InsideHailunPiano

One Chinese Manufacturers Unorthodox Global

Approach To Achieving Superlative Quality

On the Saturday before the opening of the MusicChina Fair in Shanghai, a multinational team ofpiano designers is crowded around a hand-carved piano at the Hailun Piano factory inNingbo, 175 miles to the south. The special edi-

tion concert grand with its images of Chinese landscapescarved in rosewood will be the centerpiece of Hailun’s exhib-it at the show. Voicing specialist Sibin Zlatkovic is making hisfinal adjustments to its exposed strings while the rest of theteam looks on. “We did this kind of work at Bösendorfer,”says Basilios Strmec, an Austrian who is now president ofHailun USA. “This is gorgeous, all hand-carved. It took 19months to build.”The showpiece piano represents a first step into the luxury

market for Hailun, whose mid-priced pianos have taken holdthroughout North America and Europe as well in as in thedomestic Chinese market. Last year the brand received world-wide exposure in the form of a red lacquered grand piano builtfor ceremonies in the run-up to the Beijing Olympic Games.Behind the scenes, Hailun’s team of artistic and technical

experts is as international as its aspirations. In China for theupcoming trade show, along with Strmec, are American FrankEmerson, Austrian Peter Veletzky, and Zlatkovic, a Serbian.Emerson, who designed pianos for Baldwin and later forMason & Hamlin, is a recipient of the Friendship Medal, thehighest honor presented by the Chinese government to for-eigners who have made outstanding contributions to China’seconomic and social progress. Veletzky, the owner of Austrian

MUSIC TRADES FEBRUARY 2010

HailunPianoAnd TheQuest ForQualityHindered in the domestic Chinese market by

peculiar tax laws, Hailun was forced to build a

better product or perish. This tough lesson has

served the company well as it expands its global

presence.

REPORT FROM CHINA

MUSIC TRADES FEBRUARY 2010

piano maker Wendl & Lung, is Hailun’s senior technical advi-sor and directs the distribution of Hailun in the European mar-ket. Zlatkovic, also of Wendl & Lung, is Hailun’s director ofvoicing and tuning and instructor to the company’s team ofvoicers at the factory in Ningbo.In about two days the whole team will make the road trip to

Music China over the newly constructed Hangzhou BayBridge, which has reduced the travel time between Ningboand Shanghai from a circuitous four hours to a straight shot oftwo-and-a-half. It’s just one example of a rapid modernizationthat touches everything from China’s infrastructure to itseconomy and the lifestyle of its people.Middle aged Chinese people can remember being taught as

children about the evils of capitalism, Western culture, and all

of its trappings, including classical music. Today, knowledgeand appreciation of classical music is regarded as a mark ofsophistication. As in Western countries, ownership of a high-caliber piano—even among those who don’t play—is consid-ered a status symbol. “Twenty or 25 years ago, there probablywasn’t a piano in the city of Ningbo,” says Emerson. “Andnow we’re building them by the hundreds.”The explosion of China’s middle class, usually estimated

between 200 and 300 million, has made China the fastest-growing market for Hailun, whose domestic sales have risen40% in two years. Moreover, market research shows thatChinese people, particularly the younger generation, aren’tjust able to buy more things—they have higher expectationsfor the products they purchase than ever before. “There’s a

Hailun Piano’s Ningbo factory produces 8,000 pianos per year for the explodingChinese domestic market as well as export markets around the world.

different turn in Chinese perceptionsand values,” says Strmec. “They haveawakened to the idea of quality.”The history of the Hailun Piano

Company will illustrate how circum-stances pushed the company to marketits pianos on quality rather than price.Founder Hailun Chen, who came from abackground in tool manufacturing,started the company in 1987 as a partsmanufacturer for other piano makers.When Hailun shifted into piano produc-tion in 2002, it built its first pianos forexport only to avoid the tax penaltyimposed by the Chinese government onprivate businesses competing with gov-

ernment-owned companies in theChinese domestic market. Later thecompany did introduce its pianos to thedomestic market, but the embedded costof the tax would make it impossible tocompete with other Chinese-madepianos on price alone. “Hailun had tobuild a higher-quality piano to justifythe higher price,” says Emerson. “Thisgave them even more incentive to pro-duce the best product they could.”Once established as a piano maker,

Hailun dedicated a $44 million capitaloutlay toward equipping its 430,000-square-foot factory with custom-designed CNC machinery. A rigorousapprenticeship program was estab-lished, recruiting 40 engineering stu-dents per year from the Ningbo Instituteof Technology. Only the top three areoffered permanent jobs. All Hailunworkers are trained for at least oneyear—four years for those involved intuning and voicing—before beingallowed to work on pianos headed forthe market. They are paid 25% morethan the average Chinese factory work-er. “We want to ensure that what wesend out is a product of integrity, that

MUSIC TRADES FEBRUARY 2010

“Our pianos are mutts. On the

Chinese side they reflect

considerable investment in

machinery and people. BUT

THE GENIUS BEHIND

THEM is also American,

Austrian, French—it’s the best

ideas come together.”

