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Rick, I don't think that's a very fair assessment.

First off... I stopped looking and posting in the Technical forum a long time ago for a few reasons. The most noteworthy being the lack of posts there. Here on the piano forum we often have discussions in a real-time manner.
Your posting on this thread proves that technicians are reading it, so what's the problem? Certainly most of our technical discussion takes place here.

Second,
Technician's opinions aside, it is the consumers who need to hear about this level of prep. I applaud Keith for offering a level of prep that very very few dealers offer. It's nice to know that there are others out there offering pianos at their full potential rather than "good enough".

As I've already mentioned, this is basic prep, so it really shouldn't advertise anything about his store, other than that he's doing what he's supposed to, and many others are not.

I'm sorry if that makes others feel that the cards are stacked against them. But I highly doubt Keith's going to steal any sales away from them ... especially with this crowd.

Rick,
You're selling yourself short. I am a dealer, and sell quality goods at a fair price. But if I follow the 20 hour plan to prep every piano, I'd be out of business before I could pay the technician's bill. What do you feel is 'standard' prep for a new piano? Basic regulation and a couple of tunings allows me to sell pianos at a fair price. Further voicing and 'tweeking' is an additional cost I leave to the customer's discretion. If it is something that is covered in warranty, I gladly cover it. But 20 hours of prep? It seems unreasonable.

Rick,

I understand that you would see it this way, and I debated with myself about posting this for exactly the reason you describe.

I have spent a lot of time today trying to offer something of value to this forum. People are constantly talking about prepping pianos on this forum, and I wanted to describe from my perspective what that means. Because I feel there are several good techs here with a lot to offer, I asked them to help describe this process. They are welcome to contradict me or whatever. I think many participants in this forum are interested in more detail regarding prepping pianos. If you want to describe your approach to prepping pianos, I would be very interested, as would many others, and I wont accuse you of trying to get a free advertisement for your service business.

Rick,

Every self proclaimed dealer or technician is doing some sort of advertising when they post on this forum.

I agree with your sentiment with regard to those individuals who exaggerate their credentials or who privately solicit business with their emails to clients. I wish there was a strict code of conduct for "industry" people on this forum. But if there was it would be completely unenforceable.

I think this thread speaks to Keith's personal philosophy about piano prep.

Each instrument is born with a unique voice. In every case that voice is compromised when the form or relationships of the individual components varies from it's intended design.

So often times this means that pianos and their owners must start a pilgrimage towards the true voice of their instrument.

It sounds like Keith is just trying to show dealers and clients alike how to shorten their journey.

Well said Alex

And Rick, re-reading my post it is a bit agressive. I hope you don't think I was jumping down your throat ... I wasn't.

20 hours of prep per piano? How does that shorten the journey? It is a great check-list of all the things that must be considered (I just passed a copy on to my technician), but is it truly reasonable and economical? Maybe for a handfull of 'top tier' grands, but for the majority of grands sold (Chinese, Japanese, Korean) it isn't.

Eric,

I don't for one second think that the way I run my business is the only way, or even the best way. You strike me as a fair guy who is a straight shooter, and I am sure that is how you run your business.

Eric,

I suppose I was implying that a fully matured piano is a piano capable of top performance.

Keith's checklist seems to serve this Idea.

A tier one piano is capable of so much more then a Chinese or Korean piano IMHO. This warrants the extra time needed to bring it to it's pinnacle.

Rick - I can hardly be accused of posting too many overly pro-dealer comments, so I think I can say that I am glad Keith started the thread. I would like some other techs or dealers to counter his view, or for both sides to quantify what the extra level of prep really means in terms of both price and performance to the average hobbyist piano player. (Is all this really necessary, and what does it cost a buyer, since Keith doesn't run a non-profit piano charity?) If that was done, this thread would be of interest to this piano player/ future grand buyer. Yes, this forum is advertising for dealers, but buyers can get a real good sense of each dealer from their posts too. (And sometimes not the sense the dealer might want.) So long as it is clear from his post that Keith sells expensive pianos with a certain level of prep in the DC area, I find no problem with his post, and would like more specific facts, on both sides.

