Music Trade Review

Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
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instrument made by men who have been schooled in piano
craftsmanship for many years. Therein lies its intrinsic
worth. We have yet to learn that machines can belly a
soundboard, string a piano, tune a piano, install and
regulate an action, can chip hammers, can assemble
a piano action, or can assemble a piano case, fit in the
piano action and many other operations which must be
done by hand. There may be several improved methods
which have been discovered by manufacturers due to their
war work, but they apply chiefly to the treatment of woods
and the use of plywood plastics. However, the personal
touch in producing a piano for tone quality and musical
worth will always prevail and it will be a long time, if
ever, before pianos will be produced from an assembly
line.
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Takes a Piano Man to Retail Pianos
UE to the prospect of mass production that Mr.
Glasser suggests, he also advises piano manufac-
turers to appoint distributors. Then he states that
through the distributors pianos should be sold to most any
kind of outlet including specialty shops, etc. If Mr. Glasser
had taken the time to look into the facts and discovered
how many establishments had tried to sell pianos when
they knew nothing about the business, and had failed, he
would not have made that suggestion. For some reason it
takes a piano man to be successful in selling pianos. De-
partment stores have found this out. Many have tried to
sell pianos without a piano manager and have made a
failure of it unless they have finally placed a piano man
in charge. Many furniture stores have had a similar ex-
perience. When he says that pianos should be sold as
furniture he should look into the results that some stores
have had when this was tried. It just doesn't work. As
statistics show, less than ten per cent of the pianos sold
are sold as furniture. For manufacturers to appoint dis-
tributors would only be inviting trouble. The business
being of a special character it is much more advisable to
conduct it direct with the dealer. Furthermore, at the
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THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW, APRIL, 1945
present writing dealers will have to pay so much for new
pianos that to add another ten or fifteen per cent for a
distributor would be fatal. Secondly, to invite the same
situation which prevails in other lines sold through dis-
tributors would also be a mistake. The piano business has
at last been forced into a list price system. The retail
prices are fixed. For years piano merchants have steered
clear of the radio business because of the pathetic discount
basis on which a large amount of this business is being
done, or at least was being done before the war, by un-
scrupulous dealers. Piano dealers will only handle the
higher priced radio-phonographs on which there is a list
price and on an exclusive franchise basis. In this way they
are protected and can do the type of business they are
accustomed to which builds prestige for their house and
the product which they handle. Furthermore, at the pres-
ent time hundreds of dealers are waiting, after finding
devious methods of remaining in business during the war,
for the piano lines they have been accustomed to represent.
There is such a thing as loyalty. It is an attribute inherent
in the piano industry and until such time as loyal repre-
sentatives of piano lines have been taken care of outsiders
must wait.
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Spinets—Forty
Inches or Less?
EVERAL dealers have asked our opinion regarding
the height of spinet pianos for postwar demand. We
must admit that the smaller pianos are very attractive.
Much depends on whether a prospect is buying for tone
or style. Statistics show so far, that purchasers must be
buying pianos for their musical worth rather than looks,
otherwise so many old uprights would not have changed
hands during the war period. On the other hand the ordin-
ary purchaser knows little about tone. Tone to them is
what pleases the ear. But, we believe that those who are
musicians, or aspire to be, will choose a piano with maxi-
mum string length and soundboard area in preference to
a smaller one. We also believe that should there be no
pianos less than forty inches manufactured the piano busi-
ness will still be good. It is still a moot question.