Presto

PRESTO-TIMES
The American Music Trade Weekly
Published Every Saturday at 417 South Dearborn
Street, Chicago, Illinois.
PRESTO PUBLISHING CO., Publishers.
Editor
F R A N K D. A B B O T T
- - - - - - - - -
(C. A. DAN I ELL—1904-1927.)
J. FERGUS O'RYAN
- - - - - Managing Editor
Telephones, Local and Long Distance, Harrison 0234.
Private Phones to all Departments. Cable Address (Com-
mercial Cable Co.'s Code), "PRESTO," Chicago.
Entered as second-class matter Jan. 29, 1896, at the
Post Office, Chicago, 111., under Act of March 3, 1879.
instrument. Each one has his or her habits
of Inlying and likes or dislikes of places where-
in to buy. The attitude of people towards a
music store invariably is what it was when
they were pupils at school. The feeling
towards stores they imbibed in school days
they generally preserve in adult years. In that
way the store which co-operates with the
school is assured of a kindly memory with its
graduates. .... .
THOUGHT FOR SALESMAN
Salesmen as well as dealers may be bene-
Subscription, $2 a year; 6 months, $1.25; Foreign, $4.
fited by a reading of a set of suggestions
Payable in advance. No extra charge in United States
possessions, Cuba and Mexico. Kates for advertising on
printed in last week's Presto-Times. In these
application.
suggestions the distinctions between a par sale
Items of news and other matter are solicited and if of
general interest to the music trade will be paid for at
and
a below par sale were made clear by the
space rates. Usually piano merchants or salesmen in the
smaller cities are the best occasional correspondents, and
experienced
piano dealer who presented the
their assistance is invited.
suggestions, bearing on more profitable sales.
Payment is not accepted for matter printed in the edi-
Salesmen often have much to say about the
torial or' news columns of Presto-Times.
Where half-tones are made the actual cost of produc-
allowances on trade-ins and should be gov-
tion will be charged if of commercial character or other
than strictly news interest.
erned by the limit set by the necessities in
When electrotypes are sent for publication it is re-
quested that their subjects and senders be carefully indi-
each case rather than by their eagerness to
cated.
interest a prospect by offering too much.
Forms close at noon on Thursday. Late news matter
should be in not later than 11 o'clock on that day. Ad-
Without waiting for a generally accepted
vertising copy should be in hand before Tuesday, 5 p. m.,
to insure preferred position. Full page display copy
schedule
of prices for the trade-ins, the indi-
should be in hand by Tuesday noon preceding publication
day. Want advertisements for current week, to insure
vidual dealer can set his own limitations to
classification, should be in by Wednesday noon.
trade-in allowances. The writer in Presto-
Address all communications for the editorial or business
Times last week named five or ten per cent
departments to PRESTO PUBLISHING CO., 417 South
Dearborn Street, Chicago, III.
of the marked price of new instruments for
old phonographs, upright and playerpianos and
SATURDAY, JANUARY 21, 1928.
fifteen to twenty per cent for grands. The
The last form of Presto-Times goes to press salesmen should be rigidly governed by the
at 11 a. m. Thursday. Any news transpiring schedule.
after that hour cannot be expected in the cur-
The writer of the suggestions cited circum-
rent issue. Nothing received at the office that stances which should cause the salesman to
is not strictly news of importance can have
attention after 9 a. m. on Thursday. If they be disciplined. Every step below a par sale
concern the interests of manufacturers or should cost the salesman one per cent, he said.
dealers such items will appear the week follow- It is an important consideration for the sales-
ing. Copy for advertising designed for the man, as sales below par, if numerous, are
current issue must reach the office not later taken to mean mediocrity.
than Wednesday noon of each week.
BUSINESS BUILDING
Some music dealers are interested only in
sales of the moment; others strive to build for
the future while accomplishing the business of
today. Each may be strenuous in his methods
but the one who looks ahead is assuring more
profits for his efforts. The first makes money
in fat years and suffers in lean years ; the sec-
ond always has several new avenues of ex-
ploitation available if times become slow in
the music business.
The piano promotion campaign with its main
purposes directed towards interesting the chil-
dren of school age, points to an excellent and
promising phase of trade today—that of school
music, but it requires a lot of thinking ahead
and preparation generally. Even from the
purely immediate point of view, it is easy to
understand how schools can turn much busi-
ness to the music merchant. But the looking
ahead phase in action by the music dealer is
the most important one.
