Presto

March, 1930
PRESTO-TIMES
ISSUED THE
FIFTEENTH IN EACH
MONTH
PRESTO PUBLISHING CO.
Publishers
417 So. Dearborn St.
Chicago, IIL
The American Music Trade Journal
Items of news and other matter are solicited and If of
general interest to the music trade will be paid for at
space rates. Usually piano merchants or salesmen in the
smaller cities are the best occasional correspondents, and
their assistance is invited.
Telephones, Local and Long Distance, Harrison 0234.
Private Phones to all Departments. Cable Address (Com-
Payment is not accepted for matter printed In the edi-
torial or news columns of Presto-Times.
mercial Cable Co.'s Code), " P R E S T O , " Chicago.
Where half-tones are made the actual cost of produc-
tion will be charged if of commercial character or* other
strictly news interest.
Entered as second-class matter Jan. 29, 1896, at the than
When electrotypes are sent for publication it is re-
Poet Office, Chicago, 111., under Act of March 3, 1879.
quested that their subjects and senders be carefully indi-
cated.
Forms close at noon three days preceding 1 date of pub-
Subscription, $1.25 a year; 6 months, 75 cents; foreign,
43.00. Payable in advance. No extra charge in United lication. Latest news matter and telegraphic communica-
States possessions, Cuba and Mexico. Rates for adver- tions should be in not later than 11 o'clock on that day.
Advertising copy should be in hand four days before pub-
tising on application.
F R A N K D. A B B O T T
- - - - - - - -
(C. A. DAN I ELL—1904-1927.)
Editor
lication day to insure preferred position. Full page dis-
play copy should be in liand three days preceding publi-
cation day. Want advertisements for current issue, to
insure classification, should be in three days in advance
of publication.
Address all communications for the editorial or business
departments to PRESTO PUBLISHING CO., 417 South
Dearborn Street, Chicago, III.
The last form of Presto-Times goes to press at 11 a. m.
three days preceding publication day. Any news trans-
piring after that hour cannot be expected "in the current
issue. Nothing received at the office that is not strictly
news of importance can have attention after 9 a. m. of
that date. If they concern the interests of manufactur-
ers or dealers such items will appear the issue following.
CHICAGO, MARCH, 1930
PRESTO-TIMES SERVICE BUREAU
MAN WHO PLUGS, GETS THERE
Presto-Times carries on a Service Department
which is open and free for advice and information to
its readers, patrons, friends and anyone interested,
concerning manufacturers in the music industries, their
capacity for production and estimates of their prod-
ucts, so far as such information is obtainable and
available.
For many years this paper has tendered its services
toward aiding individuals and firms in various ways;
in business associations, in certain line of purchases,
agency and distributor connections, and various con-
fidential angles that often arise in "getting together."
Presto-Times is often in a position to render appre-
ciable service of direct advantage to the parties con-
cerned, something we are always ready and glad to do.
This service is voluntarily offered, having in view
the mutual advantage to principal and agent and, vice
versa, to agent and principal, holding all communica-
tions and relations in the strictest confidence.
Commercial Service of
Presto Publishing Company,
417 S. Dearborn St., Chicago.
The thing- essential today seems more and more to eliminate quantity and cut price in
favor of quality and distinction.
* * *
SIDE LINE SELLING
HELPS PIANO TRADE
Like the Mississippi Cutting a New Course, There
Is Always Another Piano Outlet.
It is generally well- known that a considerable num-
ber of music stores have discontinued their business
or taken other lines which has disfigured them as
music stores, but these deflections have developed a
number of individuals and firms in other lines that
have taken on pianos as an agency proposition. These
do not figure as music houses but, nevertheless, they
could be so classified, for they occasionally sell pianos
and even band instruments to teachers, pastors of
churches and restaurant keepers.
The following letter, which was shown confiden-
tially to a Presto-Times representative, is self-explan-
atory:
"George
, Chicago. Ill :
:
"I have been called upon to furnish a piano to a
church and being suspected of knowing something
about instruments of this kind, what has this church
done but appoint me chairman of the purchasing
committee!
