David <div>  As always a lot of truth to your words.  </div> <div> </div> <div> I personally think that their "Stein-was"strategy is largely driven by the heavily vocal design change Steinway cando no right group. Steinway clearly has a market share in rebuilding their pianos to protect--i.e., </div> <div> </div> <div>Maybe so but  I also think its also driven by the less scrupulous folks in our industry just as much.</div> <div>  The PT. Barnum philosophy group that beleives "there is a sucker born every minute". Some folks when they get done with pianos will move on to the next thing they can use to bilk folks with.</div> <div> I'm not done but more later</div> <div>Dale <div style="color: navy; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS', sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; clear: both; ">Dale Erwin R.P.T. Erwin's Piano Restoration Inc. Mason & Hamlin/Steinway/U.S. pianos www.Erwinspiano.com Phone: 209-577-8397 <tt><tt>     </tt></tt> </div> <div style="color: black; font-family: arial, helvetica; font-size: 10pt; ">-----Original Message----- From: David Love <davidlovepianos@comcast.net> To: pianotech <pianotech@ptg.org> Sent: Fri, Oct 19, 2012 2:18 pm Subject: Re: [pianotech] who pays? <div id="AOLMsgPart_0_9ea13b9c-945d-4288-9ff5-dd443f7db744" style="margin: 0px;font-family: Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, Sans-Serif;font-size: 12px;color: #000;background-color: #fff;"> <pre style="font-size: 9pt;"><tt>It's a little out of context. The question is the criticism of Steinway for marketing themselves the best way they know how using a strategy that they think will be most effective. I personally think that their "Stein-was" strategy is largely driven by the heavily vocal design change Steinway can do no right group. Steinway clearly has a market share in rebuilding their pianos to protect--i.e., they make money there. Their greatest (or you can also argue weakest) asset is that the pianos that come out of their facility will be faithful to the current Steinway designs. I've seen several factory rebuilds that were fine and some that weren't. The same can be said of independent rebuilders. We all pick and choose the kind of promotional angle we think will serve us the best whether it's that we employ design changes seeking improvement or that we remain faithful to the original concept. That Steinway promotes themselves as the best avenue to rebuild vintage Steinway pianos should come as no surprise. If they were Nossaman, Erwin or Love pianos, if we are not being disingenuous, we would be making the same claim and probably by somewhat bothered by people making design changes. David Love <a href="http://www.davidlovepianos.com" target="_blank">www.davidlovepianos.com</a> -----Original Message----- From: <a href="mailto:pianotech-bounces@ptg.org">pianotech-bounces@ptg.org</a> [<a href="mailto:pianotech-bounces@ptg.org?">mailto:pianotech-bounces@ptg.org</a>] On Behalf Of Ron Nossaman Sent: Friday, October 19, 2012 11:58 AM To: <a href="mailto:pianotech@ptg.org">pianotech@ptg.org</a> Subject: Re: [pianotech] who pays? On 10/19/2012 1:03 PM, David Love wrote: > Would > you want someone stretching strings over every rebuild/redesign that > you've done and drawing conclusions about the rest of your work based > on that one piano? That was exactly the situation with all of us who had a piano at that showcase. The difference is that most of the people looking at our pianos had only ever seen that one example of our work, where a lot more of us have seen more than one example of the Steinway basement rebuild. Ron N </tt></pre> </div>  </div> </div>