PRESTO
Presto
THE AMERICAN MUSIC TRADE WEEKLY.
Published Every Saturday at 417 South Dearborn
Street, Chicago, Illinois.
C. A. D A N I E L L and F R A N K D. ABBOTT
Editors
Telephones, Local and Long Distance, Harrison 234
Private Phones to all Departments. Cable Address (Com-
mercial Cable Co.'s Code), " P R E S T O , " Chicago.
Entered as second-class matter Jan. 29, 1896, at the
Post Office. Chicago. Illinois, under Act of March 3, 1879.
Subscription, $2 a y
Payable in advance. No extra charge In United States
possessions. Cuba and Mexico. Rates for advertising on
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
preceding publication day. Want advs. for current
week, to insure classification, must not be later than
Wednesday noon.
Address all communications for the editorial or business
departments to PRESTO PUBLISHING CO., 417 South
Dearborn Street, Chicago, III.
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 1925.
THE WANT ADVS. THIS WEEK
ARE ON PAGE 24.
BUYING ON TIME
It doesn't make any difference what the
system of selling, there are always many busi-
ness experts ready to criticize it. And the in-
stallment plan of selling things is the bull's
eye of trade at which the censors of business
methods are just now shooting. The solo in
the performance is the "dollar a week" plan,
and the burden of the critical song is that the
poor public is doing too much buying and run-
ning too deeply in debt.
Was there ever a plan for stimulating trade
that was not declared by the doctors of finance
as dangerous to social economy, or destructive
in some mysterious way, to public morals ? It
may be, of course, that the cash with order
would go better. But only a small proportion
of the people have the ready cash. And, in
the purchase of some article for the family,
delay may easily be more costly than the in-
terest on deferred payments.
It is so with pianos. If there is a child to
be educated the decent parent wants the
youngster to have the special advantages of
music. Putting off the purchase may mean
loss of the youthful opportunity and conse-
quent lack of the refining influences.
It's an old story. If it could be possible to
buy roast beef, potatoes, coffee and other mere
food for the animal side of life, on the install-
ment plan, it might be well to call the dollar
a week system a business mistake. And the
grower would soon require no assurance of
the soundness of the conclusion. But with
chattels in which the security for the debt is
so sure as in the case of a good piano, we
have our doubts from a good many points of
view.
Further, it is unfair to say that because a
thing is sold on small payments the merchant
will rob the purchaser by charging exorbitant
prices. It is not so in the piano business. A
piano can be bought on installments for just
as little money as for spot cash, with a fair
interest charge on the deferred payments. And
it is very seldom that this is not made clear to
the purchaser. No sane man would object
to paying interest on borrowed money. And
buying on installments is equivalent to bor-
rowing the price of the piano, less the first
payment.
But for the installment plan there would not
be more than one-third the number of pianos
sold that are now delivered to happy homes
of the kind of people who need music. And
but for the regular payments to come, from
the steady wages, the piano buyers, in many
instances, would have nothing at all to show
for their toiling. For the tendency is to spend
as fast as we earn. That is why the savings
banks make so much effort to head off the
money wasters and induce them to put away
some of their earnings in the strong boxes.
Usually the man of money can find all kinds
of fault with the opportunities of the compara-
tively poor. And it is easy for one who has
no need of the small payment plan, in getting
the luxuries, or even the necessities of life,
to find fault with the long-time systems for
outwitting the inconvenience of a lack of cap-
ital. But in spite of it all, the people will keep
right on buying pianos on as easy terms as
possible, and paying for them with the kind
of regularity which in itself forms a habit in
life that must command just as much respect
as the boast of a big bank balance.
November 7, 192S.
association movement have not given it up,
and eventually the Hoosier State will redeem
itself in this as she has in all other affairs
which call for progress and intelligent effort.
Encourage the piano teachers. The player-
pianos are in themselves instructors in how
the composition should sound. The piano
teacher is the source of information in how
to make it sound that way, or even better, by
the exercise of the performer's own indi-
viduality.
* * *
If the average music store would put more
effort into the music roll trade the result
would be good at once. The holiday season
presents a fine time for musical gifts and what
musical gift could be more suitable than a
selection of music rolls in holly-wreath boxes?
* * *
Never stop to worry if the prospect gets
away. Just watch for the next one to turn the
corner, for in trade, as elsewhere, they come
in pairs.
