<HTML><HEAD> <META charset=US-ASCII http-equiv=Content-Type content="text/html; charset=US-ASCII"> <META content="MSHTML 6.00.2800.1106" name=GENERATOR></HEAD> <BODY style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial; BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffffff"> <DIV> <DIV>gREETINGS Ed, </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>           First of all, dont worry!...Your concerns are logical and I feared the exact same ones as you now face. After finishing tech school, I just came home, had bus. cards made and called the phone company to place an ad in the Yel pages. I just dove in and took the customers' problems as they arose. If you had the guidance of a  pro, and you have done some repairs, and have mechanical ablilty with the piano parts, and can figure the stuff out . you should be fine. </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> In the locality where I live, there are not so many concert pianists. Most people who have a piano around here are families who have children as beginners and chuurches and schools  Therefore most of these people only have a demand for the piano to be in #1 in tune and #2 all the keys should work and #3 not sound so harsh (as grooved hammers can sound) As I was saying in my e-mail, the only voicing that I have done is to tone the hammers down alittle and it works. People realyly appreciate the difference a little bit of sugar coating does.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>           When I first began to tune it took me 3 to 4 hours to tune a piano. Now days my time is down to 1 1/2 hours unless it tis a pitch raise. Some tunings like that can take 2 1/2 hours. Just do the job right. Dont worry too much about taking too long. Now...If your tuning time is 6 hours or something then get a practice piano and get your time down. I would say 4 hours is the absolute maximum that a customer should have to endure to wait for a tuner to finish up. Your tuning time will come down with practice. Take your time to trace out a problem on a piano when confronted with it. If you think you cant repair a job, be honest and tell the customer you may have to consult with a senior technician to be advised on the problem...I actually have doen this a few times, in my first year! Also know that this pianotech list welcomes rookie/beginner questions and professional questions alike. </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Hope this helps</DIV> <DIV>Julia Gottshall</DIV> <DIV>Reading, PA</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>In a message dated 2/14/2007 4:29:48 PM Eastern Standard Time, edmiller3@hotmail.com writes:</DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE style="PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: blue 2px solid"><FONT face=Arial>I am about to take more aggressive action to gain a clientele. How did you <BR>go about this in the very beginning (the stage where you were skillful <BR>enough to start offering your services, but not so skilled that you were as <BR>competant as many other piano technicians)? I worry about things, such as: <BR>that it still takes too long for me to do a tuning, that I'll be confronted <BR>with many situations where I cannot adequately solve a problem, that if I <BR>charge to little for my services now it will be difficult to raise them at <BR>the fast rate that my skills are increasing, among other worries...</FONT></BLOCKQUOTE></DIV> <DIV></DIV></BODY></HTML>