Music Trade Review

Issue: 1945 Vol. 104 N. 3

Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
I
FROM PEOPLE WHO READ THE REVIEW
Sorry Carl
In an editorial published on page 10
of the February REVIEW, reference was
made to price ceiling increase on piano
plates as 26%. This should have been
27% according to Carl Ultes of the
0. S. Kelly Co., Springfield, O., who
chides the editor as follows:
"Just to remind you that you are a
nuisance. Am getting letters asking
whether I am snitching on our cus-
tomers on the percentage increase al-
lowed by O.P.A.
Refer to page 10 of your February
number where you say "26% more for
plates." Our allowance was 27%, old
topper, so say something about it be-
fore we get brained."
Bundy is Right—French is Second
March 1, 1945
Dear Caileton:
I took the February issue of your
paper home last night and must say
that I found it well written and edit-
ed. I hope this is but a sample of the
quality of the REVIEW as we will see
it in the future.
You have many very constructive
items regarding the piano.
Thanks for the Jesse French pub-
licity. So far as I have been able to
ascertain, we are the second piano
plant to get this award. I believe the
other one was Wurlitzer. Am I right?
With kindest regards.
Cordially yours,
H. & A. Selmer, Inc.
Geo. M. Bundy
President
Thanks Fellers!
February 26, 1945
Dear Carleton:
Thank you for sending me the flat
copy of the REVIEW and I want to com-
pliment you on the first new edition—
it's an excellent job.
I read the entire issue with a great
deal of interest.
Keep up the good work.
Very cordially,
Webster E. Janssen, President
Janssen Piano Co., Inc., New York
February 28, 1945
Dear Carleton:
Thanks a lot for your letter of Feb-
ruary 27th enclosing February num-
ber of the REVIEW and we want to
congratulate you on the fine make-up
and contents of your paper.
Looking forward to seeing you one
of these days before so very long, I am
Yours very truly,
C. D. Bond
Vice Pres. & Gen. Mgr.
Weaver Piano Co., Inc.
February 26, 1945
Dear Carleton:
Damn the war! The following is a
telegram that I had prepared to ex-
press my feelings with respect to the
new Music TRADE REVIEW but tele-
graph companies, of course, are not
permitted to accept congratulatory
wires:
THE ADVANCE COPY OF MUSIC
TRADE REVIEW IS SWELL. SO
IMPRESSED I AM WIRING MY
CONGRATULATIONS.
This is the best I can do under the
circumstances.
I would appreciate it if you would
send us about four copies of the maga-
zine.
Cordially yours,
William A. Mills
Executive Secretary
National Ass'n of
Music Merchants
February 27, 1945
Dear Carleton:
This will acknowledge your letter
of February 23rd with its enclosure
which is a tremendous improvement
upon the preceding number. It has
good style and the reading matter is
interesting.
Very truly yours,
Eugene A. Schmitt, President
Hardman, Peck & Co., New York
March 1, 1945
Dear Carleton:
Congratulations upon the new Music
TRADE REVIEW.
It is splendid.
With kindest regards and best wish-
es, we are
Yours sincerely,
The Rudolph Wurlitzer Company
Hugh Stewart
Vice President & Sales Manager
DeKalb Division
L
February 26, 1945
Dear Mr. Chace:
Thanks for yours of the 22nd as
well as for copy of the REVIEW in its
new dress. The latter is very attrac-
tive and writer will read his copy
at home carefully.
With kindest regards and cordial
good wishes for continued success.
Very truly yours,
E. P. Williams
Sales Manager
Gulbransen Co., Chicago, 111.
Seeks Tuning Information
February 24, 1945
Editor, THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW,
1270-6th Avenue,
New York 20, N. Y.
Dear Mr. Chace:
Is there any publication dealing with
tuner's problems. Short cuts on repair
jobs, special tools for special jobs, etc.
Kindly let me hear from you.
Very truly yours,
Kenneth H. Larson
Dear Mr. Larson:
Answering your letter of February
24th, I would suggest that you send
for a copy of the "Tuner's Digest"
which is published by the Society of
Piano Tuners & Technicions, Inc., 1627
Elmwood Avenue, Wilmette, 111.
Also the "Tuners Journal," published
by the National Association of Piano
Tuners, address of which is 214 Buffalo
Avenue, Tacoma Park 12, Maryland.
If you are interested in technical
books on tuning, I would suggest that
you write to Harry Hale, Tuners Sup-
ply Company, Winterhill Station, Bos-
ton, Mass., publishers of "Piano Tun-
ing and Allied Arts," which is written
