Straube Piano Company
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| Industry | Pianos |
|---|---|
| Founder | Williard Naramore Van Matre, Sr. William Straube |
| Headquarters | Hammond, Indiana, Downers Grove, Illinois |
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Area served
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North America |
| Products | Pianos |
The Straube Piano Company (1895–1937) and its successor Straube Pianos Inc. (1937–1949) were American piano manufacturers of uprights, grands, players, and reproducing grands.
The years 1875 to 1932 were a golden age of piano making, a time when pianos had few competitors for home entertainment. Straube manufactured pianos for the last thirty-seven of those years. Industry-wide, nearly 364,545 pianos sold in the United States at the peak in 1909, according to the National Piano Manufacturers Association. By comparison, in 2011, 41,000 were sold, along with 120,000 digital pianos and 1.1 million keyboards, according to Music Trades magazine. The Straube Piano Company had its own golden era, from about 1904 to 1935, from several perspectives. The company flourished as an innovator of player pianos, rapidly grew into a high-volume producer of premium and affordable pianos, and earned acclaim for its concert grands.
Straube Piano Company developed influential business models based on innovative management, promotion, advertising, and pricing. Its company executives and plant superintendents, particularly E.R. Jacobson (president) and William G. Betz (superintendent and inventor/innovator), were influential industry exponents who held leadership roles in industry organizations. The company produced premium pianos under the Straube name—but also manufactured Hammond, Gilmore, and Woodward brands, some of which sold at lower prices, but were still of high quality. It distributed all models nationally, and its players internationally, particularly in Australia.
The Straube Piano Company was the outgrowth of Van Matre & Straube (aka Straube & Van Matre), a partnership formalized in February 1895 by Williard Naramore Van Matre, Sr. (1851–1939), and William Straube (né Straub; 1857–1928). That same month, Van Matre and Straube leased a factory near Chicago at Downers Grove, Illinois, on the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad, at the present intersection of Warren and Forest Avenues. The original wareroom was at 24 Adams Street, Chicago.
Straube manufactured its first piano in June 1895 at that factory, which was also the factory of Van Matre & Co. W.N. Van Matre & Co. was a music dealer at 105 State Street in Rockford, Illinois. Around July 1896, Van Matre and Straube dissolved the partnership, after Straube purchased Van Matre's share. Straube continued the business under his own name.
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