Music Trade Review

Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW, AUGUST, 19U
what really is wrong with that? The hotel
guy billboards for miles "$2 a day minimum"
and the best you can ever get is $3.50.
/ / • • B M OW to s e l l a piano profit-
ably" is the major concern of
dealers; if this requires tactics
of "Was-Now" characteristics
—and in the course of many years they
have proved that this is tops in selling
pianos—then it would seem to be the thing
to do within reason. Under these manipu-
lations, piano sales have grown from
under 30,000 to 140,000, so the boys can't
be doing anything that is hurting the
industry. What they do must be OK, as it
is done by motor cars, radio, refrigerators,
washers, band instruments, cameras, hotels,
clothiers, shoes, restaurants (ads on 45<
lunches, but it doesn't include dessert),
grocers, meat guys, druggists, jewelers, de-
partment stores from Co-ost to Co-ost, fur-
riers, night clubs, florists, theatres, sporting
goods, tire dealers, schools, house builders,
and I could go on, on and on.
T is an accepted practice to advertise
"Bargains" and to sell-up, due to the
necessity of stirring up people to make
them into customers. Feature the bar-
gain, plus the carnival "Hurry, Hurry, Hur-
r y / ' get them in and then put on the sales
bite. There are some dignified houses about
the country who cater to the hoity-toity and
do it profitably, but it is all small numeri-
cally, both the houses and the H-t's (Less
than 1 of the people pay an income tax)
so piano selling must be piano selling, and
the deed must fit the will. No, there won't
be "Anything constructive done about it"
because of the general outside conditions
under which the piano men fight, which can't
be changed in our generation.
I
HEN again, as commented in July
Radio Journal, things have changed
from "How to Sell" to "What to
Sell," for but little junior salesmen
groups will be employed by any piano-deal-
er. This eliminates the time spent in selling
education, and the dealers now are telling
salesmen what to sell—and it's just too bad
for them if they don't do it. As we are all
taking our cue for business conduct from
the existing conditions, little time will be
spent on the sublities of selling—it's all to
be bare knuckle work. And we're not going
to waste time on policies or products that
don't result in profits. It is a fighting job.
T
Incidentally, we're closer now than ever to
the predicted minimum of $175 wholesale.
ATCHING the piano business
grow from under 30,000 up to
140,000 in a few years, what
can't be understood that a similar
increase in mfrs profits didn't mature. In lines
we know, an outfit turning out 2,000 of an
article, making $5 each, to double that pro-
duction would give a profit of $10 each . . .
due to spreading of the major overhead over
4,000. Such arithmetic could continue, to
a degree, until that factory operated close
to the diminishing returns point. But in
pianos, this didn't occur, the savings evi-
dently being passed onto the dealers or else
management found ways and means of
spending the money on better values. Thus
the suspicion that piano mfrs are not serious
trying to get more profits could be viewed
as a fact.
W
VERY chat we have had with musical
merchandise boys, those who either
went into pianos or are going in, can-
not understand why piano mfrs get
such small profits. Their conclusion is that
the piano profits come from financing, not
from production. One man said that now is
the time to test the piano business by asking
fair prices with a fair profit, for with the
shortage that is bound to occur, it would do
no harm to sell less pianos at more money,
which if others see is successful, will be fol-
lowed to a general profit uplift of the entire
industry. My opinion is that this can be
tested by mfrs on just one model, giving
the dealers what they give to the public—
having that model really profitable, and then
shooting the line: "Don't think you should
order any of that model as we're afraid you
wouldn't be able to sell those in Toenail
city." No dealer I know would let that chal-
lenge go unanswered.
E
NDUSTRY has held conventions on a
burnt-out volcano, but it is the first one
since 1916 that it was held on a keg
of powder with the fuse lighted. Op-
timism, and general feeling of forging ahead,
plus a seriousness that speaks well for our
members, indicates an all-out pull for coun-
try and trade, alike. Dealers can be graci-
ously independent in maintaining prices, for
a number of products that the public bought
so far this year won't be available in half
the quantities. With less competition of
other products, piano prices should not be
I