A Hailun worker installs actions at the company’s Ningbo factory. All Hailunemployees are trained for at least a year before being permitted to worked onpianos destined for the market.

A worker sands cases at Hailun’s case factory, a separate company-owned opera-tion outside of Beilun, a suburb of Ningbo.

there’s quality behind it,” says Strmec.Four years ago, Strmec was vice president for U.S. market-

ing and sales for Bösendorfer, whose exclusive reputation isbuilt on its annual production of 400 and retail prices of$120,000 and more. Hailun, with its annual production of8,000 and typical price points between$10,000 and $20,000, demands a differ-ent mindset, but some of the principlesstill apply.“Bösendorfer continues to survive and

command prices of $120,000 and$130,000 because they do not cut cor-ners,” says Strmec. “We can’t compro-mise on little things to make our pianostwo dollars cheaper. If you’re trained inthe mentality that people value quality,you’ll have the courage to go out on themarket and say, ‘This is quality—try itand see for yourself,’ instead of apolo-gizing for the price.”Indicating a soundboard in production on the factory floor, he

says, “Do you see the grain of the wood, how the rings areclose together? A good soundboard has very close-togetherrings—that means the wood has grown very slowly and hasgreater resonance.” Later, in a room of finished pianos due fortransport to the Music China Fair, he points out the character-istic texture of the genuine ebony keys on one of Hailun’shigher-end grands. “It’s a little bit rougher; it gives the pianista better grip,” he says.

On this trip to the factory in Ningbo, Hailun’s design team isrefining its newest high-end feature, the inclusion of asostenuto pedal on two upright models, the HU 6 and HU 7,due to be presented at the winter NAMM show. By incorpo-rating the sostenuto, considered a feature for the professional

market, the designers aim to match therange of expression found in a fineEuropean instrument. “It’s the mark of ahigh-end piano,” says Emerson. “If youwant to be counted among that class ofpiano, you have to have it.”As a Chinese manufacturer, Hailun

faces the preconceptions of consumers inthe West, where Chinese products some-times carry associations with productrecalls and quality-control snafus. Evenwithin the music products industry,Hailun fights the perception that thelower cost of Chinese-made products

indicates shoddy workmanship more than the lower cost ofdoing business in China. Zlatkovic counters, “If I were tobuild the same piano in Boston or Vienna, it would have tocost three to four times more because of the cost of the elec-tricity, the real estate, the insurance, etc. Everything would bemore expensive. By building it in China, I can sell it as a lessexpensive piano, but that doesn’t make it a lower-qualitypiano.”Strmec says, “It’s a shame that the word ‘Chinese’ should be

associated with poor quality. We want to change that percep-

MUSIC TRADES FEBRUARY 2010

“We can’t compromise on little

things TO MAKE OUR

PIANOS TWO DOLLARS

CHEAPER. People value qual-

ity. You need the courage to say,

‘This is quality—try it and see

for yourself,’ instead of apolo-

gizing for the price.”

Gathered around Hailun’s hand-carved Dreams of the East piano are Hailun Chen, founder and chairman; Peter Veletzky, sen-ior technical advisor; May Wang, vice president of sales; Sibin Zlatkovic, director of voicing and tuning; Frank Emerson, chiefscale designer and lead engineer; and Basilios Strmec, president Hailun USA.

MUSIC TRADES FEBRUARY 2010

tion to reflect the tremendous history ofthis country and the integrity behind ourproduct.”Considering, incidentally, the range of

multinational influences behind Hailunpianos, it’s fair to pose the question ofwhether they should be consideredChinese instruments at all. “What is theword President Obama used to describehimself during the election?” saysStrmec. “Our pianos are mutts. On theChinese side they reflect considerableingenuity and investment in bothmachinery and people. But the geniusbehind them is also American, isAustrian, is French—it’s the best ideascoming together.”

