Steinway flat board

[Susan Kline]

Greetings, List --

Bob Davis has just said some of what I was trying to figure out how to say,
and a great deal more as well. He has said it a _lot_ better than I was
going to, which fits right in with his last line. (As Snoopy once said, see
how it all fits together?)

Where all this leaves me, I think, is confronting the question:

Given the market forces, and also the bad feelings that we all (technicians
and manufacturers both) have allowed to build up, is there something
_constructive_ we can actually do to improve quality, something _practical_?

It might also take our minds off the barracudas and sharks for awhile. <g>

(Bob Davis starts by quoting Les Smith:)

>> the manufacturer can now, for the first time,
>>  accurately match the warranty to the design and quality of the
>>  piano. In others words, a piano that carries a warranty of five
>>  years, is designed to last five years and one day.
>
>I can't say I agree w/Les on either the facts or the tone. I'm not denying
>that the "Golden Age" pianos did seem to be built for eternity, that the
>materials were fine, and that the workmanship is humbling to follow. However,
>any modern manufacturer which made a piano to last five years, then didn't
>think that piano would be out there shouting the maker's name in a raspy
>voice for the next fifty, doesn't deserve to stay in business, and some
>haven't. And, I've played some mighty fine modern pianos.
>
>The piano business is, however, a BUSINESS. It is MARKET DRIVEN. The
>piano-buying public assigns a value to various virtues, and a company has to
>decide exactly how much the PUBLIC wants it to spend pursuing "perfection."
>Will people pay $40,000 for a Steinway? Many will. Maybe they could make a
>better instrument for $60,000. Would pianists pay $60,000? $120,000? Would
>ENOUGH of them pay $120,000? Ask Boesendorfer in ten or twenty years. That
>decision has to be made for each of the twelve-thousand-somethingty-something
>parts, as well as for how they go together. Spend too much and one goes out
>of business; cut too many corners and the public and the technical community
>will balk. Here the company has a chance to respond, as Steinway has, to
>having gone to far (can you say "CBS?').
>
>Does every complaining technician own a nine-foot Golden Age Steindorfer? Why
>not? Because there are more factors than quality to owning a piano.
>
>For four completely different business plans, look at Boesendorfer, Steinway,
>Yamaha, and the now-defunct Aeolian. Admittedly, some are more satisfying to
>work on than others, but people were buying all of them. All four companies
>had to make (or not make) the tradeoffs of labor quality, materials quality,
>and price. All had to decide on a market share that matched their business
>plan, and try to meet that market share with the above decisions. Don't think
>for a minute that conditions are static for any of them, either: all must
>re-evaluate their plans constantly, as conditions change, or they will pay
>the price that Aeolian did.
>
>Because most technicians are fortunate to have enough work that daily
>competition is less of a factor than it is for a manufacturer, we can enjoy
>our small niche and focus more on the quality of our work. If I ever get to
>feeling smug, I think how it would be to have a stream of other, anonymous
>technicians (or Golden Age piano makers) passing through my shop, criticizing
>my work daily the way we sometimes talk about piano companies. Is EVERY facet
>of EVERY one of our repair jobs as good as a century-old Hamlin &
>Chickendorfer? Is it as good as the best of the modern Steinways? Could Henry
>Steinway visit any one of your jobs from any part of your career without
>making ANY suggestions? If not, it might behoove us to recognize our mutually
>beneficial relationship with manufacturers. They are under even greater
>business pressures than we are. I have seen manufacturers have to go on the
>defensive to protect themselves against piling on, some of it justified but
>not all of it, and the two-way flow stops, to the detriment of both us and
>the piano maker. We've seen on the pianotech list how valuable constructive
>disagreement is for both parties, and how wasteful and destructive flames and
>moral outrage usually are. So it looks like there's always a place for
>humility....
>
>Bob Davis
>
>

Susan Kline, R.P.T.
skline@proaxis.com
P.O. Box 1651,
Philomath, OR 97370
(541) 929-3971

"Not one shred of evidence supports the notion that life is serious."