Finding Keys to Success in a Struggling Segment

As any longtime reader of MMR knows, the past few – well, unfortunately, many – years have represented something of an uphill struggle for those who supply and sell pianos and keyboards in the U.S.

Long gone are the days when most American families aspired to not only own a comfortable home with a white picket fence, but to also purchase a piano for the living room within that home. The current national market for keyboard products is more accurately a number disparate of markets with widely ranging purchasing habits from region to region. For example, organ sales continue to be strongest in areas with high senior and retired populations, while regions such as the Northwest see comparatively healthy traffic of traditional piano consoles due to large numbers of immigrants from the Pacific Rim where, culturally, the piano remains vital to homelife and family.

The results of this recent survey, sent to over 500 MI retailers, point to a somewhat downward-trending, but still mostly “stable,” market. Many dealers noted increased customer interest in digital consoles (37 percent of participants claim that digital instrument sales account for more than 50 percent of total sales) and consumers’ desire to have the ability to connect between musical instruments and computers/smartphones/the Internet. The majority we heard from (53 percent) reported that “intermediate” priced keyboards and pianos are where the action has been in 2014 – though, obviously, it only takes a few of those big-ticket (over $10,000) piano sales to have a huge impact on an individual retail business’s overall annual picture.

It may not be all sunshine and lollipops when it comes to piano and keyboard sales in today’s American marketplace, but those who participated in this poll are spotting significant trends and buying habits – and a greater awareness of these factors will hopefully assist both their operations and yours in the coming months.