Today it was announced that Harrods piano department is to close. There are simply not enough people who regard a piano as an essential feature of the home these days. Or, more likely, not enough who have the room for one.
How things have changed. I cherish a story from long ago, in the days before plastic cards, bar codes & computerised stock control, when to be an Account Customer of the famous Knightsbridge store was a mark of your status & social standing, & all the bills were written out by hand.
One year, when the time for the annual stock taking came round, the Music Department found that it was short of a grand piano (worth about £10,000 in those days).
Well, they reasoned, obviously it must have gone to an account customer & the paperwork has been mislaid. We know our customers; there are only about 15 who might have bought a grand piano. So we’ll send each of them a bill. Whoever has the piano will pay up, & we will apologise fulsomely to the rest.
Three customers settled the bill without a murmur of complaint.
Links
The Piano Shopper
End of civilisation: Harrods shuts piano showroom
