Presto

PRESTO
December 30, 1922.
COINOLAS
FOR
RESTAURANTS, CAFES and
AMUSEMENT CENTERS
Style SO
FROM THE BIGGEST
ORCHESTRION
Tiny Coinola
THE SMALLEST
KEYLESS
Manufactured by
The Operators Piano Co.
16 to 22 South Peoria St.
CHICAGO
SERVICE IN
THE MUSIC STORE
Efficient Work in Selling, Delivering, Ac-
counting and Collecting Depends Upon
Use of the Best Devices for Quick and
Effective Service.
To get efficiency in store service is the aim of
every progressive music house and the first aid in
effecting the desired end is a knowledge of where
to get the devices for achieving efficiency and how
to fill the store employes with the spirit that assures
first class store service.
Of course it may be set down as a truism that the
right kind of pianos and other music goods at the
right price provide the first requirement in giving ser-
vice. These are essentials but good goods are not
always efficiently displayed and sold. The vital ques-
tion of overhead is conceived in any consideration of
service, for overhead expenses are usually in equal
ratio with absolete methods of doing business.
Aids by Sales.
The piano dealer for instance who has a Bowen
Loader or an Atwood Loader in his delivery equip-
ment gives evidence of an appreciation of an im-
portant element in service. The music dealer who
provides his salesmen and movers with Sill Trucks
and End Trucks for handling pianos and Lea Talk-
ing Machine Trucks, all made by the Self-Lifting
Piano Truck Co., Findlay, O., has provided guaran-
tees of service. It is generally agreed that practical
piano moving supplies increase the selling power of
the music store.
A Group of Devices.
The Piano Movers' Supply Company, Buckingham,
Pa., has been among the most potent aids to service
in the piano store. Its One-Man Street Cable Hoist
and Two-in-One Loader are more than safety-first
devices, they are assurances of quick jobs which
mean smaller overhead and bigger profits for the
music houses using them.
Every well-posted music merchant is aware nowa-
days that, to be successful, he must sell service as
well as merchandise. It has become almost an axiom
that a customer will remember good service after the
merchandise is forgotten. On the other hand, he or
she is just as prone to remember poor service and,
regardless of the quality of the merchandise she
bought, do her future buying somewhere else.
The Requirements.
With modern competition making it necessary for
one retailer to sell as good merchandise at as low a
price as the next one, it is very difficult for one store
to stand out at the expense of another in this re-
spect. This, however, is not the case with service.
Because the customer does not actually buy it at so
much per yard, many merchants have not come fully
to recognize its great importance. Many others
recognize that service, is a vital factor in the success
of their business, but they do not realize the many
angles from which the service question must be
viewed.
Service is of many forms and it is required from
the first appearance of the customer until the goods
are delivered—and after. For instance, a phono-
graph dealer may send out a special messenger to a
customer who is waiting for a certain record or selec-
tion of records and figuratively pat himself on the
back because of the good service he has rendered.
And yet, at another time, his faulty system for author-
izing charges in amounts over $10 may keep that
same customer—as well as many others—waiting a
great deal longer than she should for the authoriza-
tion of a "charge taken." This very thing is one
of the reasons why stores are so often asked to send
small charge purchases that a customer would other-
wise take with her, and during the course of a year
it adds no small amount to the cost of delivery.
Service in the Office.
In no department of a store is a lack of efficiency
more costly than in the credit department, accord-
ing to W. H. J. Taylor, credit manager for Frank-
lin Simon & Co., New York, who is quoted on this
matter by the New York Times. The modern sys-
tem of conducting a charge business makes the credit
office one of the most important "service stations'* in
the entire establishment, he said, and without a
maximum of efficiency in personnel and methods it is
obvious that a maximum of service cannot be ren-
dered. The credit man continued:
In seeking for maximum efficiency in a credit de-
partment, the more the system can be made to depend
on mechanical devices for accuracy anu 3peed the
better. Take bookkeeping machines for example.
These devices minimize the errors so frequently seen
when books are kept by hand because they prove
each day's work automatically. As a result of daily
proved posting of all transactions, whether of charge,
cash or credits of merchandise, each account accu-
rately shows the amount owed and for how long a
period it has been due.
A Useful Machine.
The use of bookkeeping machines not only makes
the work of the credit department more efficient gen-
erally, but it often is of direct value in assisting col-
lections, which make up the life blood of the business.
Every merchant who can show a proper financial
statement can borrow money enough to get over the
tight places, but let his collections go wrong and see
what happens. Bookkeeping machines enable the
collection man to get his bills and statements out
promptly, and it frequently happens that when a cus-
tomer cannot pay two bills at the same time she will
pay the one which reaches her first. . The other she
lets go another 30 days or longer.
Of as vital importance as bookkeeping to the mer-
chant, and of more importance to the customer, is a
system of authorizing charges, that is efficient enough
to do away with lost motion and time.
Latest in Files.
In order to give efficient service in this respect it is
necessary to have the best possible kind of filing sys-
tem. The old-fashioned way of filing cards vertically
in drawers has been found slow and unsatisfactory.
It does not show at a glance the information desired,
and there is always a chance of cards being misfiled.
This causes delay and loss of time and money. Vis-
ible records eliminate this loss. Manufacturers of vis-
ible index systems claim a saving of 75 per cent in
labor cost because of the speed in handling the work
of authorization. There is no way of telling- just how
much the business of a store is increased by this same
element of speed, but it is no secret that anything
that tends to speed up selling tends to increase busi-
ness. If, in the aggregate, a clerk has to lose an
hour a day waiting for authorizations of 'charge
taken' purchases, it is obvious that she will have less
time for waiting on customers than the clerk who
loses only a few minutes a day in this manner. Fur-
ther than this, it is obvious that when a customer is
held up five or ten minutes waiting for such an
authorization in one department she has just so much
time less to spend in some other department buying
additional merchandise.
REGISTERING TRADE-MARKS.
An important set of facts for trade-mark users have
been provided by Mason, Fenwick & Lawrence,
patent and trade-mark lawyers, 111 W. Monroe street,
Chicago. Among them is the highly important one
that many trade-marks not heretofore registerable
are now available for registration. This is possible
from a recent amendment to the United States trade-
mark law. "Owing to the present rate of exchange
and our having direct foreign connections, we are
enabled to quote greatly reduced prices for register-
ing trade-marks abroad. Protect your trade-mark
under the Panama Convention and save hundreds of
dollars," advises the company.
In Three Parts:
1. Instruments of Established
Names and Character.
2. Instruments that bear Spe-
cial Names or Trade Marks.
3. Manufacturers of Pianos
and Player-Pianos with Chap-
ters on Piano Building and Buy-
ing designed for the guidance
of prospective purchasers.
Fac-simile Fall-
board Names of Leading Pianos
and Player-Pianos in Colors
Revised Annually
NO PIANO DEALER OR SALESMAN
CAN AFFORD TO BE WITHOUT IT.
IF YOU DON'T CONSULT "PRESTO
BUYERS' GUIDE" YOU ARE MISSING
OPPORTUNITIES. GET IT NOW.
Give a copy to each of your salesmen.
Price 50 cents per copy.
PRESTO PUBLISHING CO.
Enhanced content © 2008-2009 and presented by MBSI - The Musical Box Society International (www.mbsi.org) and the International Arcade Museum (www.arcade-museum.com).
All Rights Reserved. Digitized from the archives of the MBSI with support from NAMM - The International Music Products Association (www.namm.org).
Additional enhancement, optimization, and distribution by the International Arcade Museum. An extensive collection of Presto can be found online at http://www.arcade-museum.com/library/