Eric F,

I can't really say what the standard prep is since I have only worked with a small sampling of dealers. I would say with reasonable confidence that the vast majority of dealers are not putting in the kind of expense into prep as Keith is doing. But some dealers specializing in the high end certainly are and perhaps a very few are doing it to lower priced pianos are as well. Of course the prep has to be built into the price somehow, but some dealers may have the kind of reputation and rapport with customers where the customer is taught to appreciate the added value that comes with the added price.

As to the hours spent on prep, my experience is that many high end pianos actually don't need 20 hours prep to play their best. OTOH, some do leave the factory notoriously rough and definitely need it.

I do the kind of work the person paying me wants done. Sometimes there is a prep goal of achieving all that can be achieved. This might be because it is an expensive piano, or it might be prepping pianos for a trade show (NAMM) where the manufacturer wants the product to show in the best possible light. 20 hours of work can happen in either case. In fact I just spoke with someone routinely putting in 30 hours on very expensive pianos of a brand that that leave the factory quite rough. But for the price and profit margin involved with that brand, they *ought* to be prepping them so well, as unprepped they aren't performing much better than the average unprepped Chinese piano.

Other times I may be dealing with low-end pianos with shallow profits and non-musician customers concerned mostly with cosmetics and getting the lowest price possible. In such a case a dealer is worried most about competing on price and may simply pay to tune it and fix any key that is not working adequately. 20 hours of prep on such a piano would certainly kill what little profit there may be in it for the dealer, though the piano may benefit.

So there are two ends of the prep spectrum. But since the majority of pianos sold are at the low end of the price spectrum, one can draw one's own conclusions as to what happens to most pianos.

I personally would like to see more prep done more often, as too many pianos are playing below their potential due simply to lack of prep (OTOH many owners don't play and wouldn't know the difference). But it has been the culture of piano retail that the vast majority of people are buying based on price, and it seems to be a pretty deeply ingrained habit of most retailers to worry about getting the sale and not much more. However if consumers demanded better prep and performance and were willing to pay the price, the industry could change and the demand for better tech skills would raise the skill level of the average tech as well.

But consumers are unlikely to make that demand en masse. So ideally, the dealer would do the prep, and teach the customer why it is important and convince them the added price is desirable for the value given. The dealer would also prime the customer as to the continuing care and maintenance of the piano so both dealers and technicians are on the same page and consumers aren't getting conflicting info- which is currently hurting everyone. I believe in some foreign cultures it actually works that way. But these are ideals practiced by a very few in the U.S., in my experience. Instead dealers and techs are often in opposition to each other and consumers are mostly bewildered.

Regards,

Rick Clark

I'm jumping in late on this one, but here goes.

Most of the dealers I know in my area really don't want to spend much money on prep. In store tuning, fix sticky keys and other obvious problems, yadda, yadda, yadda. The sad thing about it is that most pianos will never reach anything close to their potential. Even great pianos.

I don't think most of the stores around here could afford pay a tech for 20 hours per piano. A day's work, yes, and that would be a great improvement over what we see now.

Another negative is that the customers have been trained to look for the lowest possible price, not quality of work. This does not elude dealers, though it does cut hugely into any possible spending on piano prep.

If you think about it, though, everyone profits if the pianos are dialed in before they leave the showroom: the customer gets a great piano, technicians get to do what they do, manufacturers have a fine example of what their instrument is supposed to be out in the field, and the dealer gets great exposure, as in, "hey, this plays and sound great! Who'd you buy it from?"

I'd like to see dealers offer service packages with the pianos they sell. X amount of dollars extra for Y amount of extra technician's time, post-delivery. Have any dealers out there tried anything like that?

Just my 2 cents,

Dave Stahl

Keith, thanks for posting your Basic Grand Piano Prep checklist. I find it very helpful. The term "preparation", in and of itself, is a rather nebulous. Identifying the specific steps and procedures adds clarity to the discussion. If nothing else it helps educate piano owners/buyers about the amount of work that is involved in doing a complete grand preparation.

It also highlights that there are varying levels of preparation being done. Now I understand why one recent forum participant advocated buying a piano at the lowest price obtainable. His rationale was that he could then pay his tech a rather modest sum to bring the piano up to its performance potential. Obviously, a few hundred bucks will not buy him the kind of comprehensive preparation you have laid out here.

