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REGISTERED PIANO STEINWAY SERIAL NUMBER -STEINWAY-REGISTERED

The purchase of a Steinway-designed piano is an investment in music and an artistic musical instrument that requires general care and maintenance to ensure that it will perform to its designed specifications. To protect this valuable instrument it is important to ensure that you and your sales representative have completed, during the purchasing process, the owner’s registration card that is attached to the piano. If this has not been done, please contact your Steinway representative or seek help from a registered professional tuner/technician so that they can register you and your piano with the factory and facilitate your Owner’s/Warranty Certificate. If you are unsure whether your piano has been registered you can simply contact your local Steinway dealer representative or call Steinway & Sons factory at 718-721-2600 and ask for the owner’s registration department. A customer service representative will be happy to assist you with any questions you may have. Be sure to have your piano serial number available. The serial number can be found on the cast iron plate when you open the front top of the lid on a grand piano or the lid top on a vertical piano.

registered Steinway serial # location – grand (courtesy of Steinway & Sons)

registered Steinway serial # location – upright (courtesy of Steinway & Sons)

When Steinway & Sons receives your owner registration information from your Steinway representative for any Steinway-designed pianos you can expect the following:

Your piano and owner’s information is now registered in the Serial Number data log files. This speeds the process to take care of any issues that might arise during your warranty period.

After you and your piano are registered in the Serial Number database, your hard-copy owner/warranty document including a welcome letter will be sent to you via mail. This ensures documentation of your piano with Steinway & Sons.

When you purchase a Boston or Essex piano, a package is included with the instrument that contains the owner registration card

After your owner’s registration has been submitted to either the Boston or Essex Piano Company you will receive via mail your warranty certificate under your name, a “Welcome to Our Family” letter, and a owner’s survey form with a postage-paid return address.

You will also receive under separate cover either the Boston or Essex newsletter highlighting special events and stories.

When you purchase a Steinway piano and after the factory receives your owner registration you can expect to receive your owner’s warranty, a letter from the president, a “Welcome to the Family” maintenance / service booklet, and a survey form with a postage-paid return envelope.

All Steinway, Boston and Essex owners will also receive under separate cover the highly acclaimed Steinway Magazine which is sent only to Steinway, Boston and Essex piano owners. In this magazine you will see featured articles about Steinway & Sons and other music and music-related themes. A sample cover is shown below.

Steinway & Sons and your Steinway representative want to ensure that your piano provides you with years of joy and pleasure. Steinway is ready to assist should you have any questions or concerns.

from http://www.steinway.com/protect-your-investment/

How to buy a Steinway on line

How does the centuries-honed sophistication in design enter the new world of online shopping? Imagine going to Steinway.com and adding a piano to your cart. It may take awhile. The idiosyncrasies of the grand and baby grand pianos keep their sales transactions offline. Personal touch is key.

“Every piano sounds different to every player,” Mr. Spellman said. “So far the Web site has merely an educational tool that gives viewers information and helps with our branding. But the new search function is very helpful from a sales point of view. It helps connect possible buyers to dealers in their area.”

For example, a buyer in rural Illinois can be given information about the Steinway models that the Chicago dealer has in stock. Each city has only one dealer so as to avoid cannibalization.

In recent years the firm has added two lines of upright pianos, the Boston and the Essex, which are sold at a lower price point and made overseas in Japan and China.

Also available online is information on other piano models, technical specs, showroom details, a dealer locator, artists performing on Steinway instruments, competitions, music and interviews and even a link to Apple’s iTunes online music store.

In the future it may be possible for consumers to add a Boston Steinway to the shopping cart at Steinway.com. And the site may be used as a revenue source by selling tickets to concerts and performances for classical and popular music. The new strategy would promote concerts and festivals to the Steinway audience.

For a piano maker whose endorsements through the years include Richard Wagner, Igor Stravinsky, Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Gustav Mahler, George Gershwin and Duke Ellington, it seems a natural vehicle for music in the 21st century.

But the past matters as much to Steinway as the present, even in marketing. Consider the contest organized in 2003 for the company’s 150th anniversary. The goal was to find the oldest Steinway.

“A pair of little old ladies in Texas had the oldest one, from around the time that the factory opened in New York,” Mr. Spellman said. “The prize for the winning piano was a free restoration. Besides a little tuning, there was nothing we could do. The piano was in perfect condition.”