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REVIEW
THL
VOL. LXXX. No. 2
Published Every Salirday. Edward Lyman Bill, Inc., 383 Madison Ave. F New York, N.Y. Jan. 10,1925
Single Copies 10 Cents
$2.00 Per Year
What's Wrong with Player-Piano Sales
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A. W. Musser, a Salesman of Wide Experience in This* Field, Analyzes the Usual Selling Appeal Used by the
Retail Music Mercliarft for This Instrument-and Points Out Where the Weakness of This
Selling Pqlicy Exists-—Some ^Remedies,.for the Present Existing Situation
N a recent Review issue admissions were
made that there was something wrong with
the player-piano business and various reme-
dies were suggested. But most of the sugges-
tions were merely palliative measures to smooth
the rough edges of the rut we have gotten into.
If*««we-wteh to improve the player-piano busi-
ness we must leave the beaten path we have
bee*n traveling fo^ trje last twenty years. Of
coma^.this is "a very unnatural thing to do,
but every important world achievement came
about through climbing out of the tut. Striking
out from the beaten path gave to the world
of mariners a Columbus; to the electrical field,
an Edison; to the field of transportation, a
Ford; to the piano business, a Gulbransen, who
is now making one-tenth of this country's out-
put of player-pianos.
However, with your permission and without
any intention of offense to the good brother
who is the author of the article on page 18 of
the December 13 issue, I wish to register a
difference of opinion to . the statements made
that mechanical construction and mechanical
manipulation are essential sales fundamentals.
The author is, no doubt, correct when he says
that a great many salesmen fall short of effi-
cient mechanical manipulation, but what of it?
Seventy-five per cent of American families are
not interested in a player-piano. They don't
care whether it has levers or buttons or even
a leg to stand on. Piano salesmen need to be
taught a sales fundamental founded on a human
interest developing motive and when they are
once able to interest a worth-while number of
people to be willing to look at player-pianos it
is a very insignificant matter to learn the manip-
ulation of buttons and levers. Surely, we would
not think much of an automobile salesman who
could not manipulate the levers of a car and
run it, but it would also be foolish to call that
essential if 75 per cent of the people were not
willing to look at automobiles. Why do T want
a radio, or a camera, or a motorboat or an
automobile? Is it because I like to manipulate
the mechanical devices, levers or buttons? No.
It is because of what I think T am going to
get out of it.
There Is Always Money for Music
The last line of the last paragraph reads, "Mu-
sic should guide the sale, but it must not dic-
tate it." This is the whole trouble with the
player-piano business. Music is our basic com-
modity. The history, the meaning, the interpre-
tation, the influence, the necessity of music are
what we must sell. 75 per cent of American
families are not interested in player-pianos be-
I
c i o l c s fundamental conveys no musical
possibility of the instrument, no necessity for
it. This 75 per cent constitutes the better class
of people in every community. One-half of the
other 25 per cent are wage earners of the poorer
class, consequently when mills are idle, when
T Jl\ QUEST ION ABLY
one of the big
C_-/ problems before the retail piano trade
at the present time is a reform in the
present method of handling the player-piano
at retail. Mr. Musser's discussion of this
vital problem is one that is worthy of close
attention as it contains a number of sugges-
tions that deal with the fundamentals of
the entire question.
we have adverse industrial conditions, we say,
"Business is rotten." It is then that we con-
tend that there is no money.
I recently interviewed a merchant in a town
of a hundred thousand population and during
the conversation he made the statement,
"There's no money." That night I read the
town's daily paper and in it saw a statement
from one of the banks that the Christmas Sav-
ings Fund, which totaled over $600,000, was the
largest in the history of the bank.
These are the facts. What are we going to
do about it? We know that these savings
funds are neither those of the poor nor those
of the rich, but belong to the class to whom
our sales fundamentals do not appeal. People
are willing to spend money for music. They
spend in the neighborhood of $500,000,000 for
public musical performances annually, but we
have not been spreading the gospel of music
in the home on every doorstep.
Our selling is materialistic instead of inspira-
tional. We are merely selling furniture.
Whether the manufacturer or the merchant is
to blame is not interesting, but our sales funda-
mental is certainly the bunk. It applies to one
instrument just the same as another, regardless
of quality.
Every salesman has the best player-piano, be-
cause it has five coats of varnish; San Domingo
mahogany, Zanzibar ivory, ebony sharps, Ore-
gon spruce sound board, resonant bell metal
plate, laminated rock maple pinblock, bushed
tuning pins, copper wound bass, double-jointed
non-repeating action, five-point motor, metal
tubing, continuous hinges, full empire top, and
numerous mechanical doo-dads. What does a
member of the 25 per cent group care or know
about this? Nothing. The salesman only thinks
he does. He is going to buy a player-piano
regardless of the mechanical construction, be-
cause so far as the salesman's story is con-
cerned it is the same whether he pays $400 or
$800. Furthermore, if the salesman is honest
with himself he must admit that he knows
nothing about it himself. Some of us set up
the claim that we sell quality, but in the final
analysis our sales fundamental is just the same.
Some of us just have a different way of handing
il out. Some of us serve it table d' hote, some
a la carte, some en casserole, a la king or a la
Creole. The allopathic salesman delivers his in
copious portions, the homeopathic salesman is
a little more conservative, while the ostcopathic
salesman gets better results by rubbing it in.
Selling mechanical construction is not really
the best way to sell to those of the 25 per
cent group, but how about those of the 75 per
cent group who are not at all interested?
Does a man buy an automobile because it has
varnish, levers, engine, tubing, wheels, etc?
No. • He buys it for what he thinks he is going
to get out of it. It matters nothing whether
we advertise quality or whether we advertise
the $345 variety at $10 down, the 75 per cent
group is not interested. If a man understood
as little about a car as he does about the musi-
cal possibilities of a player-piano, if he could
not see where he could derive any benefit out
of the ownership of a car, would he buy a $1500
car for $1098? Certainly not, unless it would
be for resale purposes.
Should the Salesman Know Music?
I have heard the contention that it is not
necessary for the salesman to study music and
learn to play the player as the people he sells
to do not care for it. This is correct. That's
why his business is confined to the 25 per cent
group and why he is not doing any business
when they are not working. But would it not
be better if the study of music, music roll in-
terpretation constituted the basis for this class.
As it is, we sell a player to a ditch digger and
deliver it on a "ten spot." He sits down to it,
holds on with both hands and makes a hurdy-
gurdy out of it. After he has disgusted every
decent family within hearing distance with play-
er-pianos and killed the novelty of it for him-
self, he is ready to turn it back and get a
second-hand Ford. Of course we cannot teach
(Continued on page 5)