Before you buy, make sure of all these things before you lay down any money. If the shop doesn't have facilities, and something goes wrong with it after the return period has expired, and you can be sure something will go wrong, and that bargain you bought won't be such a bargain.

If the store has repair facilities, even if you buy some cheap Chinese horn, at least they can service it. It's important that the store or service you buy your saxophone from can back their instruments with a good return policy and warranty that covers repairs at least in the first few months. This works if the business in question has an on-site repair department that can adjust the horns before they go out, and also maintain them after they are purchased. Usually large retail stores will create a store brand in order to offer a cheaper option for students and players on a budget. Proprietary brands are instruments made by a manufacturers, usually in Taiwan or China, for a retail store, repair shop or mail order/internet dealers with either the dealer's name or a 'brand' name which is exclusive to that business. When a beginner's parents or the beginner themselves buy that kind of horn, because it's cheap and it's 'good enough to learn on', they end up frustrated and think that they are not any good, not considering that it's the saxophone itself that keeps the beginner from making any progress. This often leads to sometimes being ripped-off by a shady dealer, or in most cases buying an inferior instrument that is badly constructed, has shoddy keywork, simply won't play in tune no matter what you do.

Most beginners really don't know that much about saxophones when they're starting out, and to see so many 'names' and types being sold new and used all over the internet can be confusing. If you look through eBay's listings, you'll see a glut of saxophones with lots of different names, and very often, they don't even give you a name, just advertise it as 'gold lacquer alto, tenor saxophone', etc., You look at the price, it looks good, and you may think, it's cheap enough and it looks good in all the pictures, so I'll get this for my kid or for myself because it's good enough to learn on. The most frequently asked questions I get from readers of my blog are usually from beginners wanting to know 'if so and so or such and such saxophones are any good, they were advertised on eBay or I saw one in my local music store and the price was right', etc.

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