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THE
MUSIC TRADE
11
REVIEW
MISTAKES OF PIANO MERCHANTS SET RIGHT?
Some Interesting Suggestions to the Piano Merchants of Detroit as to How They May Secure
Better Results in the Development of Business Conveyed by Edgar A. Guest, President of
the National Association of Press Humorists, at the Meeting of the Local Association.
(Special to The Reviev.)
Detroit, Mich., Nov. 28, 1912.
Edgar A. Guest, of the Detroit Free Press, who
is president of the National Association of Press
Humorists, made some telling shots at the custom
of certain piano merchants of using misleading ad-
vertising to lure unsophisticated would-be piano
purchasers into their stores, in his address to the
Detroit Music Trades Association at its Novem-
ber meeting.
The fact that Mr. Guest's address was in, a
humorous vein added to rather than detracted from
the effectiveness of the points he made. The sub-
ject of his talk was "The Mistakes of Piano Mer-
chants." He said:
"One of the mistakes you piano merchants com-
mit is that you make your puzzles too hard. Now
iv takes a fairly intelligent man a minute and a
half to solve some of your rebuses and to find
the faces hidden in the foliage of those trees.
Working nine hours a day, he couldn't win more
than four hundred gold bonds worth two hundred
dollars each, to save his life, unless he had great
luck.
"Now, gentlemen, just make a mental estimate
and see what sort of a day's work that would be
to offset the high cost of living. Four hundred
certificates at two hundred per would be only
eighty thousand dollars' worth. Now, out of our
circulation of 842,981 (the advertising manager
gave me the figures as I was leaving the office this
evening), it is safe to say that at least 500,000
people will read your ads and take up that method
of getting a few carloads of grands for nothing,
lacking considerable. The very best they could do
in a day would be two hundred million pianos, and
if they answered your ads every day at the same
rate, you could only dispose of 1,200,000,000 pianos
in a week. And what does that amount to? Not
a drop in the bucket to such a vast business as
yours.
"Let me advise you, gentlemen, to make your
puzzles easier. You could just as well dispose of
three billion high-grade pianos a week as 1,200,000,-
000, if you would only adopt better salesmanship
and publicity methods.
"Another thing which, through diligent research,
1 have found is wrong with the piano business, is
that you do not turn out enough slightly used
pianos. There is a tremendous demand for slightly
used pianos. Only a few days ago we received in
our editorial office the latest census figures from
Washington on this matter. They were so sur-
prising that I do not dare to give them to you.
"You could just as well cut down your output of
brand new pianos and increase your production of
slightly used ones, and thereby take advantage of
the enormous call for instruments that have got the
Steinway faded a little in some particulars, but
which can be had at a reduction of only 99 per
cent, from list price, and sold at a dollar in hand
and the rest in the bush and free piano lessons
for a year to boot.
"In my reference to the Encyclopedia Britannica
in preparing this address, I found that this idea of
free piano lessons is not new. Paderewski, for
instance, had free piano lessons, not only for a
year but for several years, while practising on an
ancient square that his father had bought on that
very sales plan—dollar down, dollar some other
time and free lessons thrown in. If you desire to
put over something new in this line, you should
enlarge the scope of it. You could just as well
furnish each member of a family a piano on that
same dollar, and let them all have free lessons.
"Aside from these few things, one of the big-
gest mistakes you make is that you don't impress
upon the minds of the public sufficiently that you
are in the piano business. You make only eight
or nine calls a day upon your prospects. And often
you fail to select the psychological time to tackle
them. The best time is when they are on the way
to catch -a train.
"You err also in the way you conduct your sum-
mer .resort sales. You rent six pianos to be sent
to the vacation places, and when they come back
you make but six hundred of them. -You could
just as well make it a thousand. The advertising
wouldn't cost any more.
"Now, Mr. President and gentlemen, before 1
conclude I wish to add one word that, in case you
have gathered from what I have said that I am
a carping critic, will disabuse your minds of the
idea that I have no word of commendation for
any of your business methods. I think your 'no
agents' plan is one of the most facile that ever
has been introduced into business. You advertise
it in the newspapers, in the street cars, and in other
ways, and to impress it more thoroughly on your
prospects, you call upon them; and while you are
informing them in regard to it at the front door
a couple of your colleagues shove the piano in at
the back door. It is a most efficient method of
salesmanship."
PROTEST AGAINST INVASION.
PIANO MEN HAVEJNARROW ESCAPE.
Piano Dealers of Albion, Mich., Insist That
Tax Be Assessed Against Itinerant Merchants.
Two Members of the O'Neill-Adams Staff Had
Exciting Experience in Touring Westchester
County Recently in an Automobile.
(Special to The Review.)
Albion, Mich., November 25, 1912.
The piano dealers of the city appeared before the
city council last week for the purpose of protesting
against the coming of outside dealers who rent a
store for a short time, hold a quick sale of pianos
and thereby seriously cut into the trade of the legit-
miate dealers. The protest was directed against a
Detroit concern which recently started a sale here
and the local piano men insist that the tax of $25
per month assessed against itinerant merchants be
strictly enforced. The dealers who appeared before
the council included Andrew Emmons, Mrs. E. I.
Tingay and. J. S. Davis.
PEASE PIANOS_FOR WARSHIPS.
Uprights of That Make Placed on the
"Wyoming," Arkansas" and "Hancock."
The Pease Piano Co., through the Brooklyn
branch of the company, recently delivered a Pease
upright each to the U. S. battleships "Wyoming"
and "Arkansas," the new super-dreadnoughts, and
to the receiving ship "Hancock," lying at the Brook-
lyn Navy Yard. A number of other ships in the
navy are supplied with Pease pianos, both upright
and grand, and with players of the same make,
Hugh Corcoran and Joseph A. O'Donnell, two
live members of the O'Neill-Adams piano selling
staff, had a narrow escape recently from injury
while touring Westchester county in Mr. Cor-
coran's car. The car was going at a fairly good
rate of speed when it arrived at Rochelle avenue
and Pelham Road. This happens to be one of
the darkest spots on the road and the chauffeur,
thinking it continued straight ahead, suddenly
found himself on the brink of an embankment.
With great presence of mind, however, he
swerved the car and applied the emergency brakes
so that it hung sidewise over the embankment at
an angle of about 45 degrees. Although some-
what shocked the occupants of the car were not
injured, but the car was damaged. Assistance soon
came from passing autos and the car was pulled
up the embankment and run to New York.
TO FEATURE BJUR BROS. PIANOS.
The Bjur Bros, line will be among the pianos
featured by the new Homer Klock Piano Co. in
Stamford, Conn. An order for a large number of
these pianos has been placed.
The
PLAYOTONE
The Guaranteed
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y O U cannot over-esti-
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Thus the Playotone pos-
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It has behind it the im-
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It is, in the first place, an
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a player that falls short in
no respect and a basic
piano that carries convic-
tion of its tonal quality
with the first note struck
upon it.
But it has something
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Made under the direct
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Thus the dynamic force
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exerted on the buyer's
judgment in favor of the
Plavotone.
This means that the
game is half won before it
is begun.
HARDMAN, PECK & CO.
Founded 1142
Hardman House
433 Fifth Avenue, New York
Chicago Office and Wareroom
where a complete stock of tke
output can be seen t
Republic Building
Corner of Adams and State St».