Music Trade Review

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Published by The Music Trade Review, 420 Lexington Avenue, New York
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"Who Gets the 29?"
First of a Series of Articles Dealing With Musical
Instrument Salesmanship and Selling, Based on Fact,
Actual Occurrences and the Author's Own Experience
By C. V. BUTTELMAN
Managing Editor of the Jacob's Music Magazines
L
li"1T
ISTEN, Brother! I got a price on a
horn up the street just $29 less than
you want. Supposing I buy your
trumpet—who gets the $29?"
I was "listening in" on a conversation across
the counter in a shop where instruments are sold
—and very obviously sold most intelligently,
judging by the salesman's quick
response to the customer—a man
who, it seemed, was "shopping
around" for a trumpet that his
young son might join the horn-
tooting throng of school boys who
are making America musical—and
helping to make business for the
folks who manufacture and sell
instruments.
This prospective customer was
of a type, common these days,—
interested in supplying his boy
with a horn and such that the
boy wanted, and also interested
quite vitally in the great American
p a t e r n a l puzzle of supplying
enough money to pay for all the
family wants and requirements.
Twenty-nine dollars, he remarked,
was a hellofalot of money to pay
for a name engraved on a horn.
Like many another father, he
wanted to know—and had a right
to ask—"Who gets the $29" 1
was quite interested to know,
myself, what' the salesman would
say about it—and I wish all the folks behind
counters and in the salesrooms of instrument
stores were as well prepared as he was to an-
swer that question.
"Mr. Smith," said the salesman, "you will get
the $29 and your boy will get more than that—
in the value and service this trumpet will give.
I don't know a thing about the trumpet you
say you can get for $29 less. Possibly it is a
real bargain, and if it will give you all this
trumpet offers, it is a real bargain—in fact, such
a bargain that I wonder why it is still unsold.
Shaping and Cutting Bells in the Factory
I suggest that you examine the instrument care-
fully, and if it comes up to the requirements
in every respect, by all means buy it; somebody
is sacrificing $29 to sell the instrument at such
a low price, and you will be the gainer. But
it is also quite possible that you will be sac-
rificing something more than money if you
buy the instrument without investigating, and
then discover that it has faults that handicap
your son's musical progress—or even discour-
age him entirely, so that he will either stop
playing or have to have a new instrument.
"Now the price asked for this in-
strument, I know, is fair. A store
cannot sell a first-class trumpet for
less money and stay in business,
for the simple reason that the
manufacturer cannot make it to
sell for less without skimping on
material or workmanship. Of all
things made by human hands, a
rn u s i c a 1 instrument cannot be
skimped. It has to be made right
in every detail, or it is no good at
all. Just one horn that is built
out of tune and the whole band
is sour. Just the slightest devia-
tion from the correct proportions
of one of these small crooks and
the result is a defect in the pitch
of certain notes—the whole horn
is thrown out of gear by the dif-
ference of a few vibrations per
second.
"No standard maker who en-
graves his name on the instru-
ments he turns out can afford to
risk the slightest error in any
small part or process of manufac-
ture. He must have skilled men, the best ma-
terials and constant inspection; and these cost
real money. I visited the York plant at Grand
Rapids the other day where this trumpet was
made, and after following the course of an in-