… and the old ways of doing things do not necessarily work any more. Continuing the thought process started off rather ramblingly in the previous post, it occurred to me that this provides further impetus to the thoughts I first espoused in a
previous post highlighting the need for a new marketing model for Stuart pianos which did not in any way rely on the need for middlemen or dealers.
Further comments from the fora referenced above:
“… there actually is a "cloak of secrecy" around piano pricing. This has nothing to do with consumers and everything to do with the piano business model. I have said it before but here goes again: Nobody benefits when a shopper cannot easily determine the price of the piano he wants to buy. Current pricing policies in the piano business make it more difficult to buy and to sell a piano than it needs to be, probably reducing overall sales volume. This has nothing to do with the actual price and the associated margins. It has to do with difficulty in determining the price, whatever it is. IMHO, the business would benefit from addressing the problem with pricing uncertainty.”
The main issue I have with this sort of thing, reasonable though it may sound, is that we are focusing too much on the price rather than the value of the piano – and this latter is a much more complex and to an extent subjective topic than many would recognise. Value in a piano sense has much more to do with the musical and build qualities of a piano than it does with the price, although obviously price is still a major factor when it comes to the final purchase decision.
The costs and hassles of a dealer model for Stuart pianos make it impossible in a practical sense for the business to be run in that way. An additional factor is that quite often we have seen that a high quality piano such as a Stuart is used to attract clientele to a dealer, only for that dealer to try to sell a cheaper piano to the customer – the classic ‘bait and switch’ mechanism, which should invoke instant decapitation, draw and quartering, boiling the remains in oil and then deporting to a foreign country, not necessarily in that order. That just grates.
So Stuart pianos are normally sold directly through the factory, or, in theory, one (and only one) internet outlet. That means that all relevant information comes from the one source, there is no ambiguity in pricing or margins and the customer knows exactly what he, she or it is getting for how many dollars.
But it important to recognise that the price is the last piece in the jigsaw puzzle. Stuart pianos are not, repeat not, commodity items to be priced as low as possible and margins set so as to promote ‘cut throat competition’ between dealers. People who want a Stuart piano for all the right reasons (music, build quality, investment, the challenge of playing one etc) will know that they will need to pay a premium price for such an instrument. This is not a mass produced clone of a Steinway – it’s a hand crafted and individually designed instrument for which the value is paramount.
As I stated in a previous post,
“The cost of a Stuart piano accurately reflects production, not marketing, advertising or retailing costs. You cannot compare Stuart pianos in a business sense with other ‘mass production’ (including Steinway) instruments because that ignores the fact that so few are made each per year and, of critical importance, totally by hand. Some people do not want mass produced product and actively seek the difference factor and, more to the point, are prepared to pay for it in the full knowledge and understanding that they cannot have such a product for nothing. The Stuart piano does not compete in any market niche – it has created its own.”
In fact, I would go so far as to suggest that the price should not be seen at all. Obviously, for someone to go through the process and be eventually confronted with an exorbitant price that in no way reflects commercial reality will result in a very quick exit – but most people have a ball park figure and if the price is comfortable in that sense, they will sign on the dotted line.
The Price is Right? No, the Value is Right.
People who purchase a Stuart piano buy for uncompromised quality, not compromised price.
Once again, I know. That’s what I did.