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THE MUSIC TRADE! REVIEW
9
business is simply astonishing them. All the
firms to whom they sell are taking enthusias-
tically to the Lester player piano, and the firm
is away oversold. They are making shipments
Trade Makes Good Showing for May—Crop Prospects Cause Some Discussion—Activity With
just as fast as they can get them out. They
the Small Goods People—Schomacker Piano Co. Affairs—Anxious That Settlement be Ef-
have always been staunch believers in the player
fected—Some Recent Visitors—Witney Agency With Strawbridge & Clothier—Wanamaker
proposition, "but," Mr. Miller says, "the way
Piano Department in New Quarters—Cunningham
News—Hardman
and Marshall &
they have been goins has really taken us off of
Wendel Pianos Big Sellers at Bellak's—The Lester Player Piano in Great Demand—The
our feet. It is very much greater than we ever
Lester Co. Arrange to Double Their Power Plant—Organ Business Active With Estey.
thought it would be. The firm's new style 45 is
(Special to The Review.)
The house has more than doubled its business a beautiful piano and is taking very well indeed.
The Lester people have two pianos at the
Philadelphia, Fa., May 15, 1907.
in the past two years. They have a fine line of
The Philadelphia piano trade is looking up Steck pianos, which is just the kind of in- Jamestown Exposition, both of them placed in
very well in May. The month started very good, strument to appeal to the exclusive taste of an the Pennsylvania Building. They have one of
and the pleasant spring weather has brought out exclusive set of customers as is enjoyed by this the Lester grands in the reception room, and
the trade in a way satisfactory to the dealers. firm. They have also been doing very well with an upright in the ladies' parlor.
E. E. Forbes, of E. E. Forbes & Co., of Birm-
There has been an increase all along the line, the Pease, the Krell and Royal pianos, and re-
and the dealers are well able to handle it, for cently added to their agencies the Witney piano, ingham, Alabama, was a visitor at the Lester
they are all stocked up with instruments, and
made by the Witney Piano Co., of Brockport, house this week.
The Lester Co. are arranging to double their
with as fine a line as they have ever carried. N. Y.
They are expecting trade to run well into the
Dawson J. Blackmore, of the Krell Piano Co., power plant at the Lester factory this summer.
summer, and hope to make up the deficiency that
was a visitor here last week, and another recent They will put in new engines, new boilers and
they experienced in April, for all the firms agree visitor was George A. Witney, and William Bacon new generators. The engine has already been
that April was one of the dullest months they is expected this week. The new style Stecks, 53 installed and the boilers are about to be in-
stalled.
have had in several years. They are a little and 54, are being particularly admired.
The Estey Co. are enjoying, with the other
afraid of the reports from the West of the short-
The Wanamakers moved their piano depart-
age in the grain crop, and the high price of
ment into the new quarters in the new addition houses, a fine May business. Their exhibition
wheat, which the local manufacturers expect will of their store on Wednesday last. The order to parlor on the second floor is very much admired,
hurt their business somewhat, particularly in move was given quite unexpectedly, and there and they are unfortunate in not being able to
the fall. However, the Philadelphia factories was some tall hustling required. In two days, get the Estey player pianos to such numbers
are going ahead on the idea that this is going to however, they were fully installed, and they al- that, like their competitors, they can make a
be a big year, and are getting pianos out as fast ready have a magnificent department, although move on them. They never advertise them, for
as possible.
it is far from finished. The office quarters are about they are always oversold, and it is with difficulty
The dealers in the small goods are just as confi- done and they cover considerable floor space, that they are able to keep one on hand as a
dent. In their new home the Bauer Company the men of the different departments all having sample. Their organ business continues large,
are pushing their plant as hard as possible and their own offices and can work to the very best and they have work on hand now that will carry
are not getting any stock ahead. They are mak- advantage. The main piano salesrooms are also them well through the summer, if they do not
ing heavy shipments to the West, particularly close to completion, but the private parlors are get another order.
along the Pacific Coast, and are exporting more still far from finished, and the rooms in which
MAHER BROS. IN NEW QUARTERS.
than double the amount of banjos, mandolins and they will install their player department. Little
guitars than they have ever before shipped. The work has been done on their fine concert hall,
Maher Bros., the piano dealers of Jackson,
firm of H. A. Weymann & Co. are preparing to but this will be the last to receive attention, as
remove to their new home on Chestnut street, they will have no use for it before the fall, and Mich., moved into their new quarters on Main
which is being fitted up for their purposes, and they have already planned concerts and recitals street recently, having purchased the building
Robert C. Kretschmar has given the largest order for next season that will be a surprise and a some time ago, and had it thoroughly renovated.
