Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Piano Forum What does a brand new Steinway & Sons model D or B cost???

States that have sales tax have use tax. If the dealer does not pay sales tax, you are supposed to pay use tax. A dealer who pays sales tax has the right to collect it from the buyer.

Technically the buyer is still responsible for paying the use tax to his state. Of course, few people actually do, since the tax collector has no way of tracking all the online purchases you make. That is why some states are bringing lawsuits trying to force Amazon to collect sales tax.

I was told by my Steinway tech (who spent his entire career with the company) that the mark up was 100%. When I bought my M in 1985 it was priced at approx. $17,000. The owner of the store had just received the Steinway Franchise and said he was willing to match any price. I offered him $10,000, thinking he'd still be making a nice profit if he'd paid $8,500. He came back with an offer to sell to me for $11,500. I then went to my home city and approached the dealer there with this price and showed them check book in hand that I was ready to buy but would rather buy locally and he matched the price + paid for several visits by my tech to get the piano regulated and voiced the way I wanted it. (My tech went with me to check it out before I made the final purchase and of course he knew the owner well.) I still have the piano and love it and feel that a paid a fair price and the dealer made a fair profit.

Unfortunately, most people are not that fortunate, and also the Steinway fans do not work together to influence the price. People give up easily and willing to pay the MSRP.

People who buy expensive pianos are either rich and feel that they must have them so it is a passionate buying. Both ways are good for piano dealers....that is why they can keep their price high. People who do not money and need a functional piano to practice will be unlikely to pay MSRP. They will shop around.

Again, SS is not a commodity piano like Yamaha or Kawai.

A lot of misunderstanding of the money made in the piano business. Gross margin is the difference beteween the basic manufacturing cost (materials labor, factory direct overheads) and the sell price from the manufacturer to the retailer. Manufacturers gross margin of 33% is not abnormally high and not equal to profit ( or earnings),because all of the general expenses of the business are still to be deducted ie marketing, R and D , engineering, accounting, finance costs ( ie debt)etc etc. So gross margins in the thirties for are about as low as you want for this kind of business to remain healthy and investable. The guy who wants to rush of and buy Steinway shares because the dealer mark ups are high is way off the mark.
Retail mark up is not going to Steinway, it goes to the retailer. It may seem high but from this the dealer has to maintain a high end store, staff, local marketing costs,invest in some very expensive stock, finance his working capital and many other costs. And he does not sell Steinways at a high rate of knots! I'm not crying for either Steinway or the dealer, but neither do I see it as a gravy train. Probably not the first place I would look to invest my hard won money.

What a laugh... Steinway stores, not to mention a multitude of other businesses, are closing their doors left and right across the world and the best Steinway can do is a lousy 7% discount. That's hairy armpits crazy! Look, I don't want to think the people at the factory haven't worked hard and their efforts aren't worth anything nor the people at the sales and dealership divisions but really... 7%????

Well at least they haven't stooped to using 10 year old slave labor in China to make a profit... cuz that's what music and instruments are all about right guys?




Oh yeah... here's my p.c. disclaimer. Steinway pianos are awesome, and I mean it!

Your opinions are interesting in that they have nothing to do with the real reasons for margin. The cost of simply keeping a showroom open, base on long-time industry averages is ~40% of the selling price.

Retailer have to pay rent, payroll, advertising, cost of tuning, etc. in ordre to do business. Add to that the cost of maintaining a $500,000 - $1,500,000 inventory and provide for a return on the dealers investment.

The reason so many dealers are closing their doors isn't that they have too high a mark-up. It is because their simply aren't enough current buyers to pay the overhead.

Understood... and i am not a Marxist with a lack of an education or appreciation of what it takes to run a business, i am a small business owner myself.

but there are smarter ways to keep companies like Steinway alive.

For instance finance incentives like 10% off or more and use that credit as a margin for reduction or elimination for a down payment based on the appraised new value. Get more companies involved in financing or do factory financing... obviously this applies to all makers not just Steinway.

At least in america there should be a lobby that involves congress to urge or give incentives to banks to loan to consumers under preservation of the arts programs.

Come on, if we can support over 900 military bases worldwide and spend trillions on unconstitutional wars we can help a family get a steinway, schimmel, yamaha.... to enrich our civilization.

