I am sorry to revive this thread but I do have my opinions about the Mark guitars:
I think the failure of the Mark guitars was due to the wrong Marketing by Norlin.
they marketed the guitar to Nashville hillbillies who couldn't tell the difference between a refined instrument and a plain guitar,
they marketed them to the type of "guitar player" who can only play basic guitar chords in the first three frets.
So what can you expect from a school of thought that dictates that "Martins" must be the best guitars because someone plays a Martin at the Opry?
they also should have been marketed in New York and California, not in Nashville for heaven's sake. In 1980, music stores in
Los Angeles did not know what a Mark guitar was. I know, I was there in 1980, they had never seen one. There was no internet in 1980.
it should have been marketed as an upscale instrument, the equivalent of a fine "violin", (not a hillbilly fiddle), as a Jazz guitar,
as a "Django" kind of guitar, as a "Modern Steel String Acoustic for the discerning guitarist", as a refined guitar like Richard Schneider intended, not as a bonfire bargain guitar sold at Montgomery Ward's stores!
then, if that wasn't enough, they decided on 5 (repeat FIVE) Models of the same guitar. The old "good to best" Sears Roebuck and General Motors marketing gimmick which only led to confusion at music stores, (not to mention at the factory), and music store owners eventually said: "I ain't got time for this crap". MK-35, 53, 72, 81, 99, it was absurd! Who needed that?
had they concentrated on just ONE model of the Mark guitar, ( the "Less Is More" marketing approach), in this case the top-of-the-line model, in either Natural or Sunburst, it would have been a different scenario, because after all is said and done, the Mark 81 guitars are the best-sounding acoustic guitars ever made, second to none. Norlin spent lots of money on Research & Development, (ask Bruce Bolen), lots of time, lots of energy to design this guitar and make something really special out of it.
the Mark guitar was Richard Schneider's "baby", he was one of the 20th Century's foremost guitar designers and builders, second to nobody, some of his prototype guitars ended up in the hands of Segovia and other famous players, who would not return them once they got them on "loan", and many of his Mark guitar innovations are being copied by other luthiers even today.
The MK guitars are not "Country Music" guitars for 3-chord Opry players, they are way ahead of that for heaven's sake. Schneider knew that, but Norlin didn't.