belief that one price is the proper way in
which to conduct the piano business, and they are also further im-
pressed with the idea that that price should be the correct one, and
that it must be named by the manufacturer. The any old price
of years gone by has been succeeded by a willingness on the part
of leading members of the trade to stick to the one price principle.
It removes the barter element, and all that goes with it, from the
piano industry and places it on a plane where it must be respected
by business men in every other line.
The belief is steadily growing that the manufacturers must
fix the prices at which their instruments shall be offered to the
purchasing public, and in that way only can piano stability be main-
tained and improved with the passing of the years.
A SUBSCRIBER to The Review asks: "What do you suggest
1~\
as a means to encourage trade during the summer?" The
question is answered briefly: Work is the best means to know to
assist trade during the dull summer months, but that work must be
well directed. It is a hard tussle in this busy workaday world of ours
to win success in any line, but as a noted writer says: There is
no success in life without industry. To have the character for
it is the passport to favor, and to practice it gives daily additional
power and worth. In the struggle for life on every side, laziness
is left behind at the starting. Competition demands application
and diligence if we would not be beaten. Men stand too thick on
the ground, and the strong outgrow the weak. Dutch shopkeeping
will not do now even in Holland ; the feather bed and long pipe in the
parlor and lazy parley before getting up are a tradition; there are
no sleepy hollows in modern commerce, hardly any in modern life.
A little honey has to be gathered from many flowers. Industry
saves the moments, acts with full knowledge, gives its heart to its
work, keeps its eyes and ears open, is always rather too soon than
too late. It meets opportunity as it comes; idleness follows it. It
is thoughtful of all that goes to its aim and never misses through
thinking on other things. Tt turns worthlessness into new wealth,
and is quick at seeing improvements on existing uses. All that we
see bears its mark; for civilization, in every detail, is its creation.