Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW
9
The Marketing of the Present and Future Output of Player-Pianos Does
Not Depend Upon Conditions but Upon the Selling Ability and Energy of
Those Back of Them—Absorptive Capacity Exceeds Output at Present.
At the present time, if one happens to be talking
to a piano merchant or piano salesman who is do-
ing anything like a reasonably good business, one
observes rather quickly that such a gentleman con-
siders himself a first-class salesman by the very
fact that he is doing such good piano and player
business. In short he who has the opportunity to
talk to piano merchants here, there and elsewhere
throughout the land finds that they nearly all are
of the opinion that it is rather a mark of consid-
erable talent to be doing any sort of business at
all at the present time.
Now, the fact is that all these gentlemen—every
one of them—are making a vast sort of a mistake.
There is unfortunately a fairly widespread impres-
sion not only that the piano and player business
has been bad, but that it must remain bad during
the continuance of the present war; and that, there-
fore, to be able to sell players at all jus; now is
quite an accomplishment. There is a still wide-
spread impression to the effect that the piano busi-
ness has seen its best days and that the whole
piano game is overdone. There is a third impres-
sion to the effect that the talking machine has
knocked out the player-piano. Each and every one
of these impressions is false.
As for the absurd notion that the present war
of itself is the cause of any slackness in the piano
business, »the less said about it the better. Any
slackness that the piano business has endured the
last twelve months was due anyhow, war or no
war, and due to previously existing economic causes
which have affected the whole nation more or less.
That people have been afraid to do business briskly
no one will doubt, but that this condition is pass-
ing away is equally evident. Nobody is dying for
lack of business if he is making the right sort of
try for it; and the man who is not making the
right sort of try deserves no sympathy.
them, they would not now be talking hard times.
They would be out selling.
Some Interesting Figures.
tc the intelligent. Hence demonstration declined,
and with it the interest of the intelligent in the
player-piano. If the critic of these statements will
take the trouble to call in every piano wareroom
on Fifth avenue, or Boylston street, or Wabash
avenue, and get the salesman in each place to show
him player-pianos, he will quickly learn to what a
pitiful state of degeneration the art of showing off
the player has come.
It is the part of wisdom to recognize facts even
when they appear to be unpleasant. Salesmanship
in the player business has been on the down grade
for some time past, all because for a time it was
easy to sell without taking any trouble. Now, to-
day, when salesmanship is all we need, we find that
we have it not.
But we can get it. If every piano merchant who
reads these words will take to heart the truth about
the player proposition he will realize that all he
needs is intelligence in himself and in his sales-
men. If the player business is to prosper it must
he conducted once more by an appeal to the intelli-
gence of the public. In short, the same intelligent
effort, evolved as the result of painstaking study
of the situation and facts, as has made the auto-
mobile business so prosperous and is making the
talking machine so formidable a competitor of the
player-piano, must be put into the problem of sell-
ing players. That problem is not incapable of so-
lution; but it cannot be solved by childish methods.
The more one considers the facts the more ob-
vious is it that the field is very much open, that
there is room for all the player-pianos that can be
turned out this year and for the next many years,
that the player-piano has an appeal all its own
which cannot be supplied by any other sort of mu-
sical or other instrument and that when the piano
trade is willing to use a little common sense and
quit worrying about the talking machine it will sell
all the player-pianos it can buy. Till then to talk
about salesmanship in the player trade is merely
amusing. That salesmanship is good which makes
good.
The other day we were informed by the travel-
ing representative of an eminent piano-making
house that in one city where he stops a dealer that
he knows there has been making a canvass of
homes of the better class. The population of the
city is somewhere around 300,000. This dealer and
his salesmen actually made over 1,600 calls on fam-
ilies of the better sort in point of wealth. These
families were carefully chosen from among the
total number of calls made that year as being dis-
tinguished by possessing (1) at least one maid and
(2) at least one automobile. Now, of these 1,600
prosperous people, only fifty-eight possessed player-
pianos. A few had grand pianos, the majority
had more or less indifferent uprights, while more
than 400 had absolutely nothing in the way of a
musical instrument in the home.
No we do not suppose that these almost incredi-
ble figures can be considered as applying to one
city only. Suppose that they are twice as bad as
the average of similar cities. Even so, is it not
plain that the sales field is now white for the har-
vest and that it is stark nonsense to talk about the
business being overdone. What we need is sales-
manship. The automobile people know what sales-
manship is; and they sell their cars rain or shine.
Piano merchants have told us that the day of
player demonstra'.ion is passed. We don't believe
it. The day of demonstration has not only not
passed, but has hardly yet arrived. Talk about
demonstration! Does anybody see the talking ma-
chine men stopping demonstration ? On the con-
trary, they .demonstrate day and night. Retailers
v, ho sell both talking machines and players present
an interesting illustration of the point in hand.
They have for the most part entirely given up
player demonstration; but they go in for talking
Absorptive Capacity Exceeds Output.
machine demonstration ever more enthusiastically.
The cries about the talking machine and about
the piano business being overdone are simply ab- The truth of the matter is that demonstration has
surd, for the reason that as soon as one examines always sold the talking machine, and demonstration
the facts one finds out the amazing fact that the has just in the same way always sold the player
when it has been carried out intelligently- Good
absorptive capacity of the nation for pianos and
OPERATORS PLANT A BUSY ONE.
player-pianos is many times what at present the demonstration is the highest form of salesmanship;
output is known to be. The competition of the ;md when our player merchants say that they have
(Special to The Review.)
given up trying to conduct demonstrations of the
talking machine is a competition that has been built
CHICAGO, I I I . , August 2'.).—The Operators Piano
up and made possible through the remarkable sales player, they indicate {hat they think very super- Co., of this city, reports an excellent volume of busi-
ficially.
talent evidenced by its promoters. The talking ma-
ness, and this is indicated by the fact that it is run-
chine has succeeded for one reason, and one only.
ning full capacity at the present time. Orders are
Along the Lines of Least Resistance.
It has succeeded because good salesmanship has
Eor ten years the player salesmen have been coming in rapidly for Coinola instruments, many
been applied to its promotion, and because it has moving along the lines of least resistance. In earli- of them by wire, from dealers throughout the coun-
persistently been kept before the eyes of the pub- est days the idea of demonstration was the strong- try. Manager Palmer, of the local warerooms,
lic, whether the days were bright or downcast.
est idea in the whole trade; and so long as it was closed a number of good sales last week, and re-
Now, when we come to look into the matter we conducted rightly it made good. The player prop- ports from dealers everywhere would indicate that
find that the trouble with the player business is osition was already well started toward stability the Coinola is in for a large and continuous de-
simply lack of sales ability. Contrary to the gen- and permanent prosperity when the retail trade mand throughout the fall.
erally received opinion, the piano and player trade began to demand the cheap instrument. Cheap
does not boast many good salesmen. If it did, if goods are sold only to cheap people. Cheap people
1\ G. Smith, of Brooklyn, N. Y., has opened a
piano salesmen were more usually talented in real never made a good business yet. Cheap people new and well stocked branch store in Huntington,
selling, if they knew their goods and believed in cannot be caught with the sort of bait that appeals Long Island.
The Master Player-Piano
;
is now equipped with an
AUTOMATIC TRACKING DEVICE
Which guarantees absolutely correct tracking of even the most imperfect music rolls
W I N T E R & CO., 220 Southern Boulevard, New York City