A couple of weekends ago, we were at Allans Music on Bourke St checking out the pianos.

I was down to the Kawai uprights (K6, K8, K35) while hubby had his eye on the baby grand.

The reason we visited was because of Allans' publicity email about their massive EOFY sale. Take 10% off RRP then another 5% off the discounted price etc. So we went in expectation of crazy ridiculous prices that might just put a Kawai within our reach finally.

When we got home, I checked around online and discovered that one retailer has all along been selling Kawai pianos at the marked-down price that Allans is trumpeting.

Minus the fuss.

Today I got another email from Allans, announcing a "EOFY stocktake clearance" because "Kawai Japan has shipped a warehouse load of fresh new pianos to Kawai Australia with the instruction to sell!" (exclamation mark theirs)

If you go to the Austral Piano World website, you'll see their pianos are marked "Don't pay $xx. Our price $yy".

A quick comparison -

Example:
K35 upright
Allans: "Now only A$8,595"
APW: "Don't Pay: $10995.00 Our Price: $8595.00"

Example:
RX2 Grand
Allans: "Now only A$24,995"
APW: "Don't Pay: $34995.00 Our Price: $24495.00" (That's $500 less than Allans, and it's not even a sale.)

In all the months I've been researching, I have yet to see a sale announcement of any kind by APW. With no mark-ups to start with, I guess there's really no need to mark down.