Music Trade Review

Issue: 1928 Vol. 87 N. 9

Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
The Music Trade Review
SEPTEMBER 1, 1928
REVIEW
Out September 8
Monthly
Magazine Issue
(Registered in the U . S. Patent Office)
Published Every Saturday by
Federated Business Publications, Inc.
at 420 Lexington Avenue, New York
of
President, Raymond Bill; Vice-Presidents, J. B. Spillane, Randolph Brown; Secre-
tary and Treasurer, Edward Lyman Bill; Assistant Secretary, L. B. McDonald;
Assistant Treasurer, Wm. A. Low.
B. BRITTAIN WILSON, Editor
CARLETOII CHACE, Business Manager
W. H. MCCLEARY, Managing Editor
RAY BILL, Associate Editor
F. L. AVERY, Circulation Manager
E. B. MUNCH, Eastern Representative
THE
WESTERN DIVISION:
BOSTON O F F I C E :
FRANK W. KIHK, Manager
E. J. NEALY
JOHN H. WH-SOM, 324 Washington St.
333 No. Michigan Ave., Chicago
Telephone: State 1266
Telephone: Main 6950
Telephone: Lexington 1760-71
Musical Instrument Promotion Activity
and the General Music Store
The growth of the general music store in the retail
music trades has been one of the outstanding features
of the retail trade for some years. Its extent is shown
in this article, based on a survey undertaken by The
Review of 1,000 music dealers. The importance of this
trend to the trade is also analyzed.
Window Display
Cheapest Advertising
82 Per cent, of retail music merchants can trace sales
directly to their display windows. And those display
windows constitute the cheapest form of advertising
which the music merchant can use. Some figures
that show definitely the value of the window, and the
loss entailed in not using it efficiently.
60 Per Cent. More
Phonographs Can Be Sold
A Middle Western retail music merchant believed this,
as least so far as his department was concerned. He
worked out a plan of handling his salesmen and al-
ready his volume has increased 50 per cent., with the
other 10 per cent, in view. In this article he tells
how he did it.
How Are You Handling the
Radio TradeJn?
Several of the largest music merchants with radio de-
partments in the Metropolitan District tell in this
article just how they are escaping loss in their han-
dling of this problem, one that confronts every music
dealer who sells radio today.
What About Your Hallowe'en
Window Display?
Several ideas for the musical merchandise department
for its October window displays. The Fall buying
season is starting and you want to be ready for it.
Every one of them has a sales punch—they have
proven it in actual practice.
IN ADDITION
A number of other merchandising articles covering every
side of the music merchant's merchandising activities, and
The Monthly Piano Technical Department, an exclusive
feature of The Review.
Out September 8
Vol. 87
I
Cable: Elbill New York
September 1, 1928
No. 9
The $1,000 Slogan Contest
HE music industries is to have a slogan designed to
center public attention upon musical instruments and
particularly upon their playing. The idea has been in
the air for some months past and has finally developed to a point
where a committee, duly appointed to handle the matter, has
formally launched a slogan contest to end on December 1, having
for its object securing a phrase that will be accepted generally as
the keynote for merchandising musical instruments.
Many other industries, as well as individual business houses,
have adopted and used slogans, some of them good, some of indif-
ferent quality, and quite a number rather nonsensical. Some of
these, however, have achieved marked success, notable examples
being the "Say It With Flowers," of the florists, and "Save the
Surface And You Save All," of the paint industry.
If the thousand dollar prize offered by the Music Industries
Chamber of Commerce in the slogan contest for the music trade
brings forth a phrase of equal value, then the money will have been
well spent.
As The Review has pointed out before, however, the simple
adoption of a slogan is not going to increase sales over night. The
slogan is simply a means to an end and should be accepted only
as another lever at the service of the music merchant to help him
pry sales away from a public which at times seems rather indiffer-
ent. If the music merchant merely uses the slogan in his advertis-
ing, and lets it go at that, he is in no better position than before.