by William Braid White."
—Editor.
Advisedly—Kluck, Klucks
Editor of THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW:
Your special bulletin received about
the piano situation.
What do I think—I would say NO.
Looks like a dictator in the making.
In accordance to example on Bulle-
tin the dealer is in for paying the 13%
increase and the 10% excise tax—and
freight, plus.
J. M. Kluck
Kluck Music House
Waterloo, Iowa
THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW, MARCH, 1945
Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
February, 1945
Established 1879
Vol. 104, No. 3
THE
PIONEER
REVIE
PUBLICATION
OF
THE
2782nd Issue
MUSIC
INDUSTRY
Conserve Your Capital Now;
Keep it Liquid for the Future
by LOUIS G. LaMAIR
President of Lyon & Healy, Inc., Chicago, 111.
HERE are two thoughts I would like to get before the group.
One of the greatest services I think that we as individuals,
or we as an association can render, is to drive home to our
own business associates and to our own local merchants,
whether they be in the music business or any other business,
the idea that conducting a retail business is not now and will
not he, with or without OPA, with or without any kind
of government regulation, a simple task. The cost of doing
business in all retail stores, in all kinds of business, has been rising. We have
been on an escalator, and without even recognizing the fact that the escalator
was going up, it has been going up. New kinds of expenses have been saddled
onto us, expenses such as employment insurance, federal old age benefits. Real
estate taxes have risen. It is expressed either in your bill from (the tax
collector or in your bill from your landlord. The costs of rendering all kinds
of service in your establishment have been increasing, whether it is the night
cleaner, whom you used to employ for six hours a night for $55 to $60 a month,
and whose wages now are $90 to $95. whether it is the personal property tax
bill—whatever form it takes. All of these costs have been increasing, some
of them slowly, some of them rapidly, but continuously going in only one
direction.
i] ?
In the case of the department store,
the music merchant, or any other kind
of business, with the narrowing of
income on one side and an increase
of expenses on the other, whether we
get it from OPA or from any other
source, the squeeze is on, so that if
we are going to survive as merchants,
we are going to have to become better
business men than we have ever been
in the past.
I have heard stories of the old days
in this business where piano mer-
chants would buy carloads of pianos
at $95 apiece, ship them four hundred
miles away from Chicago, and go out
and sell them in the countryside for
prices ranging anywhere from
THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW, MARCH, 1945
In an informal discussion of industry
and association problems at the mid-
ear meeting of the Board of Con-
trol of the National Association of
Music Merchants, L. G. LaMair, Pres-
ident of Lyon & Healy, Inc., and
Vice President of the Association,
called attention to the necessity of
anticipating postwar capital require-
ments NOW. So much interest was
shown in the subject by those pres-
ent, it was decided to make the in-
formation available to the member-
ship. The statement herewith and
the discussion which followed was
therefore distributed to the NAMM
membership by Executive Secretary
William A. Mills and is printed here-
with for the benefit of The Review
readers—Editors note.
LOUIS G. LaMAIR
as high as $500 and $550. They
would take five dollars down and hope
that the customers would take four
or five years, at six per cent interest,
to pay them off.
I believe that when such easy condi-
tions as that exist in an industry, you
have to be pretty darn good to avoid
making money—and those are the
conditions which prevailed in this
music business twenty, thirty, forty
years ago. But we might just as well
wake up and realize that those condi-
tions are not here now, and that they
are never coming back. They just
aren't. You are going to have to be
better merchants. You are going to
have to do your business in the best,

Download Page 4: PDF File | Image

Download Page 5 PDF File | Image

Future scanning projects are planned by the International Arcade Museum Library (IAML).

Pro Tip: You can flip pages on the issue easily by using the left and right arrow keys on your keyboard.