What Do Word Association Surveys and Bobble-Heads Have in Common?

BY GEORGE QUINLAN, JR.

Popular author Daniel Pink opens his book To Sell is Human: The Surprising Truth About Moving Others with an interesting tale about Norman Hall, the last surviving Fuller Brush salesman in existence. The Last One—a genuine “old school” salesman! (If you’re not familiar with this company, we’re not surprised. The Fuller Brush Company flourished during the mid-20th century using a door-to-door sales model.) Daniel follows with a discussion about a wordassociation survey he developed entitled “What Do You Do at Work?” He posed a simple question: When you think of “sales” or “selling” what’s the first word that comes to mind? More about this later…

If you ask a typical classroom teacher, “What Do You Do at Work?” their response might be, “I teach 4th grade” or “I teach High School Spanish.” But, we realize as band and orchestra directors, you often wear many hats. You are often an emergency instrument repair technician, a fundraiser, a career or academic counselor, a motivational speaker, a logistics coordinator…and, oh, you also teach music—often all before noon on any given day!

You’ve Got a Friend in Me...

As a retailer devoted to school music service, our goal is to help make participating in band and orchestra easier for students, parents, and teachers. Recognizing the busy lives of the parents and students, we help by providing service at school on a dependable weekly basis to save them time and travel. School music dealers provide high-quality instruments at affordable rates, large selections and inventories of music and supplies, customized websites for your ensembles, and most importantly, dependable, high-quality repair service with quick turnaround all coordinated by your friendly educational representative. That person is known for being service-oriented, prompt, and having a strong musical background. Often, educational representatives become more than just our rep by sharing best practices and ideas learned from other schools in the area. They also take time to get to know your school secretaries, business office and administration personnel, custodians, and other important people in the district to navigate and facilitate the varied ordering and delivery processes for your school. It’s not uncommon for our reps to pair “like-minded” directors together to learn and share ideas based on conversations during their weekly visits. Sometimes, it’s the intangible things they do that create the most loyalty. Often, it’s just “being there”—a trusted colleague to listen when you’ve had a challenging day. We realize that our visit together might be the only adult conversation you may have the entire day!

ISO—Instrument Shaped Objects

One delicate subject we often discuss with educators relates to sub-standard, poor-quality instruments available on the market, particularly online. Often referred to as an ISO (Instrument Shaped Object), it will usually set a student up for failure when not properly monitored. Parents always want to do what is best for their child, but they need expert information to make good decisions. Teachers ARE experts at knowing which instruments perform best for students. Even first-year teachers may have twelve years experience as musicians, far more than most parents. Without proper guidance from you, parents will make decisions based on other factors like online reviews, fancy colors, or clever advertisements… not to mention a free pair of gloves! Please stress to parents that your goal is to have their child succeed in music, and their instrument is a key part of their success. The instrument must be of high quality, easily repaired, and play with

good tone and intonation. Most teachers provide suggested brands for their parents’ consideration. Without guidance from you, the expert, we cannot blame parents for making uninformed decisions.

We Want You to be Happy…

It’s true that WHERE you buy is as important as WHAT you buy. This is a common expression and is particularly relevant for musical instruments, especially for beginners. School-oriented retailers pride themselves on having top-notch, in-house repair technicians (our company employs over 50 band and orchestra technicians) to serve students in their communities. Older, high-quality instruments can always be repaired, but ISO’s frequently do not play when “new and out of the box,” have limited availability of parts, and will not “hold” the repair.

If a trusted repair technician refuses to try to repair an ISO, it is because they know the customer will be unhappy in the long run. For example, if a flute has soft keys, they are easily bent and get out of adjustment far too easily. How many times can you bend an Ab key on an ISO until it breaks off altogether?! A good technician will get the instrument in working order, but within a short time, the student will likely bend another key, and the parents will blame the technician for not doing the job properly. Knowing the parents will not be happy about the situation, many technicians prefer their dissatisfaction be directed appropriately at the seller of the ISO by explaining: “ultimately you won’t be happy with this instrument. We may get it to play today, but it will break again, and you’ll be unhappy. We don’t want you to be disappointed with our work. I’m trying to do what’s best for your child.” An astute band director once said, “Buy Nice, or Buy Twice.” Fortunately, the largest online seller has a very liberal return policy, so encourage parents to get a refund and invest it into a better instrument!

What we Practice, Improves…

As a professional educator, you will likely recruit a beginning band or orchestra class about 30 times in your career. Many of the best practices in recruiting techniques are developed by trial and error over many years. Educational representatives love sharing these great ideas. In fact, a typical educational rep will be involved with 30-40 school recruitment campaigns each year. They truly become recruiting experts! Reps are eager to share ideas about instrument demonstrations, “fitting” techniques, online and other resources, and traffic management for rental events. They become skilled at helping organize your beginner registration. Ideally, parents will get the information they need, receive the best guidance from the experts, and enjoy the convenience and efficiency of enrolling their child in music while obtaining a good instrument (typically by rental) and supplies. After all, this is the first impression parents will have about you and your program. First impressions are lasting impressions, so let’s work together to make sure it’s the best it can possibly be.

You’re not alone…

Most people involved in the school music industry once played in band or orchestra and now understand the benefits music provides for kids. As businesses, we support many organizations whose mission is to improve music opportunities for students. You may recognize NAMM (National Association of Music Merchants – Music Products Industry), NASMD (National Association of School Music Dealers), NAPBIRT (National Association of Band Instrument Repair Technicians), ASTA (American String Teachers Association), Music Achievement Council, Music for All, the Midwest Clinic, and your state and local Music Education associations like IMEA, ISSMA, etc. An entire industry is there to support you and your efforts to bring music to the next generation. Please let us know how we can help!

Back to Daniel Pink…

Based on the first-word response to “sales” or “selling,” almost every response in the word association survey was negative, with “pushy,” “annoying,” “difficult,” and “yuk” being the most common responses. In fact, the most frequent somewhat positive word to describe a salesperson was “necessary.” If this is true, why do music educators place such a high value on their relationships with their reps? Music education representatives transcend the stereotypical salesperson. Instead, they build trusting relationships with the directors they serve that often last for decades.

In fact, for several consecutive years, we ran a Facebook contest asking directors to complete this sentence—I Like my Quinlan & Fabish rep because… We were encouraged and delighted to read the heart-warming narratives and poems, listen to the songs, and view the videos paying tribute to our team of Q&F reps. The men and women on our Q&F rep team work hard to surpass your expectations to become your trusted advisor and partner in Music Education. To demonstrate and celebrate this unique “win-win” relationship, the winning directors received custom-made bobblehead dolls of themselves with their Q&F rep! l

George Quinlan, Jr. currently serves as President & CEO (and part-time 35+ year veteran educational rep) of Quinlan & Fabish Music Company, a regional chain of five retail stores serving schools in Indiana. He currently serves as Treasurer for The Midwest Clinic, Past President of the National Association of School Music Dealers, Chairman of the VanderCook College of Music Board of Trustees, a member of the Music Achievement Council, and Artspeaks204—a grassroots arts advocacy group. He has served two terms on the Board of Directors of the National Association of Music Merchants (International Music Products Association) and the South Shore Brass Band. In 2013, he and his father were recognized with the Don Johnson Music Industry Service award, and Q&F was recognized as 2014 Retailer of the Year by Music, Inc. magazine.

Quinlan & Fabish Music Co. has been recognized as one of the leading school music retailers in the United States. Q&F has made participation in band and orchestra easier for parents, students, and teachers as a trusted partner in Music Education since 1959.