Top Selling Musical Instruments 2018

As the year comes to a close, I like to look back at the trends of the year to obviously plan for the next year. I obviously do this for business purposes but am commonly surprised at some of the results. Most often, when you think of a music store’s “Top Selling Musical Instruments”, one would not tend to put a Bass Clarinet, Bari Sax, or Piccolo in that list! You would think it would be a flute, clarinet, trumpet, alto sax, etc… the more “common” instruments. Well, I have completed my review and like always, found some of the results really surprising to me and thus I thought: “you haven’t posted enough on the blog lately, this would make a great post!”.

First, for a little further information on this sorting:

• “Top Selling Musical Instruments” are chosen based on quantity sold through our family music store, Kessler & Sons Music
• There are 2 categories: Top Selling Musical Instruments for All Brands (includes our Kessler Custom & Solist brands) and Top Selling Musical Instruments for Major Manufacturers (excludes our own brands).
• “Major Brand” rankings are based on both our in store sales and our internet sales whereas the “All Brands” rankings will be based on our internet sales only.

 

So here it is, our Top Selling Musical Instruments for 2018!

Top Selling Musical Instruments
Major Brands Only Division

Top Selling Musical Instruments 2018, Major Brands – 5th Place
Yanagisawa T-WO1 Professional Tenor Sax
Yanagisawa saxophones are among the finest manufactured instruments on the market, regardless of brand, price or instrument type. The T-WO1 specifically offers exceptionally quick response with impeccable intonation, a rich tone and an overall free-blowing performance suitable for any level of saxophonist!
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Top Selling Musical Instruments 2018, Major Brands – 4th Place
Yamaha YCL-650 Professional Clarinet
Yamaha is of course one of the industry’s top brands offering solid instruments across every level. This year, we had a large number of the 650 clarinet purchased by schools to upgrade their clarinet sections’ performance. With an excellent scale, quick response and exceptional financial value, the Yamaha 650 clarinet is a great choice for the advancing performer!
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Top Selling Musical Instruments 2018, Major Brands – 3rd Place
Pearl Quantz 665 Flute with Brezza Headjoint and C# Trill
The Pearl 665 Quantz flute is a trusted intermediate flute. However, this particular “best seller” for us is a Custom Configured variant that includes the upgraded Brezza cut headjoint and is configured with a C# Trill & D# Roller for added value and flexibility. We have special order this configuration from Pearl to offer our customers a phenomenal value!
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Top Selling Musical Instruments 2018, Major Brands – 2nd Place
Buffet Prodige Student Clarinet
Buffet clarinets are the single most trusted brand in the clarinet market. Their new Prodige student clarinet offers a huge upgrade from the previous Buffet student model (B12) with a professional bore derived from the Buffet E13 and upgraded leather pads. While this model is not listed for sale online, it still managed to come in near the top of the list due to its in store sales performance.
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Top Selling Musical Instruments 2018, Major Brands – 1st Place
Yamaha YTR-5330MRC Mariachi Trumpet
The 2nd instrument from Yamaha in our major brand category to appear on this list is truly a remarkable offering. Released only at the beginning of this year, the new Mariachi trumpet from Yamaha sold like crazy in our local market of Las Vegas where the Mariachi programs in the schools are growing at record pace! These instruments were largely purchased in our stores by our local school district for these programs. To think that a 1st year, specialty product made our store’s #1 spot in this list is absolutely astounding and a testament to the performance quality that this horn offers to Marichi and Jazz players alike.
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Top Selling Musical Instruments
All Brands Division

The “All Brands” division was ruled by our in store brands; Kessler Custom and Solist. This is not necessarily surprising since these instruments are only available through our store and are developed with the concept of providing exceptional instruments and value. What is surprising to most people though will be the particular instruments themselves that occupy the list… For this list, I excluded the “in store” sales so that our student model sales from the typical “back to school” season didn’t skew the results.

Top Selling Musical Instruments 2018, All Brands – 5th Place
Kessler Custom Standard Series Lacquer Tenor Sax
Our Standard Series Kessler Custom tenor is one of the most amazing tenors in our store. Based on a true professional design with exceptional build quality that is higher than your typical intermediate horn, this instrument is just flat out awesome. Big rich sound, great performance throughout and an phenomenal economic value!
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Top Selling Musical Instruments 2018, All Brands – 4th Place
Kessler Custom Performance Series Lacquer Soprano Sax
Like our Standard Series tenor, the Performance Series soprano is an unbeatable value. Best of all, this soprano is a budget friendly knock out that out performs sopranos 4 times its price! The perfect offering for the sax player who wants a soprano that is solid and performs but doesn’t want to break the bank!
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Top Selling Musical Instruments 2018, All Brands – 3rd Place
Solist Low A Bari Sax
Our Solist bari sax is an unmatched beast of a horn! With a true professional Japanese bore design, wonderful build quality and a performance of instruments over 3 times its price, this bari is unreal. The demand for this horn has only continued to increase with it constantly going in to a “waiting list” status in our shop as we cannot meet the demand… to think that a Low A bari sax could be a music store’s 3rd BEST SELLING MUSICAL INSTRUMENT is unreal… but wait until you see #2 & #1!
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Top Selling Musical Instruments 2018, All Brands – 2nd Place
Kessler Custom 2nd Generation Low C Bass Clarinet
Yes, I’m serious… our Low C Bass Clarinet was our 2nd BEST selling musical instrument in 2018… and if we could have produced more, it would have EASILY been our #1 seller! The simple fact is this: our Low C Bass Clarinet is the single best value on the market for it’s instrument class. The reviews of this instrument are outstanding (thank you Michael Lowenstern!) and the demand swelled at the end of 2018 to an unreal level. At the end of the year, our “notification list” for people who wanted to know when it was back in stock went OVER 250 PEOPLE – on a Low C Bass Clarinet!!
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Top Selling Musical Instruments 2018, All Brands – 1st Place
Kessler Custom Artist Series Piccolo
Yes, a PICCOLO was our #1 Top Selling Musical Instrument in 2018. Granted, there is really good reason for this: its an awesome performance level piccolo that sells at only $549! But the reviews throughout the internet are what really drove this instrument to be #1 in this year’s list. From players posting videos on Facebook (thank you James Orlando Garcia) to reviews out online (shout out to Dr. Robert David Billington), this instrument exceeds every player’s expectations by a mile. Check it out today yourself!
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So there you have it! The top selling musical instrument models in our shop from 2018. To think that our Low C Bass Clarinet almost made it to #1 overall is mind boggling to me… but at the same time, it isn’t entirely surprising either. I have always found through the years that the instruments that offer customers the best VALUE tend to be at the top of these lists which is why the top 12 spots in our store were actually either Kessler Custom or Solist instruments – which is why I broke it down in to 2 categories.

Have a Happy New Year and I’ll catch you next year in 2019 as we celebrate our 30th Anniversary in the music business!!