VISIONARY - Music Inc. Magazine

You Outdid Yourself
Thank you so much for the
great article “Selling Personality”
that you ran on our store,
Lacefield Music, in the June 2011
issue of Music Inc.
It was so well-written you
could feel the energy of our company
leap off the page. This will
be great for our business, and we
are grateful for the opportunity.
10 I MUSIC INC. I JULY 2011
Cathy Krubsack
Owner
Lacefield Music
St. Louis
We Were Pinching
Ourselves
On the day the article “Community
Partner” came out
in the May 2011 issue of Music
Inc., I thought, “This isn’t happening.
Our store, located in the
small town of Muskogee, Okla.,
is being included in this international
publication.” I did want to
pass on two bits of information.
First off, without our amazing
and dedicated staff, our
store would not be able to have
these events and promotions. A
store’s employees have to be fully
committed to the vision and the
pursuit of growing the business.
Secondly, in the winter of
2007, we started attending
NAMM University sessions
at The NAMM Show. It has
changed every aspect of our
business for the better. We love
stealing ideas from the big guys.
Raegan Medeiros
John Michael’s Music and Sound
Muskogee, Okla.
Counterfeit Battle
IP infringement is a multifaceted
issue. In the case of D’Addario,
the counterfeiting of our strings
poses a serious long-term threat
to our brand equity.
Based primarily in China, the
counterfeiters have gotten very
good at duplicating packaging for
products like ours. Unfortunately,
they have paid more attention to
the “cover of the book” and not
the “contents.”
The quality of the strings they
put in packages with our brand
name and a made-in-the-U.S.A.
marking is grossly inferior — in
fact, defective.
As these products make
their way into markets around
the world, they could erode our
brand equity. We have already
had consumers who have purchased
counterfeit strings contact
us regarding quality issues.
This is not an isolated issue with
our strings. This is global, and
it touches every industry.
IP theft, in general, is costing
our country millions of jobs.
Recently, the International
Trade Commission published a
report on the effects of Chinese
IP infringement on the U.S.
economy and estimated that
2.1 million U.S. jobs are at stake.
A key reason the counterfeit
industry has proliferated
recently is because the Internet
has made it easy for trademark
thieves to fence their illegal
goods to consumers.
While NAMM members are
interested in a multifaceted solution
to this problem, this year
our advocacy effort focused on
garnering support for new legislation,
Protect IP, recently introduced
in the Senate. This new bill
will let prosecutors and judges
collect evidence, as they would
in any other criminal case, present
that evidence in U.S. courts
and get a warrant to shut a rogue
website’s URL down. The bill
ensures that due process is followed
and will speed and simplify
the shutting down of counterfeit
merchandise websites.
During the more than 30 visits
with congressmen and senators
we had on May 11, there
was strong bipartisan support
for our efforts.
Fly-in Feedback
Jim D’Addario
President
D’Addario & Co.
Since Summer NAMM is coming
up and I have just spent
a week with about 40 NAMM
members as part of this year’s
Advocacy Fly-In, I thought this
might be a good time to say
thanks for a job well done to
NAMM and its members.
For the past four years, I have
had the honor of being a participant
in NAMM’s annual Advocacy
Fly-In, and this year, the
energy was special and electric.
NAMM has opened this opportunity
to any and all members,
and the benefits to both the music
communities we support and the
individual members that participate
is almost unquantifiable.
It’s a good day when you
spend quality time with industry
leaders alongside national lawmakers,
discussing the importance
of supporting music education
programs and working beside Jim
D’Addario as he helps NAMM
bring attention to intellectual
property protection issues.
Menzie Pittman
Owner
Contemporary Music Center
Haymarket, Va.
EDITOR’S NOTE: MUSIC INC.
ENCOURAGES LETTERS AND
RESPONSES TO ITS STORIES.
E-MAIL LETTERS TO
EDITOR@MUSICINCMAG.COM; OR
WRITE TO 102 N. HAVEN RD.
ELMHURST, IL 60126; 630-941-2030;
FAX: 630-941-3210.