[CAUT] Rockley Family Foundation

[Jeannie Grassi]

Hi Paul,

Those sorts of deals are still going on here in the Seattle area.  A small
music school in my area had a similar arrangement with the local Yamaha
dealer only to find that when the sales weren't reaching the expectations of
the dealer, all the pianos were pulled from the school two days later,
leaving them with none.  Many institutions have become dependent on this
type of situation and wouldn't be able to function without the "loaned"
pianos so it is easy to see what the incentive is.  Too bad purchase and
maintenance of musical instruments is no longer in the budgets of some music
schools.  

 

jeannie

 

  _____  

From: caut-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:caut-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of Paul T
Williams
Sent: Thursday, May 29, 2008 7:26 AM
To: caut at ptg.org
Subject: [CAUT] Rockley Family Foundation

 


Dear List, 

Has anyone ever heard of or worked with the Rockley Family Foundation?  I
got a phone call in a semi-"cold call" style (he knew my name from some
list) asking if we at UNL would be interested in a loan program of pianos to
be replenished every year.  I asked him to send me some information and he
e-mailed me this morning. 

In Seattle, several smaller colleges have done this sort of thing with a
couple of the piano stores in the area.  They would loan various pianos to
them for a year at no charge and then sell them a year later.  The problem I
saw in this was that the stores would bring in many of their new pianos at
that time, having a "SUNDAY,SUNDAY, SUNDAY!!" sale and only the school
pianos were sold at much of a discount.  Lots of advertisement on every
media possible would be invested and lots of people would show up, making it
basically a warehouse sale. I'm a bit leary of this and having been a store
tech for many years, didn't like the store's tactics in their selling
styles.  Bit my lip many times from some of the crap the "used car salesmen"
type folks would say to potential victims,  ahhh, customers I should say.
On a university end of it now, I would be faced with breaking in many new
pianos every year and just when I get them semi-stable, I'd have to start
over. 

Any advise or testimony y'all can bring to this subject is welcome! 

Best, 

Paul T. Williams RPT 
Piano Technician 
School of Music 
University of Nebraska 
Lincoln, NE 

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