* * *
Perhaps next to "Are you making collec-
tions?" is the piano trade conundrum "Are
you doing some selling?"
30 YEARS AGO IN THE TRADE
From the Files of Presto
OH, INDIANA!
What's the matter with the music men of
the good old Hoosier state? A few weeks
ago Illinois turned out a very enthusiastic
group of music merchants. Rockford was
alive with them for two days, and an organi-
zation was formed which will prove an in-
spiration for years to come.
This week Grand Rapids was the scene of a
lively gathering of the music men of Mich-
igan. And a short time ago the Ohio trade
representatives held a large convention in Cin-
cinnati. But Indiana, the state that produces
more pianos than any other in the Middle
West—that is the home of more piano fac-
tories than the rest—failed to muster dealers
enough to justify an attempt at organizing. In
fact, the call for a preliminary meeting at In-
dianapolis awakened no interest at all.
Something must be the matter. Indiana
possesses as fine a lot of piano houses as al-
most any other state. Indiana has a reputa-
tion as a piano-making state not surpassed,
some of the industries having a distinction
which compares favorably with the greatest
on earth.
It is possible that, because Indiana is so
great a piano state in the manufacturing
sense, her interests are pretty well exhausted
by the activities of the National Association
and its doings. For Indiana's piano indus-
tries are always conspicuous in the exhibitions
and other special events of the big annual con-
ventions. Possibly the dealers follow the fac-
tories and expend their convention, or asso-
ciation, interests in the larger combinations
which get together in New York or Chicago
every spring.
But, whatever the reason of the failure to
bring about an organization of the music
trade of Indiana, there w r as disappointment
in last week's announcement that only three
dealers responded when 260 invitations had
been sent out. However, the leaders in the
(November 7, 1895.)
Even in this prolific period of the piano industry,
the appearance of a new grand is of sufficient im-
portance to attract special attention.
Poster, or show-bill advertising has at last reached
the dignity of the piano trade. Or perhaps it would
be more correct to reverse the order and say the
dignity of the piano trade advertising has relaxed to
the circus-bill level.
Miss Mary Tate, an American pianist of consider-
able merit, died a short time ago, only twenty-one
years old. Her last wish was to be laid out upon
and buried in her grand piano. Her body was laid
upon the instrument, a choral being played upon it,
while religious services were held. After the cere-
mony the cover was raised, the strings taken from
the piano and the body placed in it. Then the piano
legs were taken off and the body of the piano raised
upon the hearse.
A lady visiting Paderewski's villa in Paris, noticed
a cherry stone on the mantelpiece of his music room.
She appropriated the treasure and, taking it to a jew-
eler, had it magnificently set in pearls and diamonds.
A few weeks later, Paderewski and the lady met in
Vienna, and she showed the musician the bauble, tell-
ing him that she prized it more than all her other
treasures. "But, madame," said the divine Ignace,
"I never eat cherries; the one you found on the man-
telpiece must have been left there by my servant!"
20 YEARS AGO THIS WEEK
(From Presto, November 9, 1905.)
The Piano Manufacturers' Association of California
has been incorporated at San Diego, Cal., with an
authorized capital stock of $100,000.
Farny Wurlitzer. son of Rudolph Wurlitzer, the
president of the Wurlitzer Music Co., Cincinnati,
went to Russia to visit his brother-in-law, in Seyma
Weinberg.
The first gold medal offered by the Alabama State
Fair and Exhibit Association for the best merchant's
display, was won by the Jesse French Piano and
Organ Company, Birmingham, Ala.
The Cable Co. in Chicago struggled with a Jap
translation, with the following result: "Kable travel-
ing man heap much glood flellor—give ploor Jap boy
ten cents—buy chew gum and cligletts."
The White House is now equipped with three
pianos, the third instrument having recently been in-
stalled in the mansion. One is kept in the east room
and used by Ethel Roosevelt. Another is for Miss
Alice Roosevelt. The third is a mechanical player.
To hear Mr. Gcnnett on the subject of the Starr
Minim Grand is to realize what genuine dyed-in-the-
wool piano enthusiasm is. "I'm proud of that piano!"
he exclaims; "it's not only the smallest grand piano,
but it's a challenge to any and all of the rest of them
in everything that goes to make a small grand piano."
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