Piano Ezine - Why are Digital Pianos Suddenly So Expensive?

Digital pianos seem to be very expensive nowdays.
Why have digital piano prices gone up so much? Especially Yamaha and Roland digital pianos.

The main reason that digital pianos have gone up drastically in price is due to the UK digital piano suppliers making a move to protect piano retailers from the internet piano dealers.

These suppliers also prefer to have their digital pianos viewed in retails shops where the consumer can have a live demonstration from a salesman, deliver the piano to the customer's home and provide an assembly service rather than digital pianos being sold online and shipped in a box by courier to the end user.

The above scenario has been achieved by raising trade prices for dealers that sell most of their digital pianos online forcing prices up online. 

You can now find deals in the retail piano shops that are similar to the web.

Is this right or wrong?

Well for the customer, it is clearly wrong:

• They cannot buy a quality digital piano at a heavily discounted price anymore.
• Customers that like to buy online for convenience because they live a long way from their local piano shop are forced to pay more.
• The selection of digital pianos online is now greatly reduced as some of the big digital piano dealers stopped selling digital pianos online.
• Some suppliers have even banned their dealers from selling digital pianos on Ebay and other shopping comparison sites.

Who wins?

The suppliers win the most. They get to keep their products in the shops and receive a higher margin from digital pianos that are sold over the internet. The retailers that have never sold many digital pianos online can now achieve a higher price for their digital pianos than they did before.

Author
Article by Geoff Anderson - Piano specialist.

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