On Wed, Mar 10, 2010 at 2:53 PM, <wimblees at aol.com> wrote: > Several of you have said, (Joe, specifically), that all service calls > should be premium, in that we should do what needs to be done to make the > piano play and sound as well as it can. I totally agree with that. But when > a customers calls to ask what I charge for a "tuning", most of them don't > understand the reason for me being one of the highest price piano tuners in > the phone book. I give "premium" service, and most of my customers > appreciate what I do for them. However, and this is where I have a dilemma, > I'm not making any money giving "premium" service, when most of my customers > only want a "tuning". > > I charge about $15 - $30 more for my tuning than most of the other piano > tuners on Oahu. For my fee, I do spend a little extra to regulate, voice, > clean, etc, not to mention rock solid unisons. But when a new customer > calls, they don't know I will do that. All they know is I charge a lot more > for my tuning than most of my competitors, including the 2 other RPT's. This > week so far, I've gotten 6 phone calls asking for the price of a tuning, > but have only scheduled 2 of them. The rest are price shopping. I'm getting > to the point where I would rather tune 6 pianos at $75, than 2 at $115. > > I would still like to be able to make about $100 - $120 per service call, > provided I spend the time with the piano. So I have though of quoting > $55 for the first half hour and $25 per 15 minute intervals after that. I'll > say that my basic tuning takes about 45 minutes to an hour, which will bring > to total fee to about $80 - $100. But then, when I get there, I "sell" them > on doing additional work. It's not what I'm used to doing, but as I said, > I'm getting desperate. > > Do any of you charge by the time, with a minimum fee just to show up? > > Willem (Wim) Blees, RPT > Piano Tuner/Technician > 94-505 Kealakaa Str. > Mililani, Oahu, HI 96789 > 808-349-2943 > www.Bleespiano.com <http://www.bleespiano.com/> > Author of: > The Business of Piano Tuning > available from Potter Press > www.pianotuning.com > I have a standard fee for tuning which I will quote over the phone however I won't leave it at that but rather I engage the customer, asking what kind of piano, how long the've had it, how it's used and when I quote the price I tell them it's the going rate in the area. I ask when the piano was last serviced and depending on the answer and what the weather has been over the legth of time stated and the brand and approximate age of the piano. I often tell them it may require more than one tuning, that I know this from my 40 years of caring for pianos in this area. 9 times out of ten I book the tuning and there is very little problem when it comes time for the extra charge for the 1/2 tone or more pitch raise that is common in this area, which is a second tuning at a second date 3 to 4 weeks later at full price. I have acquired many, many customers from one sitting pitch raise tuners & techs when the piano began to sound badly out of tune 6 weeks later. I know many of you recommend the customer tune again in 6 to 8 weeks but they don't remember, they just remember they paid some guy or gal extra bucks to tune the piano and he/she was there all afternoon and not 2 months later it sounded awful. Not knocking anybody just relating my experience over 40+ years, I was taught in class to do 2 tuning pitch raises seperated by 3 to 4 weeks always have and it's always worked well. Mike -- It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it. Aristotle (384 BC - 322 BC) Michael Magness Magness Piano Service 608-786-4404 www.IFixPianos.com email mike at ifixpianos.com -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech.php/attachments/20100311/3724de6e/attachment.htm>
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