Re: [Harp-L] shark tank - harmonica promotion

[Ronnie Schreiber <autothreads@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Vern,

By the same token, walk into any music store and you'll see that they 
have at least as small display of harmonicas and usually carry at least 
a couple of brands, most often Hohner and Lee Oskar. Guitar Center 
stores have small kiosks that have harps from both of those companies as 
well as Seydel. While it pales next to the floor space given to guitars, 
basses and drums, it still demonstrates that there's a market. I think 
it was Richard Hunter who said that 41 million Americans have at least 
tried to play the harmonica. Let's say you came up with some kind of 
foolproof instruction method, something that you could teach to the 
Sharks in the Shark Tank during your pitch, that 41 million figure then 
becomes significant.

I agree with you about harmonica players being rather set in their ways. 
Peter Madcat Ruth told me that new harmonica ideas are a hard sell 
because harmonica players tend to be resistant to change.

I do think that the fact that harp players are used to spending 
relatively little on their instruments is not entirely accurate and what 
is accurate about it may present an opportunity to sell them stuff. Yes, 
a pro quality diatonic is just $40 compared to, let's say, a Mexican 
built Fender Stratocaster, that I think costs about $400. However, how 
many serious harp players have less than a dozen harps? Six is the bare 
minimum you need for the most popular musical keys. I've seen harp cases 
with almost 50 harmonicas. Fifty times $40 will buy you a couple of U.S. 
built Fenders along with a Mexican Strat. Also, if there's a chromatic 
or two in the case, the investment just went up significantly.

And then there are microphones, which typically go for $100 a pop or 
more. So harp players do spend money but one could argue that they have 
limited opportunities to spend money. There just aren't a whole lot of 
harmonica accessories and gizmos compared to what you can buy for a 
guitar. So maybe there's some pent up demand.

Ronnie Schreiber

On 11/24/2014 8:36 PM, harp-l-request@xxxxxxxxxx wrote:
> Even if you could sell a widget to every harmonica player, that isn’t a big enough market to interest a shark.  There are more guitar players by orders of magnitude. Harmonica players are accustomed to paying relatively little for their instruments and expect the accessories to be equally inexpensive.  Walk in your local music store and see how much inventory and floorspace is dedicated to harmonicas.
>
> Vern
>