Hey folks,

I'm new around here and have another thread going about my search for a nice quality used upright along the lines of Yamaha U or Kawai UST models.

Today, I stopped at the local Steinway/Kawai dealer and looked at all their uprights. They had one piano I've never seen before or even heard of the brand. It was a 48" Kaiser Studio vertical. There is very little if any info on this brand on the web, aside from a link to a .de website. But this piano I saw today did not seem to be a German-made piano.

It had a cabinet in gloss black and closely resembled a U1 cabinet. Inside, there was no model name, but "Kaiser Nippon Gakki" was stamped on the plate. Also, each hammer was labeled "Yamaha" and there was a sticker on the action, again "Yamaha."

The dealer had little info on the piano. It looked fairly new based on condition and it played fairly well. They did not have a U1 for me to do a side-by-side, but they did have a P22. I compared the two and could see similarities in the construction, though the actions felt different and I preferred the overall experience of the P22 better than this mystery Kaiser piano.

Does anyone know about these pianos? Looked like a copycat Yamaha, possibly sourced with some Yamaha parts. The salesperson speculated that Kaiser may have been a different branding used by Yamahas built in Indonesia, but they really did not know for sure and nothing in their books about it.

The price on this piano was reasonable ($3k range), but I would be real hesitant to buy it with no history or info on reliability, etc. Any info would be appreciated! Thanks.

Regards,
Eric

It's a *filler* grey-market piano.

Dealers who import grey-market pianos often buy these unknown Japanese makes from their overseas suppliers to simply *fill* their containers - cheap!

When they sell them, they not only double their money [at least...] but also save as a full container costs them as much to ship as a half full one.

Especially 40' containers with lotsa nice Yamahas in it.....

Might as well make [save] most money........

norbert

I know from living in Japan that Kaiser is indeed built in the Yamaha factory, Hamamatsu Japan. Some friend on mine in Tokyo owns them now. They are just the same as a Yamaha U1 model

Please, don't buy this piano for your home in Richmond, VA. Though the price is VERY attractive, the potential is there for this piano to perform and hold-up miserably.

Wow, someone should tell people buying U1's that this is the exact same at a fraction of the cost. Something doesn't make sense about that.

Well, I'm still looking for pianos and this dealer called me back on the Kaiser piano. I guess they've had it for awhile and anyone that seems vaguely interested in it is someone they call...

I talked to the store's manager and he tells me this was indeed made by Yamaha. All the parts are labeled as Yamaha parts and only the fallboard has Kaiser. His explanation is that back in the 70's and 80's, before Yamaha was highly renowned for making great pianos, they would make them and put a different name on them to help dealers sell them. A marketing strategy, if you will.

I asked about the grey market and he said that was a slight possibility, but not likely. Even if it was a "grey market" piano, he has not seen problems with seasoning for Asia vs. USA.

I'm not terribly interested in having a "Kaiser" piano in my living room, but if it is indeed a U1 with a different badge, I might still have a slight interest in it.

Any other thoughts on Kaiser/Yamaha pianos?

Thanks,
Eric

Your first post said that this piano was fairly new, but your most recent post said that the dealer said Yamaha put "stencils" on their pianos in the 70's and 80's.

Is it new(er), or is it a 70's/80's piano?

That's a really good question and one that the dealer can't seem to answer very well. The first day I was in there, the consultant helping me had no info whatsoever on the piano. Since then, they have called me 3x about the piano, stating that their lead manager wanted to talk to me and give me more info.

So today I had that conversation and a lot of it was slick talk about all the "other great pianos" they had in the store. He did say that 20-30 years ago, it was very common practice for Yamaha and Kawai to build pianos with other brand names on them, due to them not having the rock-solid reputation that those brands now have today. He equated it to Toyota and Datsun in the 70's, which the US was still skeptical about, not trusting anything made in Japan.

I asked him several times if he could date this Kaiser piano and he said that his consultant was working on that and give them 5 minutes. He said that the serial number should be able to fit within the usual Yamaha serial numbers and that is how they would date it. Well, apparently that did not work out, because after 20 minutes of sales talk about their Chinese pianos and how they have the best service dept in the nation, they could still not give me any info on the age of the piano. It certainly looked rather new to me and I would have guessed it was under 10 years old, but who knows!?

Regards,
Eric

If you want a Yamaha U1, go get one that is actually a Yamaha U1. Otherwise, do not have any wishful thinking that you're getting a Brand X that's cheaper that's some how still a Yamaha U1. I would say the same for any brand/model.

I would also not have much patient with dealer/salesperson who cannot give straight answers to simple questions.

Good luck.

A Kaiser piano is a Yamaha piano, there is no difference. Enjoy the savings !

Your advice is about 7 years late

Better late than never....

Rick