Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
THE
MUSIC TIRADE
VOL. LXX. No. 18
Published Every Saturday by Edward Lyman BUI, Inc., at 373 4th Ave., New York.
May 1, 1920
Single Copies 10 Cents
$*.00 Per Tear
Wanted: the General Music Store
D
URING the past months more than one piano merchant dealing in pianos and players exclusively has
pondered over ways and means for meeting his overhead expenses and for keeping his salesmen busy
at least part of the time, that they might earn a fair portion of their salaries and that he might
incidentally realize a reasonable profit out of his business. It is true that the merchant has been getting
more for his pianos than ever before, and getting more for them in cash, but at the same time the wholesale
prices of pianos have advanced, general expenses have increased, and to cap it all the proportion of instruments
he has been able to get from the factory has enabled him to satisfy only a portion of the existent demand.
Large wareroom space and selling facilities mean little or nothing except expense, unless they are utilized
completely and to advantage. An empty storeroom, or wareroom, or an idle salesman, means a substantial
dent in the profit average. That this fact has been realized by the retail trade is evidenced by their anxiety to
get goods and more goods, and to eliminate waste so far as possible in the conduct of their affairs. The reason
that many piano retailers accomplished so little in bringing about a readjustment to the new conditions has
been that these retailers could not lose sight of the fact that they were and had been exclusive piano merchants,
and simply clung to that idea in all their plans for business adjustment and development.
For some time past there has been carried on a definite, although not very formidable, campaign for the
creation of general music stores throughout the country—for the expanding of exclusive piano dealers into
full-fledged music merchants. Even the name of the national association was changed from "piano" to "music"
merchants in order to place all the various and sundry interests of the retail trade on a common basis. What is
needed now is some definite action along the line of making the general music store a factor in the trade.
The piano merchant already has more or less commodious quarters and an organized sales force. It is
the most logical thing in the world to utilize any vacant space for the display and sale of musical lines other
than pianos. It is true that the majority of merchants now handle talking machines and records to some
extent, at least, but with space and sales force available it requires only a comparatively limited outlay of
capital to establish a musical merchandise department, and with it perhaps a sheet music department, which,
properly conducted, will result in a capital turnover that is regular and profitable.
The conduct of a general music store is not in any sense an emergency measure to meet existing conditions,
but it is good business from a publicity standpoint. Many a small town music merchant has made his store a
musical center through the fact that he was able to supply practically every musical need, from a jew's-harp to
a grand piano, and it is quite possible for merchants who now confine themselves exclusively to pianos, and
even talking machines, to accomplish a similar result.
The purchaser of a violin string or ukulele to-day may be the prospect for a sale of a piano or talking
machine to-morrow, and the fact that he has established contact with a certain store means that he is most
likely to go there or at least give it consideration when planning further purchases. The youngster who visits
the dealer to purchase a quarter harmonica can likewise be developed into a permanent customer. The exclusive
piano store can make an appeal to a customer only about once in a lifetime, and depends for success upon the
constant building up of new trade. The general music store makes an appeal to the same 'customer several
times during each year, and where records, rolls, musical merchandise, sheet music and supplies are sold, it
is likely to become the accepted center for the fulfilment of such requirements. A representative stock of
musical merchandise, for instance, can be installed at the cost of a piano or two that cannot be obtained from
the factory immediately, and the turnover from the stock will very likely provide the money for that same
piano when it is ready for delivery.
Economy in time and space and the elimination of waste in those factors is quite as important as economy
in other directions, for it is. the sort of economy that maintains and in fact adds to profits.