As much as I'd love to see more acoustic pianos sold, the bottom line is that the closer digital pianos get (in the eyes of the general public) to an acoustic, the less acoustics sold because most people feel they can get close to an acoustic at a fraction of the cost. It's almost a catch 22. The Yamaha place where I'm buying my AvantGrand N1 probably only sells a couple grand pianos a month at best, but they sell tons of DPs.

I commend Steinway for not using cheap labor to bring down their cost, and instead continue sell a fine piano that keeps them in business. I'm buying my AvantGrand N1 for higher than I could buy it elsewhere, and the sales tax here is steep- 9.25%, but I know in doing so, I'm helping to keep the doors open at a place that can service the piano, and is there for me to shop at in the first place.

Not quite, but close.

According to current price lists I happen to have...

Norbert

An older restored would probably sound better, but that depends on who restored it. They say the new ones don't sound as good. Just saying.

I don't know about grand Steinway, but my friend bought an upright K52 with 25% discount 9 years ago in Orange County, CA

The dealer in Orange County, Ca is Fields. I promise that they did not sell a new Steinway with a 25% discount. I can testify that I did buy a new "B" from them in Los Angeles in 2006. Yes Virginia, a deal can be done....15% off NY list. I paid $57,300. NY list at the time was #67,300!

Steinway report that the average buyer of a Steinway has income above 300k/ annum, and that their biggest competitor is used Steinways. So how many sales swing on 5 or 7 % discounts. Top end luxury brands like Steinway are seldom price sensitive, ie a price reduction is unlikely to generate sufficient additional volume to compensate for loss of revenue and margin. So margin reductions and discounts would probably be the fastest way for a company like Steinway to get into financial trouble, not out of it. It might help the dealer to be able to negotiate, but probably not Steinway. We all love to negotiate great discounts, but on top end brand leaders like Porsche, or Steinway it seldom happens because its not what drives most sales.

Just so everyone is aware, this is a pretty old thread, and the OP was permanently banned. So, there's no real point in continuing it. Just sayin'...

i couldn't disagree more mikf. i make good money, but deal with a lot of people that make much more and price is always a negotiating point on just about any product.

i cant tell you how many times i see customers at the different high end car dealers i service, especially in the orange county area, where although they will pay cash or half and then finance for only a year for a new or even used 750, they will negotiate the price or go to another bmw dealer, or for that matter another brand. bmw dealer's biggest competition is other bmw dealers, because unlike steinway, dealers can discount as much as they want. i have even seen customers that will drive from san diego to fletcher jones mercedes in newport beach to save $500 on a new e class.

cars, furniture, jewelry, clothing, expensive vacations..... any smart person, wealthy or not, is going to keep from spending too much if he doesn't have to, period.

There are many BMW dealers in SoCal, but I think only two Steinway dealers. That is why it is impossible to pit them against each other. Not like Yamaha, there so many Yamaha dealers. In addition, most piano people in SoCal know the price of U1, and C3. If a Yamaha dealer tries to keep their price high, that dealer will definitely lose their sales to other Yamaha dealers. It is better to earn less money than not to earn at all. Not like in the Midwest, very few Yamaha dealers. They can act like Steinway dealers. In addition, people in the Midwest are not as informed as people in SoCal when comes to buying Yamaha or Kawai pianos.

I always wonder who buys Steinways. I know many of people whom I know bought Steinway not because they are rich. But because they really want to have one. It seems all my friends who are piano teachers have a dream that they must have a Steinway before they die. It appears that having a Steinway makes their life complete. They make monthly payment like paying house mortgage. I think if this makes them happy, they should do it.....

Good point Ronald, but i think that mikf's statement was that price was not an purchasing point with the $300,000 and up buying segment was totally not accurate.

I agree that some people will buy that coveted object at any price if they want it bad enough and even if they can't afford it, but my point was that a savvy person doesn't blatantly spend money like that.

Despite the economy, we have more millionaires in this county than we have ever had, and yet it seems every several months there is another piano store closing, especially shocking is the steinway store closures.

People with money are simply holding on to it longer now to see what will happen with the economy.

In addition there is more solid true competition for steinway then ever.... and buyers know that.... and those companies will deal and discount... unfortunately, steinway still doesn't.... so more steinway stores close.

Personally i don't blame steinway, i blame crooked politicians who havn't protected the american companies and the economy for decades and have allowed such unfair and unethical competition.

We need the gold standard, reinstate the equitable tariff on imports and protect american companies so they can pay people a living wage and be able to afford the products that they build at the very factories they work at.

That is what will save companies like steinway.

Is it safe to assume you live in SoCal?