Allenjason95 Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/LPSPL11205?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=dynamic&&utm_content=3648Sept17push&utm_term=dtnf-carousel Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rabs Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 Ha.. Well they only have to sell it to one sucker at that price and that's like four normal sales to more sensible people. I can sort of see where they are coming from... Sorta... (it must have hide glue, that would explain it) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Allenjason95 Posted December 13, 2017 Author Share Posted December 13, 2017 Ha.. Well they only have to sell it to one sucker at that price and that's like four normal sales to more sensible people. I can sort of see where they are coming from... Sorta... (it must have hide glue, that would explain it) Look man, I always defend Gibson when people knock the quality of the guitars or the specialness of the guitars. I own 6 Gibson’s and have owned 2 others in the past.....but 4,000 for a Special is just absurd. It’s no wonder Gibson’s rep has taken such a hit and a lot of people think they’re just scamming people. That’s just pure 100% greed right there. I looked the whole ad over trying to figure out why it’s that price and other than it says “custom shop” on it I couldn’t find any. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rabs Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 Look man, I always defend Gibson when people knock the quality of the guitars or the specialness of the guitars. I own 6 Gibsons and have owned 2 others in the past.....but 4,000 for a Special is just absurd. Its no wonder Gibsons rep has taken such a hit and a lot of people think theyre just scamming people. Thats just pure 100% greed right there. I looked the whole ad over trying to figure out why its that price and other than it says custom shop on it I couldnt find any. Well the problem is, is that these sort of guitars seem to sell.. Theres a bunch of people out there with more money than sense who will buy it cos its expensive or maybe it just happens to be their dream guitar.. I don't get it either but hey, if someone wants it and can afford it, that's no big deal to me.. Silly, yes, VERY silly.. But as long as they have the cheaper options too why should we care? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JayinLA Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 Obviously I love Gibson. I remember in my teenage years just wishing I could afford a Les Paul. It gave me a real sense of accomplishment when I was able to buy a couple of my own. I maintain that Gibson should work harder to bring some more pro-quality guitars to market <$1000. As a player, I have some real nice choices of guitars at or below $1000. With these incredible CNC machines able to cut great guitars, there are brands who have figured out how to get incredible instruments in players' hands for <$1000. Gibson has a few, but they're always a stripped down, no frills instrument. One of my bandmates picked up an Alex Lifeson and paid $3k for it. It's a great guitar with a piezo and Floyd Rose, and I admit I am jealous. But 3G's is completely out of reach for most working musicians who between gigs are doing laundry with couch money. Gibson should work harder to embrace the common man player. Keep the premium stuff premium price, but put a 335 out there that I can afford. JMO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Karloff Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 yea, but it's red. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
'Scales Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 I can't see the problem - you can buy a Les Paul Special waaaay cheaper than that if you want, and similarly people who want that one and are prepared to pay the price have that option too (and they come is several colours). If they didn't make the $1200 version then they'd probably be kidding themselves, but as they do...cool. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rct Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 Gibson's sales are down? rct Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
'Scales Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 Gibson's sales are down? rct could be. Stuff I've read suggests it happened to 'em back in 1959 as well....or that might have just been a bad year? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
american cheez Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 it never ceases to amaze me. the sheer number of people who don't even know they are affected by marketing. hans christian anderson wote about this all the way back in 1837. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Emperor%27s_New_Clothes mark twain said "it is harder to convince people of the truth, than it is to fool them." even henry himself has stated on several occasions that he relies heavily on branding. 10 years from now, one of you will buy that guitar, and pay full price for it or very close, because of it's collectability. you'll post a pic showing everyone how pristine it is, and say you got a sweet deal. remember the "vintage" and "rare" $1500 studio i posted was defended by many under the exact same premise. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
'Scales Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 even henry himself has stated on several occasions that he relies heavily on branding. Brandy....I thought he said brandy. no? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Allenjason95 Posted December 13, 2017 Author Share Posted December 13, 2017 it never ceases to amaze me. the sheer number of people who don't even know they are affected by marketing. hans christian anderson wote about this all the way back in 1837. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Emperor%27s_New_Clothes mark twain said "it is harder to convince people of the truth, than it is to fool them." even henry himself has stated on several occasions that he relies heavily on branding. 10 years from now, one of you will buy that guitar, and pay full price for it or very close, because of it's collectability. you'll post a pic showing everyone how pristine it is, and say you got a sweet deal. remember the "vintage" and "rare" $1500 studio i posted was defended by many under the exact same premise. I’m not buying a $4,000 dollar Special. Ever. And I don’t buy any “collector”guitars, mine all get played and I buy them cheap. And no, I don’t remember a $1,500 vintage Studio but I wouldn’t buy that either. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RevDavidLee Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 Yeah I have an ebony one from some years back that I paid $800 for new :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Allenjason95 Posted December 13, 2017 Author Share Posted December 13, 2017 Gibson's sales are down? rct To hear the guys here all guitar sales are down. GC just got downgraded, Gibson is selling their Memphis shop. It was a recent conversation on here anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Black Dog Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 mark twain said "it is harder to convince people of the truth, than it is to fool them." And that is the truth. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Farnsbarns Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 Who said Gibson's guitar sales are down? