Presto

October 24, 1925.
PRESTO
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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case of lacking understanding or ignorance
of music and musical instruments. With ex-
pert pianists there is seldom the same ob-
stacle, for with them the instruments' names
are usually enough. If the salesman has the
right make of piano, little of either salesman-
ship of buymanship is necessary. The piano
will take both ends of the bargain, and the
business is done.
But in ordinary cases buymanship is a large
item in the salesman's success. And it requires
good salesmanship to recognize or to cultivate
satisfactory buymanship.
INTO THE BYWAYS
There are piano dealers who boast that
they do all of their selling in the stores. They
do no soliciting, and employ no canvassers.
Items of news and other matter are solicited and if
It's very nice and dignified. No sane piano
of general interest to the music trade will be paid for
at space rates. Usually piano merchants or salesmen dealer would deny that it is the ideal way of
in the smaller cities are the best occasional corre-
doing business. But what proportion of piano
spondents, and their assistance is invited.
dealers can make a good living in that way?
Forms close at noon every Thursday. News mat-
If every piano dealer, in any community,
ter should be in not later than eleven o'clock on the
same day. Advertising copy should be in hand before would enter into a compact not to leave the
Tuesday, five p. m., to insure preferred position. Full
page display copy should be in hand by Monday noon store to seek sales the come-in-and-buy plan
preceding publication day. Want advs. for current might work splendidly. It is modern. It is
week, to insure classification, must not be later than refined. It has about it no suggestion of the
Wednesday noon.
Address all communications for the editorial or business cheap jewelry or clothing business, in which
departments to PRESTO PUBLISHING CO., 417 South
the merchants stand at the door and watch,
Dearborn Street, Chicago, III.
with a view to dragging in the chance cus-
tomer.
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 24, 1925.
But, so long as the custom of soliciting is
practiced
by one local piano dealer, there is
BUYMANSHIP
sure to be the temptation to get out and do
We read so much about salesmanship that likewise on the part of other dealers.
it is refreshing to see a new word, used to
But even the selling of pianos by soliciting
identify the other end of the bargain. It is
has
lost most of its objectionable phases. No
"buymanship."
longer
do the salesmen follow the delivery
Of course, it usually takes the buyer and
vans,
to
attack the prospective buyer with
seller to complete the triangle of which a
slander about the piano which may have been
piano forms one of the equilaterals. And the
partly purchased. No longer do rival sales-
art of bu'vmanship is often as fine, or as ex-
men meet in private parlors to fight it out, in
pert, as that of salesmanship. A good buyer
wordy debate or even sometimes with
is an easy subject for the good closer. He is
clenched fists. Piano selling has lost most of
the prospect who either knows what he wants
its old-time belligerency. It is a better busi-
or is possessed of the intelligence and insight ness today than ever before.
to get the arguments so as to be convinced
But still, and nevertheless, it is in most
when the evidence is logical.
communities
the active piano dealer who sells
It is not the prospect who is wholly ignor-
most
instruments.
He is the man who knows
ant of what constitutes an instrument that is
his fellow citizens well enough to see them
easy to sell. Often quite the contrary. Nor
in their homes, and there tell of the merits
is it always the expert in musical matters
of the instruments that keep the homes musi-
that responds readily to the absolutely fair
cal and correspondingly happy. Especially in
representations and assurances of the sales-
the smaller places the winning piano man goes
man.
out into the highways and byways and gathers
Often the uninformed, in a piano transac- them in.
tion, are suspicious and easily prejudiced. On
the other hand, it happens at times that the
The pendulum is swinging back. Ten year;-
good pianist is hard to convince, or to satisfy,
ago
it was estimated that about eighty per
because he is certain that he can detect some
cent
of the pianos produced were players. To-
slight blemish in tone, or touch, when, as a
day
it
is customary to be told that the average
matter of fact, no defect exists. That is self-
factory
output is about 50-50, and often much
deception, or some temporary distraction of
less.
the ear-sense. It may lie the result of some
*
*
=]:
external disturbance which will later pass off
If every music dealer were to offer free
and permit of a better appreciation of the
music
lessons to children, within less than five
beauties of the instrument.
years
the
combined capacity of all the piano
Whatever the cause, if the instrument is a
factories
would
fall short of supplying one-
good one, it is likely to be a lapse in the "buy-
half
the
instruments
called for.
manship" of the prospect. And the good sales-
man will not urge his customer when in such
a mood. For it is as often a matter of the
Mr. George P. Bent has gone East, it is said
buymanship of the customer as the salesman- in search of material for another book. But,
ship of the seller that results in a satisfactory quite as likely, he is on a hunt for Mike, the
Mover, for whose apprehension Presto has
sale.