A FAMILY BUSINESSHailun personnel say the company is

very much a family business. Severalmembers of the upper level manage-ment are related to Hailun Chen, includ-ing his cousin May Wang, who is vicepresident of sales to the U.S. market andalso serves as primary translator amongthe Chinese personnel and visitingexperts from the Europe and the U.S.But those who have worked there forany length of time say the sense of fam-ily extends to the entire team—evenforeigners—to a degree that’s unusualfor China, where close friendships andcasual socializing among colleagues isless common than in the U.S. For lunchat the factory, Hailun executives andvisiting designers eat family style at around table, where at least three lan-guages are often spoken at once butcommunication proceeds with surpris-ing fluency. After a round of cards witha group of Hailun factory employees,Strmec says, “At what other companywould a guy who works in the factorybe allowed to win money from the pres-ident of the U.S. branch of the compa-ny? Other companies try to create thatcamaraderie, but they keep it at arm’slength. There’s none of that here. Thereis a unique skill that Mr. Chen brings tothis company that has nothing to dowith building pianos and everything todo with building positive internationalrelationships.”Because there’s no global consensus

on what a piano ought to sound like,Hailun builds and voices its variousmodels according to the tastes of themarkets they’re destined for. Zlatkoviccan deliver a scholarly synopsis of voic-ing preferences around the world, fromthe delicate tone favored by theEuropeans to the bolder tastes of theAmericans. Time, too, has altered over-all norms in voicing. Zlatkovic will tellyou that trends in piano voicing, whichran to the warn and mellow during the1920s and ’30s and shifted to favor aharsher, stronger sound through the lat-ter part of the 20th century, have comefull circle in the early part of the 21stcentury. “If you transported a pianistfrom 30 years ago and had him play onone of the mellower-sounding pianoswe’re voicing today, he wouldn’t like itbecause he wouldn’t think it soundedaggressive enough,” says Zlatkovic.More an art than a science, voicing is

said to be one of the most difficult con-cepts to impart to students of the trade.Compounding the challenge forZlatkovic and his trainees is the lostknowledge that comes from China’slong prohibition on Western music andculture. “What I can’t give my voicingstudents is my experience of all theother instruments I have in my mentallibrary,” says Zlatkovic. “They have thetalent, but they don’t have the same cul-tural reference point as we have in theWest. That’s why they welcome theexpertise we can bring them from theU.S. and Europe, where the piano tradi-tion has existed for so long.”

THE EUROPEAN STRATEGYWith a 300-year legacy in piano build-

ing, the European markets present spe-cial challenges for a new, foreign-madepiano. Hailun’s European strategy reliesheavily on its association with Wendl &Lung, the century-old Viennese pianomanufacturer now owned by PeterVeletzky. Veletzky, who at the age of 22became Austria’s youngest master pianobuilder, represents the fourth generationof his family to head the company.Since forming a partnership with Hailunin 2003, Veletzky has overseen the dis-tribution of Hailun pianos in Europe,

where they are sold under the Wendl &Lung name. “Peter’s participation hascreated a lot of credibility for us, both inEurope and in other parts of the world,”says Strmec.In Europe, as in North America, the

repercussions of the economic crisishave created an opening for a mid-priced piano modeled after theEuropean tradition in fine piano mak-ing. “With our products that offer a lotof value at a very modest price, we arebetter positioned in this economic cli-mate than many European manufactur-ers,” says Veletzky. “I say that with botha smile and a tear: a smile, becausewe’ve done well in Europe, very well,and a tear for the European piano indus-try, which in large part is suffering.”

THE FUTURE OF HAILUN PIANOAfter the Music China Fair, Hailun’s

hand-carved concert grand, calledDreams of the East, sold to a Chinesebusinessman for approximately$347,000. Following the blockbustersale, Hailun plans tentatively to craft asimilar piano for the 2011 winterNAMM show, and eventually to buildup to 50 such instruments each year forthe luxury market. But within its pri-mary mid-priced niche, Hailun main-tains its focus on building what manysay is the missing piece for some ofChina’s most promising companies: abrand that commands recognition andrespect in the West. A sleek new HailunPiano website, tailored to the U.S. mar-ket, was scheduled to launch around thefirst of the year. On other fronts, Hailunis pursuing artist endorsements to matchfaces and sounds with the Hailun name.“Ultimately, Hailun wants to serve thestages of concert halls and recordingstudios with instruments worthy ofmusicians and music connoisseurs ofevery musical persuasion,” says Strmec.“My conviction is that a brand consti-tutes a promise that is consistently ful-filled to its customers. For Hailun todevelop into a brand that followsthrough on that promise would be mygreatest source of pride.”

www.hailun-pianos.com

HAILUN PIANO