"This piano must be new and to cost not exceeding
$485. including cartage, and it must be set in the
church as soon as I can get it there.
"Now, here is where I shine. This is the third
piano that I have sold in the last year and a half—
the first one to a lodge I was visiting and the second
one to my cousin who lives in Oelwein, Iow r a.
"I have no ambition to start a piano store and do
not intend to go on the road as a piano traveling
man. But I am so fascinated with the game that I
realize it is drawing me on until I shall very shortly
bloom out as a fully-developed piano salesman. In
fact, I secretly feel that way already. All of my busi-
ness so far has been done for one firm."
1. "The piano business is N. G."-—
2. "We are having a good trade."—
3. "I have closed ten more piano sales so far this year than for the same period last year."
The above were three interviews given in answer last week to a Presto-Times reporter's
inquiry as to how the piano and music trade is going. It does not require the deductive
talent of a Sherlock Holmes to find reasons for the three answers. The first man is allowing
his inferiority complex to work 24 hours a day, and if he should dream some midnight of making
a sale, he would keep on dreaming that all his daylight chances were just like that—the base-
less fabric of dreams. Even when such a man solicits, he does it in the belief that he will not
be able to close a sale.
The second man was a wholesale traveler who had just returned from a successful trip
through three great states of the Middle West. He did not take orders from everyone upon
whom he called, but he kept going and did take enough orders to pay him and his house for
the efforts.
The third man was a retailer who answered the question several days ago and of the
three he deserves most credit. For he kept right on plugging away, just as if there never
had been any Wall"Street panic. He went forth to find the festive piano prospect anywhere
and rout him from his lair. With faith in his goods, faith in the need he had come to supply,
faith in his own ability as a salesman—the faith of an old-time piano man—he came, he saw,
he conquered. Venit, vidit, vicit.
•
* *
The man reading, as he does every day, the daily paper is liable to speak out the thing
he has been inoculated with, notwithstanding that he has been selling as many pianos as a
year ago and more than he did six months ago. In other words, despite his pessimistic-sound-
ing talk, his trade is good. If one could place himself in the position of Paul B. Klugh, who is
now motoring on the Pacific Coast, he would find man)- dealers who would tell him they "never
had a better trade." And as he motored on he would occasionally run across an old-time daily
paper reader who has his mind charged with "conditions not so favorable"—a man so daily-
paperized that it is next to impossible for him (with those ideas saturated in his "think-
tank") to go out and solicit or close up a piano prospect. But Mr. Klugh will be delighted
to find, on this trip that the men reporting sales are greatly in the majority among his per-
sonal contacts.
WELL-PREPARED TO CARRY ON
James Hamilton Lewis in his researchful summarizing of the return of better times after
the Wall Street stock-speculation crash, told the assembled piano men at the Piano Club of
Chicago last month that a golden opportunity was now theirs. He hinted at the possibili-
ties of reviving the piano export trade; he told them that the time was ripe for renewed
activity along their regular lines and based his predictions upon the facts of this country's
preponderance of wealth; that we as a nation are better prepared to finance and carry on
and make arid market the goods and send them abroad. He dwelt on the capitalistic wealth
and power of our country and spoke of its great home market for the good things of this
life, and of the purchasing power in the average man's income in favored America.
SOUND ADVICE.
"Now, sir," said the ambitious young man whose
parents had brought him up in the fond belief that he
could sing, "you have tried my voice. I want you
to tell me just what it is best adapted to."
And, without a moment's hesitation, the singing
master replied: "Whispering."
Do we ever stop to think that the knowledge we
have acquired through experience and study is a
jewel which cannot be taken away from us?
SOME FOREIGN-MADE PIANOS COMING IN
It is possible now for the dealers of the United States to show some appreciable number
of foreign-made pianos in their stores. Quite a number of the C. Bechstein of Berlin, Ger-
many, have been imported already. Some from the Grotrian-Steinweg concern of Brunswick,
Germany, have arrived. Most of the German pianos coming in have been sent in answer to a
demand from artists and others who have lived in Europe or studied there and prefer the
instruments with which they became familiar on the other side of the ocean.
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