Music Trade Review

Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
OCTOBER 21,
1922
THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW
MUSIC EXHIBIT AT LA PORTE COUNTY FAIR A SUCCESS
Joseph C. Smith, Progressive Retailer, of LaPorte, Ind., Arranges Attractive and Extensive Ex-
hibit at County Exposition Which Resulted in Securing Many Excellent Prospects
LAPORTE, IND., October 16.—The exhibit of the
Joseph C. Smith Music Shop at the seventieth
annual LaPorte County Fair held here recently
was one of the hits of the exposition and at-
tracted much attention from the 35,000 people
who attended the fair. The Smith Music Shop
has exhibited at the fair for a number of years
and has always realized excellent results.
This year the booth was designed in the
form of a stage three feet from the ground
popular and classical songs; Paul LeResche,
cornetist, who used the Couturier conical bore
cornet for his solo work to the accompaniment
of Joseph C. Smith at the player-piano, using
both Q R S and Melodee rolls. George Kitter-
man played jazz on his African fiddle and also
played with the quartet, using a Vega tenor
banjo. Don Medaris accompanied the quartet
on an A. B. Chase grand piano. Joseph C.
Smith played several solos on the clarinet, saxo-
Comprehensive Musical Instrument Exhibit Arranged by Joseph C. Smith
and was located near the Floral Hall. The phone and Ludwig song whistle, accompanied
stage was well lighted with footlights, spot- by his brother on the harp. William Phelan
lights, etc., with trees set around the booth to also rendered a number of saxophone solos.
In the talking machine display were featured
act as shade for the spectators.
A number of impromptu recitals were given Vocalion and Okeh records.
A group of Lyon & Healy camp ukuleles,
during the week, the artists including John J.
Smith, of Chicago, harpist, who rendered solos as well as a group of Couturier brasses, were
on a Lyon & Healy harp each afternoon and awarded blue ribbons by the judges, and many
evening; Dale Kitterman, baritone, who sang prospective customers were secured.
INTEREST IN ADVERTISING CONTEST
Prominent Members of Trade Foresee Much
Benefit From Retail Advertising Contest
Being Conducted Under Auspices of National
Association of Music Merchants
Comments on the Retail Advertising Contest
for members of the National Association of
Music Merchants, the details of which were
recently announced by the Trade Service Bu-
reau of the Music Industries Chamber of Com-
merce, indicate that it will accomplish its pur-
pose to stimulate better advertising if the opin-
ions of expert observers are to be accepted.
Not alone members of the music trade, but
also interested observers outside the trade have
passed favorable judgment on the plans of the
contest and its prospects for improving adver-
tising.
Benjamin H. Jefferson, advertising manager
for Lyon & Healy, is qualified to speak from
either viewpoint because he is an authority in
the advertising world, a frequent contributor to
Printers' Ink, as well as a leader in music trade
advertising. Mr. Jefferson, who has agreed to
serve on the contest committee which will judge
the advertising, says: "The music trade will be
benefited by the advertising contest. Constant
study is necessary to make advertising pay, for
advertising at best is a grim business. It is
as ruthless as war. No better use can be made
of time at least one morning a week than to
devote it to the promotion of the business."
Philip Wyman, head of the publicity depart-
ment of the Baldwin Piano Co., who also will
act as a judge of the advertising contest, gives
assurance of his hearty approval of the plan and
comments as follows on its possibilities:
"This contest should be a splendid stimulus
to the members of the National Association of
Music Merchants to plan their retail advertising
program on a better and more effective plane.
"Such advertising is sure to build business
and bring definite results. It will show all
music merchants the great value of effective
local advertising.
"A reproduction in book form of the news-
paper clippings presented for competition would
make a most valuable advertising text-book for
the music industry.
"I hope the contest will be so successful and
arouse so much enthusiasm that it might make
everyone interested in the possibilities of a
great national co-operative advertising cam-
paign, undertaken by the Music Industries
Chamber of Commerce, on such a subject, for
example, as 'The Beneficial Influence of Music
in the Home on Civilization.'
"What we, in the music industries, have to
do is to educate the present generation to the
necessity and importance of music in the home—
to make the entertainment and educational pos-
sibilities of music more attractive—more fashion-
able perhaps—than card playing or the movies
or the cabarets.
