Brighton Music Center Owners on Their Journey Toward Becoming 2025 NAMM Dealer of the Year
Richard Schiemer got his phone out to call his co-owner, Brad Wittmer, from the Dealer Awards at The 2025 NAMM Show. He wanted to immediately deliver the news that their Pennsylvania-based music store, Brighton Music Center, had just won the Best in Customer Service category.
On the other side of the line, Wittmer was floored, overjoyed with tears. But the emotional roller coaster ride wasn’t over yet. About 35 minutes later, Wittmer got a second call.
“Hey, you’ll never believe this,” said Schiemer, “We are actually the Dealer of the Year.”
“I was like, dude, quit pulling my leg!” said Wittmer, as he recounted the surreal moment. “Richard sent me a picture of the award, and I literally broke down. My wife and my kids were in the room, and we all were hugging and jumping and screaming.”
Schiemer and Wittmer started off as Brighton Music Center sales associates. In 2011, the family-owned business decided to sell, and both men wanted to carry on the store’s legacy.
Schiemer, a vocal major in college and a trombone, tuba and keyboard musician, and Wittmer, a percussionist, bass drum and trombone player as well as pro DJ and live sound engineer, decided to take a leap of faith and purchase the business. A combination of working on the business and in the surrounding community led to their store becoming a source of rich musical education, and their winning the 2025 NAMM Dealer of the Year award.
Build Up Your Community and Growth Will Follow
When they first purchased the business, Brighton Music Center’s owners focused on growing their two stores — one in New Brighton and one in Pittsburgh. They worked on getting the right product into their stores, but perhaps more importantly, they began building more connections with music teachers and schools.
“I think the biggest and foremost thing was just making sure that every teacher and school district knew they had someone to rely on and call out to,” said Wittmer. “Too many of our schools did not have that direction.”
At first, the owners thought they may not be able to handle a larger number of schools, but they pushed past the doubt.
Brighton Music Center began to sponsor events and provide guidance for school programs and education for teachers. The music store hosted events like Clarinet Day, where beginner students could get hands-on with the highest quality instruments, and provided a repair technician to tune up instruments for student concert days.
The store owners blew the socks off local teachers when they brought in the Dave Matthews Band’s saxophonist, Jeff Coffin, to perform at schools and provide pro musician pointers to advanced music students.
Over time, Schiemer and Wittmer noticed that their multifaceted efforts began to produce results. The teacher referrals started coming in, business with schools started ramping up, and more students were entering their lesson program.
“When we started to reach out and do more in the community, people were like, man, these guys aren’t here to sell us stuff — they’re here to help music education and music performance grow,” said Wittmer. “I’d rather be the helping hand and see the reciprocation of business afterwards, than to try to force business.”
Learn, Practice Awesome Values, Repeat
One aspect of the business Schiemer takes pride in is that most of his staff have been working at Brighton Music Center for 7 years or longer. What are some of the factors that make the music retailer a great place to work?
For starters, the owners empower their employees with product knowledge by providing access to online and in-store manufacturer training.
“Buffet Crampon is really effective, and Yamaha is great at it too,” said Schiemer.
One of the best training sessions was Maple Leaf String’s intensive violin series. Over seven weeks, the rep gave Brighton Music Center’s staff deep insights into violins — how student violins are crafted differently from master violins, and the characteristics of various strings and bows. The staff were encouraged to toss violins back and forth to each other to learn that the instruments are not as fragile as people think.
“This training transformed our orchestra sales,” said Schiemer. “I have one person on staff who’s a violinist. The rest of us are guitar players, brass players and loop players, and violins are a different animal. Being able to talk to violin customers in the way that they understand has increased our orchestra sales by about 50%.”
Employee training also includes short online activities or in-person team discussions about Brighton Music Center’s fundamental values that shape interactions with colleagues and customers. Schiemer and Wittmer adopted the CultureWise software platform as their strategy for creating awareness of their values and building a consistent culture across stores.
“Our goal is to open another store,” said Schiemer, “but if your culture is different between your locations, then your customers are not going to have the same experience. We worked with CultureWise to set up these fundamentals that we now teach daily.”
The fundamentals include statements like, “do the right thing, always,” “keep things fun” and “think and act like an owner.” Schiemer described them as things that simply “make sense,” and keeping them on his staff’s radar helps with building a stronger commitment to customers, and to each other.
Good Comes Back to You
Because of these efforts and more, Brighton Music Center was recognized by industry peers as the 2025 NAMM Dealer of the Year — an honor that the owners, their employees and families cherish and take pride in.
“To be recognized with juggernauts of the industry that I look up to, and to be considered the best of the best, was something that I just won’t ever forget,” said Schiemer.
What insights do they have to offer other music retail business owners?
“I guess the biggest thing would be, listen to your community,” said Wittmer. “Listen to those teachers and to those students. Don’t dismiss the words they’re saying and what those needs are. I would encourage everybody to look deep in their own communities.”
Schiemer said, “My thing is, you put good out in the world, good comes back to you.”
The NAMM Dealer Awards Category Winners
Here’s the full list of NAMM’s Dealer Awards winners recognized at The 2025 NAMM Show:
2025 Dealer of the Year — Brighton Music Center | New Brighton, Pennsylvania
Best Community Retail Store — Elefante Music | New Providence, New Jersey
Best Store Design — Music Bliss | Petaling Jaya, Malaysia
Best Online Engagement — Instrumental Music Center | Tucson, Arizona
Best Customer Service — Brighton Music Center | New Brighton, Pennsylvania
Music Makes a Difference Award — Zeswitz Music | Reading, Pennsylvania
Best Marketing and Sales Promotion — Five Star Guitars | Beaverton, Oregon
Innovation Award — Chuck Levins Washington Music Center | Wheaton, Maryland
Visit our NAMM Dealer Awards page to learn about the program, watch the awards or view a list of the 2025 Top 100 Dealers.
About the Author
Jessica A. Baris is a writer on the marketing team at NAMM and editor of Playback Blog. She shares member stories, covers The NAMM Show and collaborates with industry experts to create content that educates and informs NAMM members. Baris leads a musical life as a Latin dancer, growing singer and player of instruments, including castanets, clave and tongue drum.