All expert piano salesmen know how to get offered a reward.
* * *
the prospect into the buymanship mood. It
is, more than anything else, in winning the
It has not been easy for Mr. I. N. Rice to
confidence of the customer, especially in the decide to pull away from the scenes of his
life's earlier ambitions and settle finally in the
West. But the genial gentleman has at last
chosen San Francisco as the headquarters of
his future work and his permanent home. Few
piano men have so many warm friends and
none more heartily deserves them.
* * *
The very small uprights seem to have grown
into an immense popularity. Some of the man-
ufacturers find it hard to fill orders as fast as
they come in.
* * *
There is an almost unprecedented call for
both traveling and retail piano salesmen. It
is a certain sign of greatly enlarged business.
* * *
There will not be any fewer pianos made in
the years to come, but there probably will be
fewer factories to make them—and larger.
*
*
#
It promises to be a long, cold winter. Just
the kind for indoor music. Further oppor-
tunity for the energetic piano salesmen.
30 YEARS AGO IN THE TRADE
From the Files of Presto
(October 24, 1895.)
It seems probable, to our way of thinking, that the
next decade will see a complete exodus of music
houses to the side streets, and that, say, Adams and
Jackson streets, froin Michigan to Wabash, might be
the coming center of location.
Day after tomorrow night the fourteenth meeting
and banquet of the Music Trade Association of Chi-
cago takes place at the Auditorium.
The officers of the association this year are: Presi-
dent, J. W. Reed; first vice-president, J. W. North-
rup; second vice-president, A. M. Wright; secretary,
C. F. Thompson; treasurer, W. L. Bush, holding over
from last year.
During the month of August, 1895, the total value
of musical instruments exported from the United
States and the result of American manufacture was
$97,553, against a value of $96,563 in August, 1894.
This increase is not very great, but it is encouraging,
so also are the exports for the eight months ending
August 31, the value having increased from $620,360
in 1894 to $674,065 in 1895.
Now that the trolley cars are running on the South-
ern Boulevard, the piano district out there is as con-
venient as one could wish. The cars pass from 129th
street directly to the doors of all of the following
factories: Estey Piano Co., Spies Piano Co., llaines
Bros. Piano Co., Strich & Zeidler, Jacob Doll, F.
Connor, Ludwig & Co.; and within half a square of
Decker & Sons, and Ncwby & Evans.
20 YEARS AGO THIS WEEK
(From Presto, October 26, 1905.)
It may worry you when you call for more pianos
and find the manufacturers really have advanced their
prices. Too many dealers want the manufacturers to
do all the worrying. Don't sell your stock so low
that you will make a loss when you replace the
goods.
Enlargement to the already giant factory of the
Jesse French Piano Co. is the best possible proof of
the success which has attended the progress of that
ambitious industry. When completed the plant will
be a veritable monument to the American piano and
its material development.
Henry Rowan Brinkerhoff, vice-president of the
Brinkerhoff Piano Co., died on Tuesday of this week
at the home of Mrs. Henry O. Shepard, 342 Ashland
Boulevard, Chicago. Mr. Brinkerhoff was taken ill
two weeks ago last Friday with nervous prostration,
resulting from overwork, and grew steadily worse
until he died.
Phil A. Starck has secured the former Bush &
Lane factory in Chicago, together with all the manu-
facturing equipment, including engines, dynamos,
dry-kilns and a large supply of seasoned lumber.
The plant is perfectly adapted to the business, and it
has been given up by the Bush & Lane Co. only
because that concern desired to occupy a factory of
its own for the production of pianos in quantities.
We understand that Walter Lane of the Bush &
Lane Piano Co. is giving most of his time to the
development of the Bush & Lane factory at Holland,
Mich., which is soon to be occupied by the company.
A correspondent of Presto says that this new factory
in the piano industry will be second to none for com-
pleteness of detail and fine facilities favorable to
turning out superior work.
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