Ax, I hope a long distance move doesn't completely undo the work I had done to my piano. Will let you know how it goes.

Rick, I think discussions like this one will help educate consumers so they can become more value oriented. I think most buyers focus mostly on selling price because it represents the single biggest expense and also because they do not know about or appreciate the other aspects of piano ownership. That's why having a discussion like this one is useful.

JP

Alex, it is refreshing to hear a dealer say that. So often the dealers around here make it appear as though their only goal in contributing is the overall betterment of mankind.

How can a buyer "tell" what level of prep has been done on a piano, other than asking the dealer (who will always say, "lots")? Are there any tell-tale differences? Between a full prep of the sort being described here, and the cheaper "tune and fix sticky keys"? What should a buyer look for? (Or know is missing, and then expect a better price?) This may be especially difficult for a buyer when trying a piano brand they are not familiar with for the first time, in a new store. PW posters frequently say, "This dealer or that dealer preps their pianos well/ not well." How to tell if this is true or not?

I think it would work with the well-informed consumer, but how many of those walk into the dealer's showroom?

Knowing what I now know, there are many pianos I would buy in the crate, given the right price, and let my tech uncrate and do the prep work in my home.

My tech would probably prefer this, since I feed well.

Thanks to the internet and sites like this, there are far more informed customers than there were a few years ago. In speaking to dealers, I've found that some see it as a problem. What they often get is customers who want the perfect piano(a mythical creature) fully prepped, at a low price.

As a sidebar to this topic, I thought you all might be interested in this. For any who are able to get to Nashville this year for the national PTG convention, I'd like to point out that there is a seminar on dealer/technician relations, and how to improve them. The focus is on working together to achieve a common goal, to keep the industry alive and thriving.

I've been assigned to call some of the dealers in the Nashville area to inform them of the dealer outreach seminar. Here's the sad news: I was given a list of 8 phone numbers that were listed in the NAMM directory as active in 1997. Of those numbers, only 2 were NOT disconnected.

In the end, we have to be concerned about this industry. Will everyone end up buying pianos on the internet and shipped directly to their doors without ANY prep whatsoever?

Dave Stahl

A large part of an honest dealer's job, is to explain to the naive customer, what prep is and which his pianos are getting.

Very few get these high levels of prep, even at NAtional shows I go to.

The pianist,once educated to this level and playing pianos at this level can in fact begin to tell a piano that is or is not well prepped. It falls under education, and we can all learn. As a Technician and pianist, I can instantly tell if a piano has been prepped (taken care of) and what it mechanical and tonal issues are. I am not a rare person for many musicians and Technicians can do this. Education, no more. But once you know, it becomes difficult to buy into lesser agendas for piano maintenance.

I have counted over 3000+ minute adjustments I make for a complete piano preparation, from 2mm down to palpable friction levels only. Pianos wear better, fuction better, run like a BMW not a HArley and will do this for much longer. Once at this level, get your (Knowledgeable) Tech to spend 30-50 minutes at every visit go over regulation and voicing. This will help insure that the piano is always up to its potential.
Sure, after 3-4 years of playing you may have to reshape hammers and redo voicing, but the benefit of this kind of prep is very long lasting.

Wow, I appreciate this thread. I was tempted to create a topic asking what constitutes "prepping" but was afraid the question would be too basic. This has answered all my questions.

I appreciate the thread that Mr. Keith started. I believe that most of the people dealer/non-dealer, technician/non-technicial, etc.) who come to the forum here are doing so because they want to be better educated about pianos. Many are (or soon will be) shopping for a piano, or have bought one in the past, and the extra knowledge can only be beneficial. It definitely is for me.

I think one point that is important to mention is the fact that like our store and some others across the country, Keith is the one prepping his own pianos. Technician based stores don't have to contract out all of their floor work. This make putting the exta time into prep more feasable. I can sympathize with Keith on this topic. We spend many hours prepping our pianos to play to their potential, but still, we will lose sales to the guy down the road who doesn't do a thing to his pianos but sell them at a cheap price. It is a harsh reality of the piano buisness that customers don't know what good prep is. Most don't even care. They would buy one out of the box if it was cheaper. We figure that if we keep doing what we are doing, eventually people will gain an appretiation for what a good, well prepped piano sounds like.