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LarryUK Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 I posted a video yesterdat about Goodall guitars. After watching that and then watching a Gibson factory video. Gibson need a good shake up. A lot of companies now believe that any job can be done by any person. An operative on minimum wage. If you give a person one job it's ok. Things like guitars aren't really a thing that should be in that mould. But, back to Goodall. They say they've stopped using hide glue as it isn't as good as modern glue etc. Plus the attention to detail was amazing. You don't see that in Gibson. Gibson should be the brand that others aspre to be. Not laughed at. Without doubt they have quality control issues and they just bury their head in the sand. We see these new models coming out with stupid prices and a mass of copies of old guitars. No guitar should leave the factory with a fault. For the prices they charge you could have a Knaggs or Collings. Living on the back of a brand name will work for a while, but I think that time is over for Gibson and they'll change hands or close soon. Even Fender are doing it. I saw a Tele yesterday for £6k. How can a block of wood with a bolt on neck be £6k? I don't care what you do to it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pippy Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 ...I saw a Tele yesterday for £6k. How can a block of wood with a bolt on neck be £6k?... Absolutely. The whole 'Masterbuilt Hevy-Relic' thing has reached the point where the asking price is completely nuts. How's about this for 'Purple Prose', lifted from an actual ad. for just such a Telecaster, for a load of utter bollocks; "XXXXX XXXXXX is known across the globe as one of Fenders highly revered Masterbuilders, a select group of the worlds most esteemed luthiers. With this Godly status, any guitar with his name attached generates a huge amount of interest..." It's not a Stradivarius. IT'S A FENDER TELECASTER !.........It's BOLTED TOGETHER from PRE-ASSEMBLED UNITS ! ! ! Pip. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zigzag Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 Who said Gibson's guitar sales are down? Sagging Guitar Sales Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
surfpup Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 Gibson financials here. Not sure 2017 is in the books though, so data may be incomplete. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rct Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 To hear the guys here all guitar sales are down. GC just got downgraded, Gibson is selling their Memphis shop. It was a recent conversation on here anyway. Oh sure, I see that. "Industry experts" all agree that guitars sales are down, but they are talking about three privately held companies and don't know jack about their financials. Besides, me and goofballs like me on the internet are "Industry experts" and you know what our opinions are worth! And GC is "downgraded" based on their own debt and what appears to be no way out of it without giving up equity. Gibson is privately held, there is no sales/revenue/overhead/expense data anywhere, so I don't know that their sales are down with any certainty. Selling the Memphis place may be the actions of a healthy company that wants to stay that way. Fender also faces some pretty big debt issues this year and next. When you go there they won't ever talk about business or money not ever never. They argued with me incessantly about why they don't produce a decent American Esquire and they won, of course, but no money, no business, not happenin. rct Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rct Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 Gibson financials here. Not sure 2017 is in the books though, so data may be incomplete. D&B, Sage, PrivCorp, others like that, provide estimates of private corporate performance based on public information. You can look at that stuff fairly quickly and see a modestly healthy company with somewhat down revenues this year as compared to previous years, that's about all you can do with public information. But it is all guesswork. You wouldn't entertain the notion of thinking about considering bidding on or investing in a company with that information, it just is not real. There are a lot of ways to account a publicly traded company depending on the audience for the sheets and the impression you want to give, accounting a private company that you have no fiduciary liability for is not possible. It's like diagnosing your really bad cough by looking at the internet and seeing that flu is going around. Could work, also could not in a very bad way. rct Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dbreslauer Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 i don't know. doesn't the Custom Shop function separately from the Gibson USA shop? i.e. this is still a hand crafted instrument, and the extra attention and labor accounts for something. My son plays flute in his HS band, and I bought him a Yamaha "intermediate" flute after comparing them to the "professional" ones: the price difference was staggering (~$1300 vs ~$2500, being essentially the same materially). this all said, we vote with our wallets: maybe someone's dream instrument is a custom shop special in red... :) cheers, D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
surfpup Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 While it's about a year old, this is a pretty in depth article about the company's financial status. No sales figures are provided since, as already mentioned, Gibson is a private company. You will notice also the company owns a number of other bands, Phillips, Teac, etc. The article speaks a lot about the debt Gibson carries mostly. That bond debt is public so someone smarter than me may be able to find more current info. Still a bit useless without actual sales figures in determining company heath I imagine. I will post the authors closing paragraphs below, as I think they summarize what a lot of us have been saying about the current status of the guitar world... "If there’s anything I’ve concluded in looking at that musical instrument industry in greater depth since covering Mandolin Hut, it’s that this business is kind of resistant to complexity. Guitars. Picks. Amps. Cabinets. Cables. Speakers. These are artisanal products that are rather simple. They provide joy. They’re made of wood and metal. Adding tons of sophistication, from either software algorithms to business models, seems a risky play. We musicians are a simple lot. The joy of a Les Paul blasting an A-chord through a Marshall and thus through your pants is not complicated, but it is addictive. Get too far away from those equations, and trouble seems to brew. Otherwise, I think that the fundamental issue for guitar manufacturers is cultural, not technocratic. Rather than focus on a cross-technological, spectrum-spanning, electromechanical, consumer-creator-hybrid growth hacking play, we gotta get more people to play guitar and keep playing guitar. We gotta get people from Epiphone to Gibson, from D chord to D dorian mode, if you dig. Figure out how to inspire the love of actual tube amps in a tone-simulated digital world. We must take action like the Irish monks who saved antiquity from the witch-burning idiots who didn’t know a good thing when they saw it." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rct Posted December 13, 2017 Share Posted December 13, 2017 While it's about a year old, this is a pretty in depth article about the company's financial status. No sales figures are provided since, as already mentioned, Gibson is a private company... This is a good look at what Moody's cryptically said over the last couple years. It's about debt, particularly asset based debt*, not sales. They could be selling through the roof for all anyone knows, but the publicly traded bond debt is going bad for them. *In this instance, they are guessing inventory is an asset. In most instances, inventory is a liability that a buyer or investor will give you literally pennies on the dollar. Accounting is fun! rct Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.