Scan 5
Musical Courier 1927-12-15: Vol 95 Iss 12, 1927
32 lines. Read by computer on 28 September 2026. No printed page number was found. See the scan on archive.org.
1every direction. Music is the basis of all enjoyment in home life. The radio supplies it. In the great events of athletics, which are growing to enormous proportions, the radio supplies to millions what before this discovery was confined to a few thousands. But this does not militate against the constant urge for music, and that leading to music of the highest grade.
3Let the piano dealer who says he burnt his fingers with the radio in the beginning, stop and study his own business, and if he has a piano store, let him figure as to the amount of time that is in hand which could be employed in the direction of other sales than pianos and which work in the same field and method of selling as the piano. The overhead of an average piano store is extremely high. Much of this overhead could be reduced if the piano dealer would but arrive at the conclusion that it is the piano he is selling, and not fine, elaborate warerooms.
5The Overhead
7The greater part of the work of selling pianos in a well-organized piano store is on the outside, and not on the floors of the warerooms. There is a vast amount of money wasted in the one item of overhead, rent. If the piano dealer will but organize a music department that will carry the radio, phonograph, and small musical instruments, extending as far as to brass band organizations in the smaller centers, he can cut his piano overhead fully 50 per cent, if he so desires. And speaking of brass bands, there is one piano house in this country that last year sold $95,000 worth of brass instruments to bands that were formed and supplied with instruments by this establishment, and in doing this increased the piano sales.
9The piano dealer should have control of the selling of these lines of musical instruments, and that should be absolutely distinct and separate from the sale of pianos. Let the piano salesmen have their work to do, and employ the necessary people to sell the musical instruments. This does not absolve the piano salesmen who may be loafing around the warerooms waiting for a customer to come in to wait upon one who may desire to purchase a small musical instrument. What is meant by the separating of the efforts of the sales organization is to keep the piano salesmen from seeking the paths of least resistance and building up a record on the small musical instruments that do not require the finesse in selling that piano selling demands.
11Added Sales Opportunities
13The piano salesman who is doing outside work can be given an opportunity to increase his commissions by the sale of radios, etc., and if the piano dealers would but train their piano salesmen to look upon the radio as an assistance, and explain what this assistance means in the hearing of music and in knowing music, and thus arriving at what is the best in music, there would be a change in piano arguments on the part of the piano men.
15Past history in all this, shows that the piano dealer has not kept pace with present day advancement in music.
17We can look around and study the piano trade in its retail phases, and it will be discovered that the most successful retail houses in the piano world today are those that are music stores. The smaller musical instruments keep a fast turn over and a constant audience of people on the wareroom floors, thus filling in the waste time of piano selling, and building to a greater volume of business, with a lessening of the overhead.
19If a piano dealer will but study these conditions he will find that if his music department only pays for the rent of the space that it thus occupies, and breaks even on his profit as to the musical merchandise, etc., he will be making just that much more money in his piano business. The writer knows of one successful dealer who started in the piano business, took on the Victor, and the Victor from that day, paid his rent, and leaving him free for his piano sales. That rent represented clear profit in the lessening the overhead.
21Let the dealers who have formed an antagonism against the radio study the fact that what is presented in the music programs, such as the Atwater Kent and other radio manufacturers are emulating, and it will be found that the radio can be utilized to increase the sale of pianos instead of justifying the attitude presented today by many piano dealers that the radio has killed the business, or will kill the business. The Musical Courier Extra will attempt to present to the piano dealers of this country the advantages of the radio, and be able to prove that it is an aid in piano selling.
23Profit on Service
25We must note what the phonograph and talking machine has done for the piano dealer, and this in itself will but carry out as to the radio, if the dealer will only lay aside his prejudices, study the question of service as it now is in evidence, take up the music of the radio, and at the same time recognize that the tonal results of the radio under anything like reasonable climatic conditions will present the tone as it comes from the artist who is giving the number on any program.
27Let the dealers realize that the radio is here to stay. Unless the piano dealers of this country take up the radio, others will get it, and then the dealers will find that there will be a competition presented through the radio dealers' taking on the piano. That is as sure to follow as that the radio is the musical instrument of the day in its appeal to the masses.
29There is presented with this article the six programs of the Atwater Kent Radio Hour given every Sunday evening on the dates the programs show. Millions of people have heard and will hear these various programs and it indicates in no uncertain manner what the radio is doing in a musical way. The piano dealers of this country should take advantage of this music broadcasting, for it is educating the people to a love of good music. These programs are of unusual value from a musical point of view, and but carry out what has been said in this article.
31William Geppert.
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