Presto

February 28, 1925.
PRESTO
8
Presto
THE AMERICAN MUSIC TRADE WEEKLY.
Published Every Saturday at 417 South Dearborn
Street, Chicago, Illinois.
C. A. DANIELL and FRANK D. ABBOTT -
• Editors
Telephones, Local and Long Distance, Harrison 234
Private Phones to all Departments. Cable Address (Com-
mercial Cable Co.'s Code), "PRESTO," Chicago.
Entered as second-class matter Jan. 29, 1896, at the
Post Office, Chicago, Illinois, under Act of March 3, 1879.
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application.
Items of news and other matter are solicited and if
of general interest to the music trade will be paid for
at space rates. Usually piano merchants or salesmen
in the smaller cities are the best occasional corre-
spondents, and their assistance is invited.
Forms close at noon every Thursday. News mat-
ter should be in not later than eleven o'clock on the
same day. Advertising copy should be in hand before
Tuesday, five p. m., to insure preferred position. Full
page display copy should be in hand by Monday noon
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Wednesday noon.
Address all communications for the editorial or business
departments to PRESTO PUBLISHING CO., 417 South
Dearborn Street, Chicago, III.
SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 1925.
THE MUSIC ROLL'S PART
It would be interesting to know to what de-
gree the manufacturers of and dealers in play-
erpianos appreciate the influence and enter-
prise of the music roll industries. For some
time past the leading music roll makers have
been investing in a kind of publicity that must
be of immense value to the playerpiano in its
every contact with trade and public. In some
instances this music roll enterprise exceeds
the best that the piano makers themselves
have done, with a few exceptions.
One of the larger music roll industries has
given very general and very expensive empha-
sis to a direct call upon the public to buy more
playerpianos. And to the piano dealers to sell
more pianos. No special stress has been placed
upon the immediate interests of the advertiser.
It has been by indirect, but obviously very
creative stimulation of the music desire, and
the best means by which to quickly gratify
it, that the music roll industry has made its
appeal. And the attention of both trade and
public has been awakened by word and pic-
ture of inescapable attractiveness.
If the Q R S Music Company alone had been
investing largely in the broadsides of adver-
tising which have marked that industry's prog-
ress, it would have effected a very appreciable
trade increase. It would, and has, helped
the piano dealers—even those who have per-
haps not realized the source of many of their
sales. And necessarily every playerpiano sale
has resulted in increased demand for Q R S
rolls.
But also other music roll industries have
been doing liberal work for the general good
of music and the piano trade. The U. S.
Music Company, by Mr. Friedstedt, has di-
verged from the beaten track by his insist-
ences in a change of the period of annual ac-
counting from the calendar year to the fiscal
year plan. And his trade paper publicity has
been productive of results for the dealers.
So, too, has the Vocalstyle Company been
doing a great deal to enlarge the sale of music
rolls. Original publicity and trade promotion
from Cincinnati has had a good share in the
results, and the world of music is the better
for it. And the same may be said of the ef-
fects of the Capitol music roll promotion, and
the steady demonstration of the almost end-
less productivity of the J. P. Seeburg Piano
Co., and several large music roll industries
in New York City.
The music roll is the playerpiano fodder.
Without it there could be no such instrument
as has put new life into the trade and inspired
the homes of the people in every city, town
and country place, nearly the whole wide
world over. And he must be a shortsighted
piano manufacturer, or music merchant, who
does not appreciate the large contribution of
the music roll industry to his own prosperity.
IT WOULD PAY
One of the large piano houses of San Fran-
cisco has adopted the plan of guaranteeing
service with every playerpiano it sells. The
service involves care of the player mechanism
and keeping the piano in tune. And the plan
works well—as naturally it must.
Suppose that when the playerpiano first
came into general sale some such plan had
been instituted at the demand of the manu-
facturers. Suppose the dealers, in order to
secure the representation of any special play-
erpiano, had agreed to give the service im-
plied. Would the condition of the trade be
any different than it is today?
Certainly there would be none of the talk
about the proportion of players that are now
"silent" in the homes. And equally certain
that the demand for players would have con-
tinued to grow larger, like the boys' snow-
ball in mid-winter. Equally important, there
would be harmony all around, and no discord-
ant banging in the homes where the players
remain intact but where, like chimes that are
cracked, there is "jangling out of tune."
