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THE
MUSIC TRADE
RE™
PUBLISHED BY EDWARD LYMAN BILL, Inc.
President and Treasurer, C. L. Bill, 373 Fourth Ave., New York; Vice-President,
J. B. Spillane, 373 Fourth Aye., New York; Second Vice-President, Raymond Bill, 373
Fourth Ave., New York; Assistant Treasurer, Wm. A. Low.
J. B. SPILLANE, Editor
RAYMOND BILL, B. B. WILSON, W. B. WHITE, Associate Editors
WILSON D. BUSH, Managing Editor
CARLETON CHACE, Business Manager
L. E. BOWERS, Circulation Manager
Executive and Reportorial Stall
V. D. WALSH, E. B. MUNCH, L. M. ROBINSON, C. A. LEONARD, EDWARD LYMAN
SCOTT KINGWILL, THOS. W. BRESNAHAN, A. J. NICKLIN.
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Departments conducted by an expert wherein all ques-
tions of a technical nature relating to the tuning,
regulating and repairing of pianos and player-pianos
are dealt with, will be found in another section of
this paper. We also publish a number of reliable technical works, information concerning
which will be cheerfully given upon request.
Player-Piano and
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NEW YORK, NOVEMBER 6, 1920
Vol. LXXI
FACTS
CONCERNING
PIANO
No. 19
COSTS
SURVEY of piano manufacturing costs recently compiled by
the Music Industries Chamber of Commerce and published in
The Review last week is interesting not alone for the fact that it sets
forth most convincingly the heavy increase in such costs during the
past six years but because it divides and classifies the various
processes of piano making and their relative costs in a way that is
both interesting and constructive.
There are some manufacturers in the trade who are giving the
question of costs considerable thought and have developed their cost
system to a fine point. There are other manufacturers, however,
who have not followed out this course, and the tables as compiled by
the Chamber of Commerce might well be adopted by such manu-
facturers as a guide to their own figuring in the future.
An accurate understanding of costs is one of the fundamentals
of a successful manufacturing business of any sort, and it is the
only basis upon which wholesale and retail prices can be fixed with
the assurance that they not only cover all costs, but provide the
necessary margin of profit. Instances are not lacking in the piano
trade where manufacturers have found themselves on thin ice be-
cause they did not know their production costs, and were actually
selling instruments at a loss.
A
AN OPTIMISTIC OUTLOOK
HE Review is in receipt this week of much more encouraging
reports from manufacturers and dealers regarding business
prospects than for some time past. Piano merchants are waking
up to the importance of providing themselves with stock for their
holiday needs, and this is a wise provision, for pianos cannot be
turned out like castings in a day. Dealers possessed of sufficient
vision must realize that they cannot expect to be supplied with the
instruments they need unless they order them at an early date.
The leading commercial authorities are also in a much more
optimistic mood regarding the general trade outlook, and in an
address made before the Chamber of Commerce of Cleveland re-
cently, Governor W. P. G. Harding, of the Federal Reserve Board,
T
NOVEMBER 6, 1920
remarked in discussing the business situation: "The Federal Re-
serve System is still confronted with conditions more or less ab-
normal, but we have passed through the period of exhilaration or
intoxication which characterized American business activities sev-
eral months ago, and the transition to a more normal basis is pro-
ceeding quietly and without alarming features.
"Credit, which is required for seasonal needs, is being granted,
and business generally is looking forward to Winter business of
at least average activity. Sentiment is being helped by the bountiful
harvests, by the better outlook for the articles and by the knowl-
edge that many highly essential developments which have been long
deferred by force of circumstances, such as enlargement of our
transportation facilities and additions to housing accommodations
throughout the country, must soon be undertaken. A broad de-
mand, which will probably extend over a period of years, is opening
up for the products of our basic industries, and if in the readjust-
ments ahead of us any lines of business should prove to be overdone
there is every assurance that any surplus of brains and energy now
engaged in such lines can be readily utilized in other fields of activity.
"We have problems confronting us and we shall always have
them; but, as always in the past, we can cope with them success-
fully if we approach them with a spirit of confidence and self-
reliance tempered with common sense."
Entered as second-class matter September 10, 1892, at the post office at New York, N. Y-,
under the Act of March 3, 1879.
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REMITTANCES, in other than currency forms, should be made payable to Edward
Lyman Bill, Inc.
REVIEW
THE TAX QUESTION AND THE TRADE
T
HAT the music industry must of necessity be on its guard against
attempts to put through tax legislation that will serve to increase
the burdens of the industry was well illustrated at the recent sessions
of the Tax Committee of the National Industrial Conference Board
where the recommendation was made seriously that excise taxes on
certain musical instruments be increased from 5 to 10 per cent.
This recommendation naturally came as a shock to those members
of the trade who have not been in close touch with the situation and
have believed, fordly, that they need only wait until the next session
of Congress to have the excise taxes removed entirely.
The advocates of a general sales tax on commodities arc natu-
rally opposed to any excise tax on specified industries, but it is up to
the members of the industries that have been discriminated against
to offer organized resistance to any plan to shift on to their shoulders
the burdens that should be widely distributed. Undoubtedly the
Music Industries Chamber of Commerce was in touch with the
situation, and General Manager Smith went before the Tax Com-
mittee of the National Industrial Conference Board and entered a
strong protest. It is not to be assumed, however, that the matter
will be dropped and that other attempts to saddle additional tax
burdens on industries alleged to produce luxuries, or semi-luxuries,
will not be attempted.
This industry has fought too hard for a recognition of its status
in industrial and educational circles in America to remain dormant
when these fresh attempts are made in peace times to increase war-
time tax burdens. The sooner a campaign is started to have all
excise taxes removed from the industry the better, for it would
appear that an offensive, rather than a defensive, campaign is calcu-
lated to get the best results.
THE INCREASING EFFICIENCY OF LABOR
OME interesting reports regarding the increasing efficiency of
labor are now in evidence which would indicate that the workers
are commencing to realize that co-operation with their employers
rather than antagonism is the most satisfactory plan in the end. For
the past couple of years the vicious idea prevailed among a certain
type in labor circles that the less a man accomplished for his em-
ployer the more employment he was giving his fellow workmen.
This brought about a state of mind where fewer hours, more holi-
days and higher wages seemed to be the principal ambition of a
great many employes.
The change now in evidence may be attributed largely to the
increased number of men looking for work, and to the weeding out
being made by employers which is resulting not only in an improved
morale among the workers, but in increased productive power. In
the piano industry, at least, labor is one of the biggest items in the
increased cost of production and if prices ever come down it must be
by reason of the increased efforts of the worker to deliver a greater
value through a larger production than has been to his credit for
the past couple of years-
S