Piano seller exhibits retail virtuosity

San Francisco Business Times - June 28, 1996

http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/stories/1996/07/01/smallb2.html

by Clifford Carlsen

When he was 13, William Donald Bellville went to work doing odd jobs after school and on weekends at Marin Piano & Organ, a San Rafael retail business founded in 1961 by Al Gehl.

"If you work real hard and learn the business, maybe you'll own the company some day," the sales manager told him, no doubt in jest.

Bellville worked part-time for three years and then left to take a restaurant job and get his high school diploma. When he was 18, he dropped in at the store and discovered the company was looking for a salesperson.

"I took a straight commission job, and after three months, I was making two to three times what I had at the restaurant," he said.

Three years later, he was named sales manager. One day Gehl handed Bellville a business broker's card and said, "I'm retiring. You have three weeks to buy the store, or I'm selling to a competitor."

Bellville scraped together $50,000 from a home equity loan and $6,000 in personal savings to make the down payment. Gehl carried the balance, about $150,000.

On May 1, 1990, Bellville went from employee to owner. The business had about $500,000 in revenue, one employee and $2,200 in a checking account.

"I was beside myself -- not with stress, but with enthusiasm," he said.

The first month after Bellville bought the business was the best in Marin Piano & Organ's history. "I found myself with $30,000 to $40,000 net profit. I had instant cash flow." However, the piano market had been declining since 1982, and Bellville had to find ways to counter the industry's downward trend.

"I had lots of ideas and energy," he said, and he started making changes right away.

He brought in a new line of pianos from Germany and added a sheet music department. "The sheet music isn't really a profit center," he said, "but it brings an extra hundred people a week into the store." Bellville also added a rebuilding and repair facility and a piano lesson program for children and adults. He got out of the organ business and replaced it with digital pianos.

Two years ago he launched Bellville & Sons, a wholesale business with a warehouse and showroom in Santa Rosa. At the time Marin Piano & Organ was doing a brisk business in Russian-made J. Becker pianos, and Bellville struck a deal to distribute them. A year later he added a line of Brazilian pianos. To finance the wholesale operation he used $60,000 from the retail business, a $100,000 SBA loan and a $100,000 credit line from Wells Fargo Bank. As a retailer himself, Bellville has a competitive edge with retail customers. He can relate to their problems and needs.

"We're the only distributor coming from a retail background, and our customers love it," he said.

Revenues have increased more than threefold since Bellville bought the business, to $1.8 million last year, and he is projecting wholesale and retail volume of about $3.7 million for 1996.

As Marin Piano & Organ grew, Bellville struggled to balance the demands of a burgeoning business and his desire to spend time with his wife and kids. He learned the classic lesson of entrepreneurship.

"You can't do it all yourself," he said.

He hired a bookkeeper and a sales manager.

"Without them, I couldn't have started the wholesale business," he said.

Marin Piano & Organ now has seven full-time employees and about 10 independent contractors who work for the company on a regular basis. And Bellville has more time with his family.

"It took me a long time to figure it out, but you can have a successful business and a family life," he said. "And after all, what is one without the other?"