31st Annual
America’s Top Music Chains So, what’s new in MI retail? If our yearly report on the top chains PO P DP BO PC FA SR EK PM DJ LT IN
Piano/Organ Piano Digital Piano Band Instruments Percussion Fretted Instrument/ Amplification Sound Reinforcement/ Recording Equipment Electronic Keyboard Print Music DJ Equipment Lighting Installation
As the majority of the dealers represented in this report are privately held, in most cases data being presented in “America’s Top Chains” was supplied by the companies, themselves. In other instances, MMR made estimates based on available data. *Not including Best Buy 56 MMR
in the industry is any indication, the answer is both, “Not much” and “Quite a bit.” It all depends on whom you’re asking. Though a decent number of the folks we reached out to provided feedback on the past year and expectations for the coming months prior to the results of the presidential election, the outcome of our collective trip to the polls on November 6th was often cited as a determining factor in how the coming year would pan out. And, much like the election itself, those responses indicated a highly divided nation. For every executive who expressed concern about the Obama administration’s policies and how they’d affect the bottom line for the MI business, there was an opposing voice pointing to a recovering economy and the upsides of the nation’s current and upcoming initiatives. Piano Distributors’ William C. Boyce, Jr. nicely summarized the dichotomy by voicing worry over, “new health issues for small businesses with ‘Obamacare’,”
while simultaneously predicting a better year in 2013 due to “a better economy [that] should increase sales!” Politics aside (or somewhat aside), how’s that “economic recovery” going, anyway? Once again, it really depends on whom is being asked. Truthfully, roughly half of the individuals we heard from reported that 2012 was “much the same” as 2011, or that business had seen a “slight increase.” But there are plenty who see things in (slightly) more extreme terms. “I don’t believe there is a ‘recovery,’ nor will there be,” asserted Music Go Round’s Tim Kletti. “The economy is now what it will be.” Beth Houlihan of Kidder Music, however, feels that, “Things are starting to turn around and we’re seeing a bit of an uptick.” And then there’s Chris Syllaba of Jordan Kitt’s who offers a very positive DECEMBER 2012