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THE
MUSIC TRADE
REVIEW
establishment on Fifth avenue an active business has been carried
on during the period when most men have been complaining of
summer stagnancy. If such results do not show that it pays to
advertise in all seasons then what does the lesson teach?
A
EDWARD LYMAN BILL - Editor and Proprietor
J. B. SPILLANE, Managing Editor
Executive and Reportorlal Stall:
GKO. B. KEUJEB,
W. H. DYKES,
P. H. THOMPSON.
BMILIE FRANCES BAUF.H,
L. B. BOWERS, B. BRITTAIN WILSON., WM. B. WHITBJ L. J. CHAMBERLIN, A. J. NICKLIN.
BOSTON OFFICE:
CHICAGO OFFICE:
R. P. VAN HARLINGEN, 195-197 Wabash Ave.
TELEPHONES: Central 414; Automatic 8643.
MINNEAPOLIS and ST. PAUL :
ST. LOUIS :
ERNEST L. WAITT, 278A Tremont S t
PHILADELPHIA :
R. W. KAUFFMAN.
A. W. SHAW.
CHAS. N. VAN BTJKEN.
SAN FRANCISCO: S. H. GRAY, 2407 Sacramento St.
CINCINNATI. O.: NINA PUGH-SMITH.
BALTIMORE, MD.: A. ROBERT FRENCH.
LONDON, ENGLAND:
69 Basinghall St., E. C.
W. Lionel Sturdy, Manager.
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 and Mexico, $2.00 per year;
Canada, $3.50 ; 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, $60.00; opposite
reading matter, $75.00.
REMITTANCES, in other than currency form, should be made payable to Edward
Lymnn Bill.
Directory ol Plaao
The directory of piano manufacturing firms and corporations
Jl
~ ~
found on another page will be of great value, as a reference
MtnnUeluren
f o r d e a i e r s and others.
Exposition Honors Won by The Review
Grand Prix
Paris Exposition, 1900 Silver Medal.Charleston Exposition 1902
Diploma.Pan-American Exposition, 1901 Gold Medal.. .St. Louis. Exposition, 1904
Gold Medal. .. .Lewis Clark Exposition, 1905.
LONG DISTANCE TELEPHONES-NUMBERS 1745 and 1761 GRAMERCY
Connecting all Departments.
Cable address: "Elbill New York."
NEW YORK, AUGUST 3 , 1907
EDITORIAL
T
HERE has been a dearth of music trade advertisements in the
New York papers during the past month; even Wanamaker
and Bloomingdale Bros, have had little to say about pianos and
other musical accessories. Special sales have been lacking, but
there is one concern that never tires winter or summer in prosecut-
ing a vigorous advertising campaign.
We refer to the Aeolian Co., whose business announcements
during the entire month of July have been a prominent advertising
feature of the New York daily papers. Most of the advertising
put forth by this concern has related to the Pianola, and it is in-
teresting to note that the direct result of this carefully planned
publicity has been to create business even during the extremely hot
weather, which we have been forced to endure recently.
T
HIS condition of affairs will interest many of our readers who
have nurtured the belief that advertising during the summer
months is unprofitable. There are a good many who believe that it
is better to husband one's resources until men are in the mood for
buying—until they have recovered from the lassitude which accom-
panies warm weather, and are ready for the fall campaign.
One well-known music trade man remarked to The Review
recently: "I consider that advertising is practically thrown away
during the summer months; people are not in the mood for buying,
and they do not care for pianos, organs, or anything in the line of
music. They just wish to keep cool and get away from business;
get out in the open air, under the trees, or in boats, on the lakes
and on the ocean. My policy has been to wait until fall opens, and
then expend whatever appropriation I have decided upon for ad-
vertising. I have never seen any reason to change my belief in
this particular, and as long as I am at the helm of this business
we shall stick to that plan absolutely."
The gentleman whom we quote above is known to have de-
cided views, and it is seldom indeed that he changes his policy,
but it might be well for him, and others, to know of the Aeolian
Co.'s success in summer advertising and to learn that at the great
S far as trade paper advertising is concerned, we may say that
most of the heaviest Review advertisers prefer to follow the
same plan which is generally adopted by most of the larger adver-
tisers of the country. Our advertising orders for July and August
are usually curtailed somewhat, although in later years there has
been such a demand upon our space that it has been impossible to
reduce the paper below fifty pages weekly. While the business de-
partment puts forth no special effort to secure contracts during the
summer, yet there is no relaxation in maintaining this trade news-
paper institution up to a high grade of efficiency. Vacations, of
course, have to be arranged, and naturally during that period there
is a reduced reportorial and business staff of the paper, but an
organization like this is compelled to maintain a leading position
at all times. Some of the small publications with slight expenses
and smaller staff drop down to a very meagre point during the
summer months, but our policy has always been to maintain an
impressive trade newspaper in season and out, just as we believe
that it pays every business man to keep eternally hammering at his
trade, no matter if men generally are crying dull times and business
stagnancy.
N
EVER mind what the others are saying, there is always busi-
ness to be won and trade to be taken care of, even if it is
not coming in easily. It is the hard work that counts, and the
advertisers who cut out their announcements in July and August
are sometimes making a great mistake. Is it wise to retrench in
such a manner? Advertising may be divided into two departments
—scheme and plan—according to the views of an expert. Adver-
tising by a scheme is selecting mediums at haphazard; sometimes
being moved by the eloquence of solicitors instead of placing busi-
ness according to information secured by investigation. Adver-
tisers who work on the scheme system are won over perhaps by
reason of the solicitors being personal friends, or that they feel
that they will take a flyer, just to try'out one or two papers. The
men who advertise by scheme are those who invariably drop out
of all periodicals during the summer months. They usually lack a
definite policy in their advertising campaign. It is chance or spas-
modic advertising, and not the regular systematic campaign which
is carried on by the scheme advertiser.
T
HE plan advertiser is the man who looks over the field im-
partially, weighs each publication carefully, after deliberate
investigation as to its standing and its circulation; he then plans to
keep up a certain publicity in season and out. He may not spend
as much money during the summer months in the great magazines,
but he is always represented, because his advertising is on the plan
basis. It is systematic; it is thorough, and he is treating advertis-
ing as an important department of his business, and not simply a
department in which he takes a few flyers like he may buy stocks
of a certain kind. He works along clearly defined lines, and he
keeps everlastingly at it in season and out.
In the Borough of Brooklyn the Sterling Piano Co. have been
liberal users of printer's ink during the summer months, and as
we have said in a previous issue of this paper, their expenditures
along these lines have resulted in pleasing returns.
O
NE'S expenses in business never cease; they may be lessened
somewhat, but they are going on all the time no matter
whether it blows hot or cold, and therefore why should there be a
tremendous slowing up of business energy? Why should adver-
tising be entirely withdrawn during the summer months?
r
"T v HE piano merchants will get the people out of the habit of
_L thinking pianos and piano players if there is too much lassi-
tude shown, and bear in mind one thing above all others, the way
in which any article is advertised is reflected immediately in the
i*te?est which the purchasing public show in that particular article.
When the bicycle trust was formed the bicycle dropped out of
popularity, and why? Because all advertising was withdrawn from
the magazines and the daily papers, and as a result people ceased