It is not yet too late. The policy of the
'Frisco house is a fine one. It really costs
nothing, for presumably the expense of look-
ing after the instrument is considered when
the retail price is fixed. Besides, the popu-
larity of the house is so enhanced as to create
a very large asset. And then the activity of
the music roll department must be so in-
creased as to yield a good return, and a steady
one. Anything that builds public confidence is
of value beyond computation.
As contrasted with the 'Frisco plan, there
are piano houses that pay absolutely no heed
to the needs of pianos after the prices have
been paid. In some instances, even the com-
plaints of a kind that must come to any dealer
who does any considerable volume of business,
are permitted to pass unattended. The instru-
ments grow steadily worse, and stand as a
kind of warning to all comers against the
house that sold them. The injustice to the
manufacturers is not considered. It is one
of the crying mistakes of the trade.
If every retail piano dealer in the land
could be made to see the advantages of af-
fording the right kind of service to player-
pianos sold and delivered, even to calling up
the owners at regular intervals, the business
would sustain a better place and there would
soon be no "silent" pianos of any kind. In
other lines of business the system is adopted.
Also with some professionals. The dentists,
for instance, have their patients reminded at
fixed intervals to come in and have their teeth
looked over. And their patients appreciate it
and the molar masseurs are kept busy even
in "dull" times.
Business builds business, and service is one
of the most profitable means to the end of
almost all lines of business.
Piano manufacturers are presented with a
rare opportunity in the offer by Mr. Geo. P.
Bent in this issue of Presto. At this time
there is a demand for grand pianos, and many
industries which have been devoted to uprights
entirely are adding the more impressive style
of instruments. There can be no question
about the merits of the "Crown" and "Geo. P.
Bent" scales. Read the advertisement and act
before too late.
*p
*K
*
Another strong argument in favor of family
playerpiano. The orchestral musicians are
manuevering for increase in pay. The New
York Times fears that the result may be a
prohibitive price of concert tickets. Sell more
good playerpianos and let the families enjoy
their concerts at home, and free of charge.
30 YEARS AGO IN THE TRADE
From the Files of Presto
(February 28, 1895.)
Mr. P. J. Healy, who has just returned from a trip
to New York and Boston, says that business shows
no more signs of improvement in the East than in
the West.
The day after Mr. E. W. Furbush's arrival in
Boston, after leaving Chicago last week, Monday,
he received an order for a carload of pianos from
one of the new agencies which he established on his
last trip west.
War-song concerts are becoming a popular craze,
being the successor to the living picture fad. Every
country paper contains accounts of the preparation
or performance of the war-song concert, and "Battle
Cry," "Tramp, Tramp," and "Marching Through
Georgia" are doing an effective duty in the pursuits
of peace and pleasure as they did in the days of war
and terror.
How would the name Steinway Hall appear
applied to the new Music Temple building at Nos.
19-21 Van Buren street? This building, just near-
ing completion, is about 75 feet wide by 90 feet deep
and ten stories high. The premises or any part to
include the first, second or third floors and basement,
would make a grand music house establishment, al-
though a house like Steinway & Sons would require
even more of the building than this.
20 YEARS AGO THIS WEEK
(From Presto, February 28, 1905.)
Robert B. Gregory, treasurer of the Lyon & Healy
house, is touring among the Mediterranean Sea cities
at present.
A remarkable Steinway piano has just been placed
in the music room of Edward L. Doheny's handsome
home in Los Angeles, Cal. It is a concert grand,
the case fashioned in Louis XV style and heavily
enameled in fourteen carat gold leaf.
One of the piano manufacturers of the East has
adopted a characteristic plan of publicity, or adver-
tising. He clips the advertising of his representatives
from the local newspapers and has them reproduced
in the magazines of general circulation. The idea is
to stimulate trade by showing the spirit of enthusiasm
of dealers who already sell that particular piano.
The capital stock of the Hobart M. Cable Com-
pany, of Chicago, has been increased from $250,000
to $350,000. This indicates again the scope of the
progressive industry whose "Twin Ports of Pros-
perity" are at La Porte and Freeport respectively.
It means that the advancement already made is to be
maintained and that the sinews of industrial war-
fare keep pace with the artistic and material develop-
ment.
Chicago is promised a new piano trade center. It
will become a great point in the wholesale trade
particularly, and among the industries represented
will be some of the most progressive order, that is
if present plans go through. Chicago's new piano
trade center promises to be the splendid new Re-
public Building at the corner of State and Adams
streets. The building is of the most modern descrip-
tion and in some respects it presents advantages
heretofore unknown to the big city skyscrapers.
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