Opinions of Working For Dealers

[Ken Hale]

On 26 Apr 96 at 8:13, Rob Kiddell wrote Re: Opinions of Working For
Dealers:

Hi,

Working for dealers is certainly a two way street. I am sure there
are many dealers that have had less than positive experiences with
Piano Technicians.

I have worked for several different dealers in a few different
cities and have had mixed results. The best, by far, was a very
respected Band Instrument Store with a piano rental business. This
relationship only lasted several months before I left the big
city, but it formed my baseline. None since have met that baseline,
which consists mainly of mutual respect for our jobs. The owner was
also one of the instrument repair people, so he knew about skills. He
did not know about piano tuning and repair techniques and I knew just
enough about band instruments to know that I did not know about band
instrument repair.(g) I worked cheap and got gold referrals.

About the same time I was working a little at a BIG store and
overheard a salesman telling a customer, after he had asked me to
touch up a floor piano, something about, "you know how expensive
those piano tuners are". That job lasted about a week and a half.

So, those are the extremes of my experience.

I think that something more fundamental is going on here and that is
the way some stores sell their pianos. "Oh, this one will not need to
be tuned or serviced for at least two years." Features and not
musical qualities.

I have talked to a few technicians about Europe and understand piano
stores there are different. They talk of musical and tone quality and
playability, not so much about my glue is better than your glue. I
wonder if there are some technicians from Europe or other countries,
on Piano Tech that would be able to comment on this or am I just
dreaming.(g)


Ken Hale, RPT
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