My local shop stopped carrying parts, ...I am upset!

[Marcelo1281734115]

I went to my local music store the other day to look for parts to maintain my guitars in good shape. I looked everywhere in the store, in places that, only a month before, had a large display of spare guitar parts for most guitars they sold. I now saw that the display was GONE!.

 

I asked the salesman "where did the spare parts display go, I need tremolo springs for my Strat and a new switch for my Les Paul?" and he arrogantly tells me "we decided to stop carrying parts because there was just no money in it, you should buy them from the internet yourself". This statement affected me like some bad heartburn, I felt like throwing up, what a bunch of dicks!. Do they expect me to buy their guitars and they will not stand behind them? Do they expect me to put up with losing the use of my guitar for weeks while I go though all the trouble of ordering a dinky little part through the internet when it would have been so easy to just buy it from their store shelf?

 

This is a fine example of poor customer service. They are just interested in making the easy money, selling you the guitar, after that, you are on your own. It is already difficult to find parts for an Epiphone already, I always need to replace the rusting screws on the guitar and I used to go to the Fender display to find a size that would do the job. Now, to get a simple piece of hardware, I have to spend hours to find a website to order it from and then wait a week or two before I get the parts. That just sucks! I am boycotting this store from now on.

[TWANG]

I've often thought a store shouldn't even open without a decent parts counter.

I once asked for a capacitor at the parts counter at GC and the guy asked me what that was.

 

Sure, it's expensive, the guitars, even of the same brand, vary quite a bit. And stocking a lot of parts and having them on hand

is going to cost money. Money the dealer will only make back incrementally, over time.

 

But basic parts, those things that certainly can be interchanged, those things that a dealer ought to know are the most commonly problematical

for his brands.. there's just no excuse.

 

We know how guitars get treated, we know how easy it is for accidents to happen. We know that the best of care is still subject to

a bad day, a bad moment, etc.

 

I've noticed that my parts bin grows all the time. And often I look through it all and think.. some of this is going to be yours whether you know it or not, Twang.

 

But if I had a formal store front, and it was stocked with guitars, I think there's no doubt about it, I'd know that a percentage of what I wanted to sell for instruments would have to be backed up with a certain number of parts.

 

How can you sell tube amps, and not only not carry tubes, not even know the differences?

How can you expect to sell guitars and then not be expected to help the customer after the sale?

 

Part of it, I think, has to do with how much the dealer knows about guitars in the first place.

Sometimes they're pretty good pickers, but not such hot techs.

 

Competition is stiff. Seems like every time I turn around some bigger company sells the same parts I have for nearly what I pay. Sometimes, even less!

Small dealers can't buy a thousand of everything, or even a hundred. But big companys with lots of room, can.

 

So, I feel for the guy. I know it's tough. And I understand your postion, too. It's a total drag.

Find one or two suppliers.. and bookmark them. Get their catalogs. Make sure you double check via google for prices that go up or down without notification.. they do that to me all the time by the way.. I quote a customer, order the part, and the price increase eats half my meager profit.

And it can happen to you, too.

So yep.. a hassle to find what you need, and then to get a fair price, plus the extra charge for shipping, and then the wait.

 

TWANG

[Digger]

Having run businesses myself I would want the small items to attract you to the store, as what are you going to do while waiting for help? Look at the guitars on display!

 

I would also have the parts down the back of the store so you have to walk past the guitar display to get to them.

 

Digger

[Marcelo1281734115]

I was expecting him to be helpful and order the part from his sources for me as a custom order, but when he told me to get it from the internet myself, I was fuming!

 

If you are a store, you may not need to invest a lot of money to carry the parts that fail most of the time. In a guitar, you need only need to carry the fast movers, i.e. the most common parts that break down all the time. Then carry one or two of each, not more. So then, the store keeps a kanban-like system where when one items sells, you place an order to replace it on this week's order from that supplier. This system places a cap on their inventory investment.

 

For parts that fail very rarely, just ask the customers to pay up front and place an order with the supplier the next time you order parts from them. There is not much choice here.

[voodoo]

+1

 

Sometimes I wonder who taught these people how to do business.

 

When I started playing electrified music you could go to hardware stores for your amp tubes.

 

They even had a machine to test them.

 

What happened?

 

Thank goodness for the internet, if I had to count on music shops, I'd be screwed.

 

8(

[TWANG]

tube testers are way rare nowadays.

nobody uses nearly as many tubes as in the past.

 

I used to work for tv repairman..

and when he was out of the shop I'd pull out the bad tubes and blow 'em up on the tester!

 

TWANG

[charlie brown]

+1

 

Sometimes I wonder who taught these people how to do business.

 

When I started playing electrified music you could go to hardware stores for your amp tubes.

 

They even had a machine to test them.

 

What happened?

 

Thank goodness for the internet' date=' if I had to count on music shops, I'd be screwed.

 

8( [/quote']

 

Gee VooDoo...you must be "old as dirt," too! I remember the "Tubes in the Hardware store," and tester too.

Here, it was "Gambles!" That was Awhile, ago! LOL! '50's-60's.... ;>)

 

CB

[voodoo]

Ya caught me Charlie..... should we tell them about the floriscopes in the shoe stores too?

 

[charlie brown]

Ya caught me Charlie..... should we tell them about the floriscopes in the shoe stores too?

 

:P

 

LOL! Yeah...I remember those, too! Sorry....

 

But, even so...it's pretty sad, that you can't find tubes, at a "Radio Shack," at least?! Not around here,

anyway. I have to drive to OKC (180 miles, or Wichita (100 miles)...or, order on-line.

No big deal, if you have plenty of time, but if you need something "now" (as accidents do happen),

you have to carry spares (minimum 1 set).

 

CB

[Marcelo1281734115]

I remember being a kid in the late 70's and going to buy tubes for the TV set at the local convenience store a few hundred yards away. The convenience store was better than the hardware store, because the hardware closed at 6PM and the convenience store was open until 9PM or so. Sometimes the tubes would go out in the middle of a movie and I would be sent to the store with the burned-out tube in my hand to ask the store-owner to "give me one exactly like this". In those days, they had lots of tubes perhaps in a few dozen or more sizes. Then a few years later, maybe around 1980, you could no longer find them anymore.