- Steinway & Sons’ sales plummet to 2,423 pianos, less than 50% compared to 1929.
- The retail price for a new Steinway & Sons Model D grand piano is $3,000.
- Trying to boost sales, Theodore E. Steinway makes a risky decision to invests $416,904 in a new nationwide advertising campaign. Instead of “immiortals”, the new ads feature a large photo of a child playing Steinway & Sons piano. The text of the ad states that a Steinway & Sons piano builds character, encourages virtues and breeds popularity.
- Despite the new advertising campaign, Steinway & Sons makes no profit, but loses money for the first time in its history. The company’s net loss is $128,000.
- Henry Ludwig Ziegler dies. Theodore E. Steinway is left without his mentor, alone at the top of Steinway & Sons’ crumbling pyramid.
- Steinway & Sons lays off 75 workers at Ditmars factory.
- The most affordable Steinway & Sons upright piano costs $875, whereas the price of Model A Ford automobile is only $435. A car is a more obvious display of social status than a piano, and most prestige-conscious Americans choose to buy a Ford rather than a Steinway, further undermining Steinway & Sons sales.
- By about this year, the Klavierschule method, pioneered by Siegmund Lebert and Ludwig Stark in 1858, is replaced by teaching techniques whereby pupils learn to play simple tunes in one hour for their own immediate enjoyment, rather than aiming to become virtuoso pianists. This makes musical education more democratic and available to wider market.
- Since 1860s till approximately this year, during the height of ivory trade, hunters yearly kill 25,000 to 100,000 elephants for their tusks. One elephant tusk yields between 50 and 55 piano keyboards.