Music Trade Review

Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW, APRIL, 19U
HIS means that the $200 in-
strument becomes $250, or
$249.50; the $250 becomes
$300 or $295, etc. It is easier
to sell a $300 piano to one now earning
$75 a week, than it would have been
to sell the $250 to one getting $40. Out
of the millions enjoying more wages,
the piano dealers only have to dig up a
handful of customers—tops of 135,000
—and the selling job at the new prices
is much less than last year—this means
easier selling at more money. Many
dealers last year only went up about
10% in sales versus the industry growth
of 22%, because additional dealers
came into the picture and sliced off a
few sales from this dealer and that
one. For example: Macy is credited
with $240,000 in less than a year;
Bamberger with $150,000, and they,
and others new in pianos, could not do
business without paring the sales of
others.
T
UT a handful of piano mfrs are
merchandising-minded; this
is the art of selling that in-
cludes the dexterity of promo-
tion that gains a greater volume of
business at the expense of those who
don't know how to "merchandise." It
includes a development of trade pres-
tige that arouses enthusiasm from
dealers to the point that they "push"
that particular make. To sell a piano
to a dealer because of price is not
praiseworthy for in spite of the price,
the instrument becomes a football for
advertising purposes, stepping up pros-
pects to the "push" lines. "Now is the
time for mfrs to come to the aid of the
profit" for with the right prices, and the
development of the art of merchandis-
ing (the all-inclusive word for profit-
able business tactics) so that there will
be some financial glory attached to our
sizzling sales in numbers expansion of
15% this year vs. 1d40. Even grands
are up a little.
B
F the foregoing is not done it will
be comparative to walking over a
well filled pocket-book and re-
fusing to stoop and pick it up. Of
last year's production, we estimate that
about 40,000 pianos are still in ware-
rooms, this being about the proper
number based upon turnover. Turn-
over will be less this year, so the per-
centage gain from velocity of turnover
must be compensated by small im-
mediate price raises. Also few instru-
ments can be replaced at the quota-
tions of 1940, and this tilting is justi-
fied. All appreciate the consumer asso-
ciations point of view, and their neces-
sity of getting the most for the money,
but generally their advocacy is only on
one side—everyone forgetting that the
man who makes more can pay more,
and that the piano mfr. who pays more
(materials and labor) must get more,
and so must the dealer. The brilliancy
and sparkle of "piano merchandising"
applied intelligently this year will take
the blues out of production troubles.
Last but not least, to get adequate re-
turns of 12 net on piano manufactur-
ing will permit the payment of more
taxes to Uncle Sam, who needs it and to
whom it can't be paid without you get-
ting your share.
I
O important is "Piano Tuning"
both as a service requirement
dealers; a factory necessity,
and for the develompent of more
piano business, that this is being
handled with more enthusiasm than
ever before. A full meeting of the Piano
Tuner Technicians Association, New
York, was recently devoted to our re-
cent editorials on the subject of tuning,
the body taking exception to our gener-
alization that the average price of
tuning for the US being $2.
S
T would be difficult to summarize
the actual price; the number of
tunings sold being unknown; the
volume of business done at the
advertised price of $2, or less; the
I