Every pupil of the school who studies music
in any form is a future prospect for the dealer
who develops a connection with the school.
That is the kind of connection that prolongs
itself and pays dividends to the dealer in the
years to come.
In considering the musical life of a com-
munity one naturally focuses observation on
individuals. This one leaves school to con-
tinue music study; another immediately
launches into a career as teacher or profes-
sional musician and still another develops as
a music lover and performer on this or that
January 21, 1928
ences of half a century may hamper a sale,
whereas a new procedure prompted by the
originality of genius may bring it to a quick
and profitable close.
SOLVING PARKING PROBLEM
A great many firms in the loop, Chicago,
claim the parking ban recently put in opera-
tion there, is hurting business. On the con-
trary, other firms, including some in the music
trade and several of the largest State street
merchants deny their trade has been affected.
The downtown parking question interests a
number of cities and a few of them have set-
tled the problem by a ban.
Among other cities, Kansas City, Mo., has
the problem of automobile crowding in the re-
tail business section. There, the excuse for
curb parking is the allegation that it encour-
ages shopping. The J. W. Jenkins Sons' Music
Co. disbelieved that theory and pointed out
that curb parking cannot possibly accommo-
date more than an average of two or three
cars to the store frontage. After a certain
hour each morning customers of the music
house riding down to make a purchase invari-
ably had to endure a pretty long walk between
the only available parking space and the music
store.
Then the J. W. Jenkins Sons' Music Co. set-
tled the parking problems of its customers,
which really were its own, by establishing two
completely equipped branch stores in choice
residence sections unaffected by traffic jams. .
The right of a music dealer to demonstrate a
phonograph, a record or a radio by means of
a loud speaker operating at the store door has
been questioned by city authorities in many
places and several precedents, for and against,
have been created. Portland, Oregon, dealers
compromised when the city persisted in silenc-
ing the loud speakers and accepted a new ordi-
nance prohibiting the speakers before and af-
GENIUS IN SALES
ter
certain hours of the day. Now Hans Chris-
The essentials of life sell themselves ; to sell
tianson
of the Christiauson Bros. Co., Racine,
other things calls for special ability in varying
Wisconsin,
has a berserker mad on because a
degrees. Selling groceries, for instance, is
municipal
court
judge muzzled his doorway
clerking, but selling pianos is salesmanship.
loud
speaker.
He
has filed an appeal and avers
Of course, experience and graciousness of
he
will
take
his
case
all the way to the U. S.
manner are aids to success in selling groceries
Supreme
Court
if
defeated
in minor courts.
as well as in selling pianos. But apart from
the well understood selling essentials what the
It is always interesting to report an increase
piano salesman must have is something like
genius. A wag of the trade says it requires in production, especially of a concern that is
divination today to find a piano prospect. It manufacturing high class pianos, for this in-
dicates that the standards of American living
is an exaggeration prompted by a condition.
A piano sales manager who has had twenty- and of correct living everywhere are not being
two years' experience, says the genius of a lowered or dragged into the mud. Without
piano salesman is the ability to continue look- art and the artistic spirit, the races of men
ing upon piano selling as work. It is another soon begin to retrograde, to descend the hill
form of the aphorism: "Genius is only the toward barbarism, a recurrence that no civil-
capacity for hard work." The natural fitness ized being can contemplate without horror. So
for selling pianos is an endowment that the it is a pleasure to note that there was a sub-
salesmanager alluded to considers tantamount stantial increase in Steinway & Sons sales at
to genius. A prime essential it must include retail in New York City in 1927 over 1926.
* * *
is honesty: the honesty of the salesman with
himself, with the house and with the customer. ' National Music Week is considered a period
"It is strange to have to say it, but many I of interest to all phases of trade as well as
have vainly tried to direct toward success, the music trade, by state retail organizations
could not realize that success is impossible and chambers of commerce in many places.
without the honesty that applies to every- Letters from various sources to the National
thing," said the sales manager.
Music Week Committee confirm that fact.
The genius of the piano salesman is made Music Week is not only considered cultural
apparent by the ability to make a good impres- but a means of stimulation in a particular
sion on the prospect. Then he proceeds in a trade. But a sensible argument of chambers
manner that disregards the traditions of piano of commerce is that, indirectly, all trades are
selling if the circumstances suggest an original helped when the condition of any one in partic-
course. The traditional precepts and experi- ular is improved.
i
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