Music Trade Review

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genius free play to contribute to the
general sales effect.
My job today is to stick to the score.
The sales management score, as I visu-
alize it, is one capable of rendition by
one person or by a hundred or more
people—the number of players is really
unimportant. The score should prove
useful to the small store and to the large
store alike.
The objective is to get more music out
of the cash register at the point of sales.
If you want to get more music out of
the cash register at the point of sales,
you must be prepared to do some work
—in fact you will have to accomplish
three specific tasks.
To help accomplish these tasks, you
have available five basic tools. There
you have the target, the tasks, and the
tools—all, in fact, that is necessary or
useful in the selling of music. LetV
analyze that word M-U-S-I-C.
The "M" in music means the mer-
chandise and the merchandise services
that you offer to the prospective cus-
tomer. Let's forget about your standard
merchandise classifications and, for
purpose of sales management analysis,
put all of your merchandise into two
broad categories that will reveal the
basic problems and opportunities.
In the first group we should place all
merchandise that operates for the cus-
tomer if he will merely press a button,
flock a switch, or twist a dial. Such mer-
chandise requires little if any skill on
the part of the user. This is the prepared,
pre-played, packaged or no stoop, no
squat, no effort type of merchandise.
This merchandise affords the customer
vicarious pleasure rather than the plea-
sure of participation.
In the second group we place the mer-
chandise that is operated by the cus-
tomer. He must beat, blow. saw. or
strum the instrument if any sound i? to
ensue. This merchandise requires elforl
on the part of the user, if not a consid-
erable degree of skill. The customers
pleasure in this merchandise is that of
a participant. It encompasses pride in
performance as well as pride in owner-
ship.
Superimpose on these two classifica-
tions the facilitating services, such as
installation and instruction, and you
have covered broadly the merchandise
that you offer to prospective customers.
Competitive Selling
What are the sales management prob-
lems and opportunities implicit in these
important merchandise classifications?
Obviously, you face two kiiuls of selling
problems rather than one. The first of
these problems might be called compe-
titive selling. This deals with the mer-
chandise that operates far the customer
—radios, record players, television,
combinations, and the like. This classi-
fication calls for competitive selling in
the sense that for this merchandise you
enjoy no restricted or exclusive sales
right except, perhaps for an occasional
brand franchise here or there. It calls
for competitive selling (because you
compete in this classification against
the slick selling specialty stores and the
mass merchandisers such as the depart-
ment, variety, and drug stores both
chain and independent. These are the
babies with the boarding house reach
for sales volume wherever it is to be
found. These stores are to be found—
frequently first—wherever worthwhile
sales action exists or is even antici-
pated. Or am 1 wrong? Did uie music
stores do the big job on the Arthur
Godfrey ukelele? Why were the three
radios, the child's record player and the
scores of records and albums in my
home not bought in music stores? Why.
in fact, were the only two items in our
entire household that were actually pur-
chased in a music store—at a discount
so substantial that there was little left
tor profit—turn out to be a washing
machine and an electric ironer? I don i
know who is being kidded by all this
lack of distinction, but I say it adds up
to a genuine need for competitive sell-
ing in the classification of merchandise
where you enjoy no exclusive sales
right.
Creative Selling
In the second classification of mer-
chandise, that is operatea by the cu>-
lomer. there is a need ior creative sell-
ing. It is too little to say thai a ma-
jority oi people want the pleasure of
participation. Many people would like
to develop musical skill or anility on
one or several instruments, but they do
not want or have not been made to want
it enough to work toward tnat end. In
short, they have not been sold. 1 ven-
ture to say that probably more merchan-
dise in this classification is bougiit ny
the purchaser than is truly sold ny the
teiler. 1 would guess, moreover, that the
bulk oi this merchandise is bought fo:
use by someone other than the purchaser
himseli—that is to say, bought for the
child by the parent, or for the wi;e b\
the husband. What this adds up to is
servicing rather than true selling. Yet
it takes place in a market where the
desire is latent and virtually limitless.
It occurs in an area wherein your spe-
cialization as music merchants gives you
a peculiar and practically exclusive
franchise to develop and to enjoy the
market. You can't duck the challenge
and the responsibility-—it is not a hope-
less job. it is not alone an industry,
or an association, or a manufacturer, or
a merchant job. Selling music is, or
should be, the job of every individual
in the industry regardless of at what
level he operates or in what job classi-
fication he operates.
Your sales problem in the classifica-
tion of merchandise that is operated by
the customer can be demonstrated by a
parallel example from a different indus-
try. I am thinking of private aircraft
and the post war predictions of what
would happen to private flying. Here
was a market populated by young peo-
ple trained to fly under war time con-
ditions. A market, moreover, in which
virtually every person had the desire
to fly like a bird. Private aircraft, as
you know, were not sold to the trained
young market. But private aircraft were
bought—not sold—by flying farmers, by
women who talked their less adventur-
ous husbands into flying for business or
pleasure, and private aircraft were
bought largely by people over the age
of 40—or those who had less reason,
less aptitude, or less ability to operate
aircraft. This is a picture of buying. It
is not a picture of selling. People buy
in units. It is only when you sell that
volume results.
You have the need for creative selling.
I don't pretend that you can place a
harp in every home, but you can use a
healthy dose of the kind of creative sell-
ing that topples sales resistance. (Alli-
gator? P()H?|
Why do people bu\ what you have to
sell? The "U" in music reminds us that
the utility that our merchandise and
merchandise services is to afford our
customers pleasure and enjoyment. In
the merchandise that is operated by the
customer the instrument may also be a
source of income or profit.
Why should people buy from your
si ore in preference to other stores? The
"S" in music shows that the store is
the framework for the assortment of
merchandise and the atmosphere with
which it is surrounded. Is our store
designed to serve and to speed a sale?
Does it reflect a selling attitude on the
part of the management and the staff?
The classical album customer should not
have to contend with the hot platter high
school crowd and is it any wonder that
the piano prospect cools off when the
salesman backs him up to a refrigerator
so the customer can get a good view of
the baby grand piano he wants to pic-
ture in his home? A music store is a
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THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW. DECEMBER, 1950