510-319-7979
The Best Piano Movers in the Bay Area
Licensed and insured. Based out of Oakland California. 5 Stars on Yelp!
Firsthand Piano Moving is been proud to serve the Bay Area. We are a worker owned and operated business, and we’re committed to not only providing the best in piano moving services, but going above and beyond to ensure our customers are completely satisfied. We are located at 1721 Broadway Oakland, CA 94612.
Video Testimonial
We are a sister company to Up and Up Moving in Oakland California. Check out this video testimonial that details how we collaborated with our co-workers at Up and Up Moving. We took 5 upright pianos up 42 stairs with tight twists and turns, and no elevator at the California Jazz Conservatory in Downtown Berkeley to save them from being damaged by a flood!
Over 10 years Moving Pianos!
Who We Are
Since 2006, Brandon enjoyed being part of a team offering piano moving services. He emerged as a leader there and in early 2015 decided it was time to form a top notch team of his own. When you book Firsthand as your first plan you are making your piano move as easy as possible. Brandon and his team take the utmost care and consideration in relocating your instrument.
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510-319-7979
An example of one of our more techinical jobs
A customer had a unique request for us this past week. We had to pull out every trick in the book with this one!
The customer wanted a 5' long baby grand piano, weighing upwards of 450 pounds moved up on to a 12' tall loft area. The loft area is only accessible by an upright ladder. There was no staircases or anything going up to the loft area. Additionally, the loft is located in an apartment within an apartment complex.
The maze of hallways, narrow doorways, and tight turns, meant that no forklift, scissor lift, or any kind of crane could fit into the space. Typically, if there are stairs, we can easily use our stair climber to climb them. Otherwise, we can put to work a fork lift, scissor lift, or crane as we have done many times. Clearly, without these options, we had to come up with something new! The windows were not removable, and no windows were located anywhere near the loft where a crane could access.
We created a custom solution and used a material lift to get the piano up all the way in the air. Once we got to that point, there were a few more obstacles. The height of the loft was just over 5 feet high. The piano on its side and on a piano board is 58 inches, so there was only a few inches of overhead clearance, which prove to be too short to lift the forks up and onto the loft area to safely unload it. Instead, we had to shift the piano to the edge of the forks, which tested the forks load capacity to the fullest. Then we had to bridge the gap from the forks to the edge of the loft by sliding it over - a very risky move! Besides that, we barely cleared an overhead vent pipe by 2" inches which you can see.
This took a lot of careful planning, research, strength and coordination. But we did it!