The warerooms present a very handsome appear-
for foreign novelties that his house has ever pleasure to the musical people of Philadelphia.
placed.
Among the visitors here this week at the Cun- ance. This house handles the Chickering, Mc-
The firm of Strawbridge & Clothier are very ningham house were W. S. Hollenbach, of W. S. Phail, Conover, Kurtzmann and other makes of
much disappointed that nothing is Deing done in Hollenbach & Co., of Reading, Pa., who repre- pianos.
the way of settling the former Schomacker Piano sent the Cunningham Co. in that section. Also
Co. affairs, as they are very anxious to get to E. M. Smith, of the Smith Lyraphone Cc, of VALUE OF AN ORGAN IN NEW ENGLAND.
work on Schomacker instruments, and will not Hanover, Pa. Mr. Hollenbach reports that busi-
The possibilities of the organ trade in certain
be able to decide what name they will give them ness on the Cunningham is rapidly increasing
until they find out whether they will be able to in his section, and that the Cunninghams are parts of New England were well illustrated re-
secure the full right to make the Schomacker doing a tremendous business with the Lyraphone cently when a music house in Pittsfield, Mass.,
piano, otherwise they will call their piano the is attested in the amount of space that they give put an organ in their window to be sold to the
H. C. Schomacker. If the Schomacker is put up to that instrument, with the player business highest bidder. The largest amount offered, and
for sale the Strawbridge & Clothier firm will no growing very rapidly, according to Mr. Cunning- the organ was new, was three dollars.
doubt be one of the competitive bidders for the ham.
The Ludden & Bates Southern Music Houses,
plant, as u:ey are in a position to desire the
James Bellak's Sons have been enjoying an
name as well as the factory ana stock more so excellent business all spring on the Hardman. of Savannah, Ga., have opened a branch store in
than any other Philadelphia firm, and will un- It is one of the readiest sellers in this city. The Atlanta, Ga., in the quarters of H. H. Hale, whose
doubtedly be able to offer more money for it.
Bellaks are about starting the interior decora- business they have absorbed. Mr. Hale will re-
The suit of Justus Gray to recover from his tion of their place, which it needs badly. This main as manager of the branch.
stepmother some patents held by the estate to fall the entire House will be gone over. The
which he claims ownership, has not come up Bellaks have also been doing a splendid busi-
for trial. Mr. Gray takes exception to a recent ness with the Marshall & Wendall Piano, which
statement; in my letters to the effect that the is one of the best selling popular-priced instru-
bookkeeping of the late firm was carelessly con- ments on this market.
ducted. There was no intention on my part to
The piano department at Gimbel's is not mov-
leave any such inference, particularly as far as ing as rapidly ahead as the departments at
the work of Justus Gray was concerned, as he Wanamaker's and Strawbridge & Clothier. Might
is recognized as a good business man, and is not it be due to the disagreement on the part of the
entitled to any responsibility for the unfortu- proprietors of that store. There are a number
nate predicament in which the company found of brothers interested who may have varied
itself when the doors were closed.
views as to a piano department. What they
Mr. Gray, as well as H. C. Schomacker, have should do would be to leave the member of the
office room in the Strawbridge & Clothier build- firm who believed in a piano department, take
ing, and are assisting that firm in every way the thing in hand and give him a year or so's
possible to prepare for the manufacture of the time, and see what he can make out of it. What
Schomacker piano. Horace Walton, a former is worth doing at all is worth doing well, is a
salesman of the Schomacker house, is also em- precept which this firm follow in most of their
ployed by the S. & C. firm as floor salesman. departments—why not in pianos.
That firm have taken quite a jump forward in
•H. C. Pressey, of the Lester Piano Co., has
the piano business in trie few years since they been off of the road for the past few days, and
MaAers
opened a department, having on their payroll is attending to the shipment of some of his last
now nineteen men. They have recently added orders. He has had a tremendously successful
considerable space to the department, including trip. H. S. Leete, a traveling representative of
the setting up of a fine Estey pipe organ upon the firm, is going South and West in a few days.
Executtve Office and Show Rooms
which is given daily periodic concerts by noted Mr. Miller says that everything is working
SUITE 730, REPUBLIC BUILDING, Stats and Adams Sts.
artists which attract considerable attention. splendidly at the factory, and the player piano
Factory; HOLLAND, MICH.
HIGH GRADE PIANOS