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The N1s are solid, capable instruments, more than adequate for a freshman in a piano study course. If you follow the anecdotes, they are reliable and accurate as heck and never require tuning. Fair warning: I'm a huge fan of the entire line, which brings something new to the table.

If you've played one, you'd understand

Ladies and Gentlemen,

The other thread that I posted on the same day, "Possible Pianistic Monkey Business", was an example of "hard hijacking". Many of the exchanges, in addition to going off-topic, became quite vicious. The moderator was justified in shutting it down.

This thread, on the other hand, is an example of "soft hijacking". The exchanges have been polite - thank you very much - but many of them have been off-topic.

Can you please get back to the original topic. Please let me restate the original quote from the current issue of the "Piano Buyer" article:

Here is another interesting statement by Christian Blüthner from that same "Piano Buyer" article:

Given what he says have been the broken promises of previous Chinese investors to preserve the integrity of German subsidiaries, Blüthner is skeptical of the assurances made to Schimmel and Grotrian-Steinweg: "No Chinese company buys a German company to keep losing money. They buy a brand and its associated image to produce the product at lower cost, with lower-quality materials and often without the expensive German labor. If Pearl River decides to build a ‘Josef Schimmel' piano in China, they won't ask Braunschweig, they'll just do it. They'll sell it as a one-off ‘special edition,' but that is where the brand dilution begins."


The questions I want answered are
1) Who were these "previous Chinese investors",
2) what were these "broken promises", and
3) to whom did they give these promises?

Larry Fine already said this:


In light of that, you're not likely to find the answers you seek here. Maybe in an international business forum, or a German business forum. I'd be glad to be wrong though, because they are interesting topics.

Almaviva, I was on the other thread, and I promise to not hijack this one.

It seems to me that Mr. Blüthner's quote above frames the desire of the Chinese firm as sort of binary choice - either they lose money, or they dilute the product with lower cost materials and labor. This, of course, could happen, but why would it be in the interest of the Chinese investor to be so short sighted? I think we frankly don't give their business acumen enough credit. What I've seen of Chinese manufacturing is that it's all over the map in terms of quality and quality goals, but they do build some wonderful stuff if the priority is there.

Dismissal of competitors through offering a binary doom and gloom Catch 22 choice is typical sales speak and seems to have obvious motivation. I'm not really blaming Blüthner, it's just seems like the typical "We're better then them" sales speak. Self promotion - and up to the customer to see through it.

Hence the questions you raise, Almaviva.

Just to add, I went back and reread the entire article and I couldn't help but think it sounded more like Mr. Blüthner was having a Clint Eastwood "Get off my lawn" moment. No problem - change is tough. The piano biz is tough. Who knows if any of these folks will make it - i'll cross my fingers for them!

Hello, and welcome to Piano World!

I suppose I may be somewhat guilty of participating in the "soft-hijack" of this thread; and, if so, I do apologize.

With that said, to answer Agent88's (a new member) questions, the first set of hearing aids I tried were Widex Zen-To-Go with the built-in tinnitus therapy option. Basically, it sounded like hearing wind-chimes in the background of whatever else I was hearing. I could turn the tinnitus theory option off, but the hearing aids had a kind of metallic sound to them. I paid $4800 for them, and then returned them before the trial period was over.

Next, I tried the top-of-the-line Phonak V-90 hearing aids. They sounded much better than the Widex Zen to go aids, plus they have a white-noise tinnitus option that I can turn on or off. I purchased the Phonak V-90 hearing aids after trying them for a couple of months, which were $2500 each, $5000 for both. But I like them much better than the Widex.

As far as how the hearing aids sound when I hear music or play the piano, nothing can replicate the natural sound of our hearing. I think more programming would help tune the aids to sound better when I hear music, but like most things, it is a work in progress. The Phonak V-90 actually has a music program as part of the microprocessor that is supposed to change automatically when I hear music, or you can change programs manually.

Again, sorry for the soft-hijack, but I guess that is better than a hard-hijack.

Now back to our regularly scheduled "Broken Promises" program.

Rick

LOL. I forgive you Rick. My mother is having trouble with her hearing aids, so your last post was helpful to me as well as Agent 88.

Thank you.

Very good point, BeaconChris.

Your comments remind me of similar "gloom and doom" comments made by Karl Schulze, the head of Bechstein, when Yamaha bought Bosendorfer in 2008. I paraphrase from the April 30, 2008 Chicago Tribune:

Yamaha had pledged to keep the company in Vienna and to maintain quality standards. They told the Bosendorfer staff that they were proud to be the owners of Bosendorfer, and they assured them that they didn't want to make any changes in the manufacturing process. The skeptical Herr Schulze said that "They will use Bosendorfer for its image; that's all".

Well, 8 years later, it appears that Bosendorfer is doing very well under its new owner.

Indeed, Almaviva

Strong opinions at a German trade show???

Yep, it was a similar sentiment coming from Schutze. Speculation typically involves multiple motives - many of which are in the mind of the one speculating. In any event, if the piano is good today, it matters little what happens to the company down the road. I have a beautiful Aeolian era Knabe with a great sound that I love (and I'm really picky) A great playing and sounding Grotrian, Bechstein, Blüthner, Bösendorfer, et. al., that you play and fall in love with today is a piano to buy. The rest is entertaining hubris (for the most part).

BC

I too apologize for the hijack. But I strongly suspect that when the hijacks end this thread will wither and die. It appears no one knows juicy details. Or, if they did, they're not talking. And why would they? There's a variety of reasons you would keep your mouth shut regarding naming names.

For example, If someone you've known on friendly terms for 30 years starts using some cheaper foreign parts, while still coming under your country's "majority of cost and value added rules so that they could still claim made in wherever under that country's laws, would you name names and potentially ruin their livelihood and your friendship? Or would you make a vague public statement that puts them on notice that someday they're bound to be found out so that they take corrective action themselves before reputations are ruined?

Or what if someone you trust with first hand information is whispering in your ear "I don't want to lose my job and would never repeat this publicly or provide physical evidence by acting as a corporate spy, but here's what's going on..." Would you keep your mouth shut entirely whilst a competitor is selling competing products in the same price tier and claiming the same country of origin -- but lowering their costs and increasing their margins by using cheaper foreign components without full disclosure?

Or would you risk your own livelihood and family's security by exposing yourself to litigation by naming names? Or decide, you're not going to risk everything for strangers but will, rather, hint consumers better pay attention?

I'm not convinced there are compelling reasons to name names. But can see there are reasons to open your mouth rather than stay entirely silent. Though I'm sure reasonable minds might disagree.

Now, back to the hijack, did you try any of the aids they sell at Costco? They seem a lot cheaper and tend to go up in price as the size goes down. My mother in law is in desperate need of hearing aids but is thus far refusing to cooperate. My father in law happens to suffer tinnitus terribly, but can hear fine. Since you mentioned it, do the what's noise generators help? Any background noises that are more soothing than others? Or do you not have tinnitus and the expensive aids just happen to have that feature?

Thank you very much.

I've been lurking here for quite a while but don't usually have anything to contribute so I don't post.

the ny times had a very good article explaining how difficult it is to assess and assist those afflicted with hearing loss, and how expensive some solutions are, which can be unsatisfactory. they reviewed a few lower cost solutions and found an application that uses a small microphone in conjunction with an iphone, because the latter technology is quite sophisticated as an audio device.