Decades later, a customer reaches out to share what their piano, and the experience buying it, meant to their family.

This past July, I woke one Sunday morning to find a text from my son’s future father-in-law, Bill.

“Do you know a Zeb Billings?”

“I did. He was my grandfather,” I replied.

As we went back and forth, he explained that his father-in-law was telling a story about the guy he bought his piano from many years before.

“Good old Zeb Billings,” he said.

“I said to my wife, I wonder if that’s relation to the Billings we know,” Bill explained. “The world just keeps getting smaller.”

“That could have been close to seventy years ago,” I said.

“Well, he made an impression on my father-in-law!”

It still happens when I visit Milwaukee. Servers will notice the name and tell me about visiting my family’s piano store when they were a kid. It’s rare that I attend an industry meeting without someone seeking me out to share how one of them “made all the difference in the world” to their career. I’ve heard countless stories from Zeb’s former employees about what an amazing experience working with him was.

“He fired me,” I’ve been told at least twice. “And I deserved it. Put me on the path to build a successful career.” I confirmed that neither of them were kidding.

As we walked through the doors of the Nashville Convention Center for the trade show some years back, my wife half-joked, “I wonder how long you’ll make it until someone stops to tell you a story about your family.”

It took about 15 seconds. Not quite 100 feet from the door.

A truly wonderful legacy

Last week, I received an unexpected email that added another dimension to that legacy.

“Greg assisted my wife and I in the purchase of a piano in March of 1986,” Carl Strandt began.

1986? As in, the Reagan administration, Members Only jackets, and 55 mph speed limits?

When this family purchased their piano from my dad, there were no smartphones (they were dumb and stuck on the wall). We listened to cassette tapes when we drove to our local video store to rent VHS tapes. The first Blockbuster wouldn’t open for another five months. We were always reminded to “Be Kind… Rewind.” (or face a $4 fine.)

AOL was barely a year old. Oprah made her national debut. Halley’s Comet flew by. Phantom of the Opera debuted in London’s West End. An eccentric businessman broke the record for fastest crossing of the Atlantic on the Virgin Challenger II… his name was Richard Branson.

If you missed Family Ties, Cheers, Moonlighting, or Matlock, you were out of luck until summer reruns.

At the cutting edge of technology, the Macintosh Plus computer shipped with 1 MB of ram for $2,599. You could buy a share of Apple stock for $0.14. Six shares of Apple stock could buy a gallon of gas. A five-pound bag of potatoes cost a buck.

Although we can no longer buy a Pontiac, fly on a Concorde, or watch a Space Shuttle landing, the Strandt family is still playing their piano.

“This piano is still going strong,” Carl Strandt tells us. “It was used to train my wife and eventually our seven children in music and piano and is now beginning to be used for my grandchildren’s piano training.”

When my father and I collaborated on an article about multi-generational music businesses in 2010, it became more apparent to both of us just how special they are. Hearing from families like the Strandt’s is the perfect illustration of that.

“Meeting these families, helping them find the right piano, and watching them grow with it was the essence of my career,” Greg Billings said while basking in retirement. “Messages like this one always warm my heart.”

I’m incredibly proud of my family’s reputation in our industry, both from those who work in it and those who’s lives are enhanced by it.

Sometimes, on those particularly long days that I spent under (or inside) a piano, I wonder if I’m nuts. Then, an email comes along like this one… and I’m reminded that this labor of love handed down by the generations before me is totally worth it.

Tonight I might microwave some Pop Secret popcorn, watch Top Gun, and toast the Strandt’s with a Bartles & James wine cooler.

Just one, though. I have to work tomorrow.