I certainly understand your frustration. It is a problem that I have seen for many years. The reality is that music stores will cater to what the public demands. I believe that there is a larger percentage of people willing to learn how to play the guitar than the piano. I have been fortunate to be able to get just about anything I want in the Portland,Oregon metro area. However, many of the smaller startup shops do not have the capital to spend tens of thousands of dollars on keyboards for their customers to demo. I don't really believe its a matter of not respecting keyboard players, I truly believe it is about the money associated with having the floor models. I would also say that the amount of floor space a good keyboard demo section takes up is very expensive as well. I would think that an owner of a store would probably calculate the net profit that every square foot of space is capable of bringing in to justify what type of product will be sold.
As I mentioned I have been fairly satisfied with the local dealers. However, when I wanted to play a Tyros 2...NOBODY !! anywhere had one. So I fired off an email to Yamaha and essentialy complained to them that all the Yamaha dealers in my area lacked the Tyros 2 in their inventory. Two days later, one of my local dealers called me up and said they had a Tyros 2 on its way to their store and I should come in and try it out as soon as it arrived.
Needless to say Yamaha managed to get ahold of my local dealer and shake things up a bit.
As Yamaha dealers they are supposed to carry the full line of product, and they were not in compliance. Anyway, they made a sale because they finally ordered one in.

I got interupted while I was typing this and have totally lost my train of thought. Oh well, that happens to me more often than I should admit.


Regards,
Dennis

[This message has been edited by TwoNuts (edited 06-14-2006).]