The slogan contest itself, if it is carried out as planned, should
prove an excellent medium of publicity for musical instruments and
a means for developing closer contact with prospects. Efforts will
be made to have the newspapers of the country give space to the
competition. But the real opportunity lies with the dealer for, by
a close tieup with the movement, he can develop his prospect list
and get in closer touch with those most able to buy instruments.
A thousand dollars for a phrase sounds like a lot of money. It
has an appeal for the average citizen that the dealer can capitalize
to his own advantage.
A slogan alone will not rejuvenate the business, but it should
help just as will all the other activities that have been launched by
the industry as means for developing better business. It is not that a
single remedy can be found to help things, but the efforts being put
forth to find a solution prove that the industry is alive to the situa-
tion, and that is a matter for congratulation. Hiding facts and
dodging the issue are fatal.
The most important point of all in this slogan contest is the
co-operation with which the retail music merchants work.
Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
SEPTEMBER 1, 1928
The Music Trade Review
Lyon & Healy Hold Official Opening
of New Cleveland Warerooms September 1
Henry Dreher, in Newspaper Advertisement, Tells of Retirement and Pledges Con-
tinuance of Policies by the Lyon & Healy Management
/ C L E V E L A N D , O., A u g u s t
28.—Henry
^ J
Dreher, president of the Dreher Piano
Co., which was recently purchased by Lyon &
Healy, Chicago, has issued "an open letter to
all music lovers in Cleveland," which has been
published in the newspapers and in which Mr.
Dreher tells of his retirement from active busi-
ness and pledges the continuation of the Dreher
policies by Lyon & Healy in carrying on the
business.
Lyon & Healy have also begun a series of
advertisements in the newspapers telling of the
purchase of the Dreher business, and pledging
the continuation of the Dreher policies that
have been in force for three-quarters of a cen-
tury. The reopening of the old Dreher quarters,
which have been extensively remodeled by
Lyon & Healy, is scheduled for September 1.
The Carlton Music Co., Erie Building, Pros-
pect avenue and East Ninth street, has been
purchased by Lyon & Healy. Gus Darmstadt,
former proprietor, has joined the Lyon & Healy
organization and will be manager of the band
and orchestra division. Mr. Darmstadt is well
known in the trade and has a large following.
The Euclid Music Co. has disposed of its
Lakewood store located at Detroit avenue and
Warren road and also the Euclid Heights store,
located at Euclid Heights boulevard and Cov-
entry road, to the H. Lesser Co., one of the
largest radio stores in Cleveland. The Lesser
Co., which has heretofore handled only radio,
will now handle phonographs and combination
radio and phonographs. The Euclid Music Co.
now has but one store, located on East Ninth
street near Euclid avenue. The company had
a chain of stores in various parts of the city
which it has gradually sold. The general line
of musical merchandise handled by the former
branch stores of the company will be discon-
tinued by the H. Lesser Co.
The Cleveland branch of the Starr Piano Co.
is now in chaxge of George N. Welsh, who
formerly managed the Detroit store for the
company. Mr. Welsh has been connected with
the factory of the Starr Piano Co. for a num-
ber of years and has a wide acquaintance in
the trade. The Cleveland branch has discon-
tinued the wholesale end of the business. The
radio department is now located in the Prospect
avenue building and is in charge of Mr. Cor-
bett. The Atwater Kent line is being handled
exclusively and cabinets manufactured by the
Starr Piano Co. are being featured.
Miss Renie Burdett, who was formerly in
charge of the retail music roll and record de-
partment of the Cleveland branch of the Starr
Piano Co., has been appointed secretary and
treasurer of the Cleveland Art Center with
headquarters on the fourth floor of the Starr
Piano Co. building.
The Cleveland Distributing Co., distributor
for Atwater Kent in this territory, will hold
its annual Fall dealers' convention on Sep-
tember 4, 5 and 6. Meetings will be held at
the company's headquarters on Euclid avenue
near East Fifty-fifth street, the new auditorium
being used for that purpose.
Music Industries Offer $1,000 in
Contest for Slogan for General Use
(Continued
primarily upon the merit of the words in the
slogan, and the simple or distinctive type of
lettering employed will be a factor in deciding
between two contestants submitting the same
slogan. Should they so desire, music clubs and
other organizations may submit joint entries.
