Music Trade Review

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Rice's Increased Rent
Founded Riceland, Ohio
Music Merchant Beats the Landlord's Game of
100 Per Cent. Increase in Rental by Going Out
and Founding His Own Town With Better Sales
Rice could not see turning any more of his piano or radio talk is interesting to the man
profits over to the landlord and did a very
who must put in many dreary hours on the
unusual thing. First he held a removal sale farm during the Winter. H e takes care of his
(o clean out the stock on hand and then went
obligations promptly and usually selects a bet-
over nine miles into the country between Mas-
ter-grade instrument than does his city brother,
silon and Wooster and started his own town
who is always looking for a bargain and usually
of Riceland with the retail music business as
gets just what he pays for.
the basis for his new merchandising venture.
"When I got the idea of coming here my
He figured that not only would he be free
family thought it a joke. Yes, there may be
from rent, but he would come in contact with
a town on the corner some day. I suppose
new prospects, an opinion that has since proved
there will be. Getting a name for the place
to have been sound.
T. E. Rice
worried me at first. Finally, since this is the
First the music man put up a two-story brick
location of Rice's piano store, Rice's automo-
H E fact that a landlord in Wooster, O.,
raised the rent of the music store occupied building, seventy-five feet long, with storerooms bile store, Rice's Hotel, Rice's golf course and
Rice's everything else, we're going to call it
by T. E. Rice from $75 to $150 a month on the ground floor and hotel rooms above.
Riceland."
is responsible for the fact that the map of Ohio Back of it he built a brick garage and an auto-
now shows a new town by the name of Rice- mobile service station. In the center of the
land, located on the Orrville road where it building is the restaurant and hotel entrance.
joins the Lincoln Highway, for that is the way At one end is the piano and music store and
Mr. Rice took to solve his high-rent question. at the other end the auto accessories stock.
A gasoline station is in front and a golf
AKRON, O., October 15.—The Mitten Piano Com-
Riceland is a town of small population, but
course
across
the
road.
Rice
with
his
pany,
New Masonic Temple Building, an-
it boasts a good hotel, restaurant, piano and
music store, an automobile accessories store, wife and sons conduct
a garage, a nine-hole golf course and a real the different enter-
personally,
estate business. It is located amid rich corn- p r i s e s
with
the
exception
of
fields and surrounded by farms and a number
of villages of three or four hundred population, the restaurant a n d
but there is enough business to- produce a garage, which a r e
revenue which last year amounted to $50,000 leased to others. He
and promises to reach the $75,000 mark this himself devotes most
of his time to selling
year.
pianos
and o t h e r
On numerous occasions piano dealers have
branched out into other lines of business and musical merchandise,
into politics with considerable success, but it i n c luding p h o n o -
graphs, records and
is believed that Mr. Rice is the first and only
sheet
music. He car-
dealer who has been moved by force of cir-
ries a stock of some
cumstances, coupled with an abundance of
twenty-five pianos of
courage and confidence, to establish a town of
his own, in what is practically the middle of a various makes and
last year sold over
seventy-acre farm.
The Center of the Town of Riceland
Mr. Rice has been in the music business for seventy instruments.
nounces it has been given representation of the
An
outstanding
feature
of
the
move
is
that
a number of years, and until after the war
Kroeger line of pianos. The complete line was
conducted a store in Wooster, taking the ups it has put Mr. Rice in close touch with a large
presented on the floor of the piano salon the
and downs of the trade as they came, and rural population which ordinarily is not reached
past week.
directly
from
the
larger
cities.
He
found
that
succeeding in a very substantial measure in
the
farmers
had
money
and
were
willing
to
building up a good business. After the war
The Standard Music Co., Waco, Tex., has
he was compelled to face the problem of getting buy. Moreover, the great majority of them
are willing to pay cash or sign short-term been incorporated with a capital stock of $1,000;
the instalment dollar from the prospect in com-
petition with the automobile man, the vacuum contracts, which has not been altogether dis- the incorporators are Herbert L. Standard, Alex
H. Sanger and Asher S. Sanger.
cleaner salesman, and the hundred and one pleasing to Mr. Rice.
"I
work
on
the
ruralite
to
a
large
extent,"
other active interests who were fighting to the
The Cammack Piano Co., which has been lo-
said Mr. Rice. "He is a good prospect,
same end. In the middle of this battle for
cated
at 828 Nicollet avenue, Minneapolis, Minn.,
usually
prosperous,
especially
when
the
crops
business the landlord doubled the rent on the
store on the plea of having to pay higher are good. The average farmer is always will- has leased new quarters at 20-22 Eighth street
ing to give you a few minutes of his time. A and will remove there shortly.
taxes.
T
* To Handle the Kroeger
NEWARK N. J,
ESTABLISHED 1862
ONE:
GRANDS
OF AMERICA'S
FINE PIANOS
UPRIGHTS
THE LAUTER-HUMANA