Just wondering why these makes don't make uprights.

Is it because their respective ideals of what a piano should be can only be a grand piano?

Is it expensive for a piano company to start new designs?

Or are they working on it?

R. Dorothy,

I can only speak for Estonia according to what they told me at the factory last Summer.

* There are no plans to develop and manufacture uprights.

* The reason is specialisation and focus and has nothing to do with having the idea the ideal piano should be a grand let alone looking down at uprights.

Personally I think it would not make sence for companies like Shigeru or Estonia to start making uprights.

* Both would have to aim for the high end market (Kawai already covers the segment below) and this is not the biggest of all acoustic piano segments.
* The investments in R&D, production set up and marketing (as newcomers!) would be hughe whereas the market for acoustic uprights shrinks faster than the market for grand pianos.
* For manufacturers like Estonia this could only result in a loss of focus threatening their dedication to the almost obsesive strive for ever better grand pianos and the development of new grand models.
* Traditional European manufactures like Blüthner, Bechstein, Steingraeber, Sauter, Schimmel... do have a complete line of uprights. This is because the've been a long time settled in the European market which traditionally was and still is an (acoustic) upright market. Still some of them like Steinway Hamburg or Bösendorfer have a limited offer with two and one model respectively.

Mind also there are other specialist grand piano manufacturers; take e.g. Fazioli.

schwammerl.

Not to disagree with Schwammerl but just to add a couple of points ..

Estonia's market focus has been the US. As an Estonia owner in Europe, Schwammerl is a statistical outlier. . He has spurned the great makers of Europe to buy into the Estonia / PW cult following. It's unlikely that hordes of others will folow his lead. Avid fans of Estonia in the US already own an Estonia grand or are dreaming about one. They're unlikely to sell their grand or their dream in order to get an Estonia vertical. Also, Estonia retailers already have whatever vertical lines they feel fit their business model.

A good part of Shigeru's mystique is in the home visit by a Shigeru-dedicated master tech to fine-tune their piano after purchase. Carrying this practice forward to cover verticals would add costs that would push the price well beyond a K8, a piano that is already expensive. Doing anything less would de-value the brand image.

Schwammerl's "not the biggest of all acoustic piano segments" reference means 'slow moving'. In the current U.S. economy, retailers would be extremely hesitant to take on any maker's pianos that involve high costs to them and turn over very slowly in the showroom. They have enough problems as it is. Pocket markets like Hong Kong and Singapore where verticals make a lot of sense even to high-income shoppers are already well-stocked with verticals from prestigious Euro makers, and the Estonia name is a virtual unknown.

There's a lot of price pressure on any maker's higher line verticals because the cost of a reasonably good grand piano in real dollars keeps getting lower. If this segment generated more sales, Mason & Hamlin would find a way to resume production of its vertical, and Charles Walter would have gone forward with its planned taller vertical.

Ask yourself...if there were a Shigeru or Estonia vertical available for 20k, would you be saving up for it and resisting all the tempting grands that cost less?

Hey, I heard Fazioli is bringing out a $ 100,000 upright...

Norbert

Thanks for the info, guys!