"Such a campaign would be a wonderful thing
for everyone in the music business. I believe
that the Music Industries Chamber of Com-
merce could carry out the proposition in a way
that would be fair to everyone—and it would go
through."
President Lou E. Holland, of the Associated
Advertising Clubs of the World, endorsed the
idea of the contest and appointed a committee
to work with the Chamber Committee in con-
ducting the contest. He says:
"Whatever we can-do to stimulate greater in-
terest in advertising is certain to be of direct
benefit to the industry in which special interest
has been aroused because, as you know, and as
every man knows who is connected with ad-
vertising, it is easily possible to create demand—
to make entirely new customers—through the
power of advertising.
"If you can get a large number of dealers in
the music field to compete in this contest you
will have accomplished a great thing for the
music trade and you will have put a feather in
the cap of the Music Industries Chamber of
Commerce."
W. T. DUKER HOLDS REOPENING
Handsome Enlarged Quarters Formally Opened
—Steinway and Lyon & Healy Featured
October 16.—A special series of
programs were given by two well-known mu-
sicians of central Illinois in the new and en-
larged music shop on the third floor of the W.
T. Duker Store to mark its formal opening.
With the enlargement of its musical depart-
ment the Duker Co. has, after a thorough in-
vestigation, completed arrangements with Stein-
way & Sons, New York, and Lyon & Healy,
Chicago, for the exclusive representation of the
instruments of their manufacture in this terri-
tory. L. A. Sutfin, formerly of Peoria, is the
new manager of this department.
QUINCY, III.,
USE SAND SOAP
= # JTsSCOURSDEEP # -
14—CASH MONEY
BT MARSHALL BREEDEN
LOSANCELES
Many piano salesmen receive a salary.
These men therefore earn less money than
they really should. The fear of a com-
mission rides heavily upon them. Yet,
after all, what is a salary if it is not a
limited commission? If the salesman fails
to deliver enough orders his salary will
some day fail to appear. On the other
hand, the salesman who works on a com-
mission is master of his own bank account.
Think that over. If a piano man can sell
pianos it is far better to work on a com-
mission, and by the same token it is better
to work on a commission for someone else
rather than to work as a dealer for your-
self if you have no financial backing.
We all think that if we only had some
money we could make a big success in
business for ourselves. We all think the
only thing lacking is money. As a matter
of cold fact money is almost the least
important thing of all. Get that straight.
Actual cash is not nearly as essential as
ability, courage and energy. And we can
all have these three, quite easily.
Some Day You Can—If!
Still, it is a very laudable ambition for
a piano man to want to go into business
for himself. All have the desire. We do
not like to make money for the other man.
Yet, if we analyze it, the act of our making
money for the other man is in itself the
surest and quickest way for us to make
money for ourselves.
If a man goes to a friend or a financial
institution and asks for money to start in
the piano business, unless he has actual
assets—cash or collateral—he will more
than likely not get the money. A good
many have tried it and then when they
were refused they spent much time in
condemning the refuser. If a piano man
who has made a real record as a sales-
man seeks financial help he will not have
to look very far for it. His record will
be the best collateral obtainable. The
man with the money knows then that his
investment will be in good, capable, in-
dustrious hands, and he asks nothing
more.
The piano salesman who hopes some
day to start for himself will find the start
much easier if he has demonstrated to
his present employer that he is a capable
piano man. The mere saying that he is,
the mere desire to be the boss, the mere
thought of selling at a profit, are in no
sense assets in the shape of collateral.
That is demonstrated only by actual re-
sults.
H. L. CARR WITH BALDWIN CO.
Made Manager of the Baldwin, Ind., Store at
Muncie, Ind.—Well Known in the Trade
H. L. Carr, for ten years a well-known resi-
dent of Elkhart, Ind., has accepted the posi-
tion of manager of the Muncie, Ind., store of
the Baldwin Piano Co. with headquarters at
Cincinnati. This store was established over a
decade ago.
For the last three years Mr. Carr has been a
member of the sales force of the Wilbur Temp-
lin Music House and prior to that for seven
years he was general sales manager for the
Davis Acetylene Co.