The judges of the contest are all men of na-
tional prominence, they being S. A. Rothafel,
the famous "Roxy" of movie fame; Dr. Frank
Crane, the noted writer of inspirational articles,
and Frank Presbrey, the well-known advertis-
ing man. The judgment of these men is re-
garded as insuring a slogan of genuine value.
It is believed that the slogan contest will
afford the active music merchant an unusual
opportunity for developing worth-while contacts
with prospects in their vicinity. Over thirty
pieces of literature have been prepared for the
use of dealers in spreading news of the contest
to their communities, and arrangements have
been made for procuring widespread newspaper
publicity for the movement. Every effort will
be made to have as many entries as possible go
through the hands of the dealers in order to
increase the effectiveness of the tie-up.
According to reports received by the
Chamber headquarters, the various divisions of
the industry itself will in many instances carry
on their own campaigns in support of the slo-
gan movement so that, regardless of what par-
ticular phrase is selected, the publicity value of
the campaign should prove of inestimable value,
inasmuch as each piece of literature urges the
reader to drop in at the nearest music store,
inspect the modern instruments, learn how
easily they may be played, and talk with the
dealer regarding the cash reward for a good
slogan.
Folders outlining the plan of the slogan con-
page 3)
test and the rules governing it in full detail
may be obtained by merchants upon application
either to The Review or the Music Industries
Chamber of Commerce directly.
with the W. F. Frederick Co., Pittsburgh, Pa.,
has resigned, and is now resting at his home in
Pittsfield, Mass
Now Hammond's Music Store
L. F. Hammond, who since 1920 has been sole
owner of Case's Music Parlors, Logan, O., has
changed the name of the company to Ham-
mond's Music Store.
In the Trade
The Remley Radio Co., Sheboygan, Wis., has
been incorporated here for $5,000. Incorpora-
tors include: Louis A. Heck, Alanson Remley
and Elsie Verhulst.
The W. F. Frederick Co., of Pittsburgh, has
opened a store at 412 Market avenue south,
t'anton, O., former location of the Globe Piano
Co. Only pianos will be merchandised.
The Superior Automatic Phonograph Co.,
Huntington, Ind., has been incorporated with
capital stock 1 of $50,000 by T. W. Small, S. A.
Guest and J. M. Sayler, to manufacture and sell
automatic phonographs in foreign countries.
The Diamond Music Shoppe, Rochester, N. Y.,
has gone to Cleveland to become manager of the
000 to deal in musical instruments.
Hammons Music Co., long located in West
Monroe, La., has moved to new quarters at 113
Trenton street, that town.
Consult the Universal Want Directory of
The Review.
GRAND
KEYS
ACTIONS
PLAYERS
of tb«
Harger & Blish, Inc., Now
Columbia Distributors
The recent announcements by W. C. Fuhri,
vice-president and general sales manager of the
Columbia Phonograph Co., Inc., of the appoint-
ment of Harger & Blish, Inc., Des Moines, la.,
as exclusive wholesale distributor of Columbia
products for the State of Iowa, except Council
Bluffs and Sioux City, is of great interest to the
music trade in that territory. Many years ago
this firm represented Columbia in the same
capacity, and it is one of the leading whole-
salers in the Central West.
HIGH QUALITY
SKILLED WORKMAN-
SHIP and
FINE MATERIALS
found in all
PRATT READ
PRODUCTS
Garmaize Bound for Europe
Arthur E. Garmaize, of New York, head of
both the legal and the export departments of
the Columbia Phonograph Co., who a short
time ago appointed John L. Stowers Columbia
distributor for Cuba and who recently returned
from South America, is now en route to Europe
on a pleasure trip.
Write u» NOW
PRATT, READ & CO.
Al Waltamath Resigns
Established 1806
CANTON, O., August 27.—Al Waltamath, one of
the best-known piano salesmen in this section
of the States, many years with the Alford &
Fryar Piano Co., and more recently identified
The Pratt Read Player Action Co.
Deep River, Conn.

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