I've been working my usual 12 and 14 hour days leading up to Christmas and have had no time to check in on the list until this evening. I found the item from about 9 or 10 days ago about Baldwin laying off most of the rest of their Arkansas workforce and the various posts about it. Part of one caught my eye, (snip"Another irony is that Baldwin's name is held in very high regard in China today. When I worked at Baldwin, the marketing folks were often bemoaning the fact that they could never seem to make any headway in the export markets. No American piano builder has held a stronger domestic marketing structure than Baldwin, "in the day," but they could get nowhere in exports. Today, as we see them fade away here, the name has become the most recognizable of any formerly-American piano name in China.") I might have some insight into why that is true. Years ago I was at the NAMM show in Chicago, the dealer I was tuning for wasn't going and my wife and I had to be in Chicago anyway so he gave me his pass, I believe it was 1985. The dealer carried Kawai and had tried Kimball and Wurlitzer before being offered Samick which he took on. In Chicago I talked with the Samick sales rep who I believe was named Riley, he introduced me to the owner of Samick, at that time it was owned by one man a Mr. Lee. He told me Mr. Lee had made his money by becoming the sole distributor for Baldwin in South Korea immediately after the Korean war. He also explained how pianos are sold there. The sales people watch for the birth notices then call on the parents, the parents choose the instrument and begin paying for it right away. By the time the child is old enough to begin lessons, the instrument is paid for and it is delivered or they pick it up depending on what they chose. My guess would be some perhaps many of those Baldwins managed to cross the border into North Korea and on into China, making them the best known American brand. Just a theory based on the facts I was given. Mike -- I intend to live forever. So far, so good. Steven Wright 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_ptg.org/attachments/20081228/aa1ec81b/attachment.html>
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