[CAUT] To buy New or Rebuilt?

[Paul T Williams]

Way Cool, Dennis!

I can only pray for this!!  Our old building is ready for rebuilding. It's 
a structure from the mid 60"s with very little than upkeep done to it 
these past nearly 50 years.  There are these nasty 3-steps in the middle 
going from North to south parts of the buiilding on ground floor and 
basement. Who knows why this architect got this job. NE is flat for crying 
outloud! The classroom doors are all single, except for the choir and orch 
doors, there is no freight elevator, the current elevator can only hold a 
Steinway B....etc etc.  I can tell a milliion other tales.

Great job on getting to "shop"!  Do you get to go to NY Steinway, Hamburg, 
Lepzig, (for Bluthners!)  and on and on.  I'd love to hear about this!

Paul




From:
Dennis Johnson <johnsond at stolaf.edu>
To:
caut at ptg.org
Date:
10/12/2010 03:20 PM
Subject:
Re: [CAUT] To buy New or Rebuilt?



Hi Ron-

My original post probably wasn't clear on that point.  We will be 
expanding into a second building scheduled to open January 2012, and that 
means purchasing quite a few pianos.  Current estimate is that we will 
need at least 50 and I'm down to 3 grands left on my out-of- 
service-and-in-storage rebuild wait list.  Those are all old Baldwins.  We 
are in process of weaning off a Yamaha lease program also so some will 
certainly be new Yamahas, but our department feels strongly about a 
diverse inventory.  When all this happens I expect to have some fun 
shopping..  

best,

Dennis Johnson
St. Olaf College
Northfield, MN.  
__________

On Tue, Oct 12, 2010 at 2:07 PM, Ron Nossaman <rnossaman at cox.net> wrote:
On 10/12/2010 1:35 PM, Dennis Johnson wrote:
Thank you Ron for the imput.  I wish we had more examples of your work
in the area here!
In only a general way I was comparing the complete cost of buying an old
instrument that is thoroughly rebuilt, not simply the cost of rebuilding
a piano we already own. I admit to not being exactly current with these
costs, but I have seen beautifully remanufactured and refinished old
grands for sale at prices comparable to new.


thanks again,

Hi Dennis,
I obviously don't know your situation. I assumed you were talking about 
replacing old pianos with new instead of rebuilding the old. Are you 
without pianos altogether, or is the old dead inventory not worth 
rebuilding (all Brambachs and Starcks? <G>)? No need to buy rebuilt pianos 
if you already own worthy carcasses that can be rebuilt.

Just trying to understand what's being discussed here.
Ron N


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