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THE MUSIC TRADE
REVIEW
REVIEW
Letters
and telegrams of sympathy
ceived at this office from
have been re-
all parts of the country,
expressing the sincercst regret at the death of Colonel
Edward Lyman Bill, for which, in behalf of his family
and the staff of The Music Trade Review, zve bar to
extend our deep appreciation.
EDWARD LYMAN BILL - Editor and Proprietor
J. B. SPILLANE, Managing Editor
Executive and Reportorial Staff:
B. BSITTAIN WILSON,
A. J. NICKLIN,
CARLKTON CHACK,
L. M. ROBINSON,
AUGUST J. TIMPB,
WM. B. WHITE,
BOSTON O F F I C E :
JOHN H. WILSON, 324 Washington St.
Telephone, Main 6950.
GLAD HBNDUSON,
L. E. BOWIIS.
CHICAGO O F F I C E :
%•?• VAN HARLINGEN
Consumers' Building,
™ So. State Street. Telephone, Wabash 6774.
HENRY S. KINGWILL, Associate.
LONDON, ENGLAND: l Gresham Buildings, Basinghall St., E. C.
NEWS SERVICE IS SUPPLIED W E E K L Y BY OUR CORRESPONDENTS
LOCATED IN T H E LEADING CITIES THROUGHOUT AMERICA.
Published Every Saturday at 373 Fourth 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, $5.00.
ADVERTISEMENTS, $3.50 per inch, single column, per insertion. On quarterly or
yearly contracts, a special discount is allowed. Advertising pages $110.00.
REMITTANCES, in other than currency forms, should be made payable to Edward
Lyman Bill.
Departments conducted by an expert wherein all ques-
tions of a technical nature relating to the tuning, reju-
lating and repairing of pianos and player-pianos are
' • dealt with, will be found in another section o this
paper. We also publish a number of reliable technical works, information concerning
which will be cheerfully given upon request.
PlJIIlA
21 nil
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8
Exposition Honors Won by The Review
Grand Prix
Paris Exposition, 1000 Silver Medal.. .Charleston Exposition, 1902
Diploma
Pan-American Exposition, 1901 Gold Medal
St. Louis Exposition, 1901
Gold Medal. .Lewis-Clark Exposition, 1905.
DISTANCE TELEFHONES^NTTMBEBS 5983—5983 MADISON SQ.
Connecting all Departments
Cabl* uddresa: "ElblU, New York."
NEW YORK, JANUARY 8, 1916.
EDITORIAL
ANNOUNCEMENT
The business of The Music Trade Review will be
continued by the Estate of Edward Lyman Bill, with the
co-operation of the efficient staff which for so long has
had charge of the paper, both at the New York head-
quarters and the various branch offices. James Raymond
Bill, the eldest son of the late Colonel Bill, will be actively
connected with the business.
[ NDICATIONS of increasing prosperity for 1916 are abundant
1 The crops harvested last summer and fall were almost without
exception the largest in the history of the country.
The steel industry, probably the best business barometer in
existence, is more active than it has ever been before. Stocks are
booming, the ranks of the unemployed are fast diminishing, and
the flood of gold that has poured into this country since the war
began has given us so large an amount of cash on hand that we
cannot., at present, use all of it to best advantage. Business of
every kind is fast reviving from the depression of the past two
years, and the piano industry has been assured, by the unprec-
edented holiday trade/that it may expect a full share of the coming
prosperity. Factory and dealer alike will do a greater volume of
business during the coming year than has been done for some time
past.
Volume of business, however, does not always make for
prosperity. Unless each transaction shows a normal amount of
profit, increased business can very easily mean decreased profits
on account of the extra overhead expense necessary to do such
business.
The constantly advancing cost of raw materials which are used
in the piano industry has reduced to a considerable extent the
average of profit represented by the sale of an instrument, and the
piano manufacturers must advance their wholesale prices, and that
in the immediate future, if they expect to enjoy the benefits which
ordinarily accrue from increasing business.
Anyone who gives a passing thought to market conditions
knows that prices on all staple commodities have in almost every
instance been forced upward by the war. Especially is this true
concerning the metals, some of which have advanced 100 per cent,
since the declaration of war.
The United States to-day is enjoying a monopoly in the sale
of many things that before the war sold only through the hardest
kind of work, and in almost ruinous competition with European
goods. The output of our factories has been doubled and even
trebled, yet this enormous production is not sufficient to satisfy the
demands being made, and the inevitable increase in prices generally
has been the result.
The piano manufacturer is paying such high prices for raw
material to-day that he cannot continue to manufacture and sell at
his usual price and expect to make the profit to which he is entitled,
unless he cheapens the quality of his wares.
Either the price must be raised or the standard must be
lowered. No manufacturer will countenance for an instant a low-
ered standard; such a course is so patently suicidal that it needs
no explanation.
The only remaining course is to advance the wholesale price
sufficiently to cover the percentage of increase in the cost of
materials.
The consumer, o£ course, will ultimately bear this increase, as
the dealer naturally will advance the retail price in consonance with
the increased wholesale cost, but the consumer, whose own business
is enjoying high tide, will not object to paying a few dollars more
for an instrument if the reasons for the higher price are pointed
out to him.
O subject should engage the closer attention of manufacturers
and dealers the opening weeks of the New Year than
that of advertising. In any and every form it may be con-
sidered one of the greatest trade-producing factors. The best
results can be secured, however, only when advertising is designed
along constructive lines. And it must be continuous, for sporadic
publicity is absolutely a waste of money.
In the complex business life of to-day we must talk to our
fellowman, and we must listen to our fellowman if we would do
business and prosper. Advertising is the voice of business. It
links man to man; it connects the seller and the buyer; in other
words, it prevents business from being blighted with the curse of
deafness and dumbness, for it must be remembered that the man
who doesn't advertise is dumb and the man who doesn't read adver-
tising is deaf.
Too many men in the music trade field have failed because
they have put themselves in the deaf and dumb class. Professors
of political economy, too many of whom were long on theories and
short on facts, used to give the impression that wherever there was
a suoply there was also a demand and vice versa. The demand and
supply were a sort of seesaw. They were supposed to eternally
balance each other. This pretty theory, however, is not always in
accordance with fact. There is sometimes a supply and no demand,
as occurred during the past year and a half, and there is sometimes
a demand and no supply, a condition which exists in many industries
to-day.
One of the most difficult problems in the whole business world
is to link together supply and demand, but nothing can do this as
quickly and successfully as advertising.
One thing, however, the piano merchant should bear in mind,
that it is not always the medium that is wrong, nor is the copy
inserted in the paper always to be blamed for the failure of one's
advertising campaign. By going further back—back of the pape",
back of the advertisement—right up to the proposition itself, the
secret of failure will be found. If the proposition is no good, or
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