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The truth is that the US economy needs to adapt, as it has had to in the UK, we have seen our manufacturing base slowly die, I suspect the US suffers from the same problem we have here, in that in order to be Market competitive you need the best technology, but while companies are driven by share holders who are only interested in short term gains, how can you get long term investment, any chief executive who did might be sacked.

So you have to shift the emphasis from mass production to small sector expertise, the truth in my opinion is that the world economy is shifting, and countries like China will become the new economic super powers.

In the guitar market I think CF Martin will be fine if they play to their strenghts, which is heritige, and having a building process with plenty of Human intervention.

Taylor have plenty to worry about, at the end of the day a guitar produced by CNC in America is no different to one produced by CNC in China is it ?

Russell, I think it is the opposite. The U.S. can't compete on human labor with Asia. Actually, I think Taylor is doing it right-Building great guitars with the help of relatively cheap automation and marketing the Taylor name aggressively as a built in the U.S. upscale product. They have even said that they have to keep on top of the technology if they want to keep building here. They have the best marketing in the business. Their high quality, brand loyalty and prestige factor is what keeps them going.

But as an indication of the times, Taylor just opened a factory across the border in Mexico for their low end lines.

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Scott Thompson
Port Townsend,WA

"In a perfect world we'd all sing in tune
But this is reality so give me some room"
-Billy Bragg

Scott

I think you are right in what has what made them sucessful so far, they have a strong brand image, A very consistent quality to the point where if you pick up two of the same model it is hard to tell the difference, and very precise machining.

However as they get Larger these things are hard to maintain, their image is already faltering I don't think people perceve Taylor as "cool" anymore, as they have become a large anonomous corporation.


My point is that ultimately there strengths can and will be copied, they just have unique brand strengh, Martin do, if they are cute and play the oldest brand, and inventor of much of the steel string technology, in my opinion they will survive.

RussellR38655.7239351852

[QUOTE=RussellR]
My point is that ultimately there strengths can and will be copied, they just have unique brand strengh, Martin do, if they are cute and play the oldest brand, and inventor of much of the steel string technology, in my opinion they will survive.

[/QUOTE]

Well, I still think Taylor is cool

And yes, I think Martin can make it on there branding also. If the Bluegridge is any indication of the future, that is all they will have going for them. Scott Thompson38655.7390046296

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Scott Thompson
Port Townsend,WA

"In a perfect world we'd all sing in tune
But this is reality so give me some room"
-Billy Bragg

I thought Taylor were cool until they got themselves an over active legal department that sues people over a bridge design, when 90% of there own product is copied from other people .

Now I really should get off my soap box

In all seriousness Scott I respect your opinion and thank you for a very interesting and I should state that my position is purely my own opinion.

Lets face it Taylor have done pretty well for themselves thus far.

Walter, It wasn't your comments about Chineese guitars or economy that caused offence, go for it with those statements and we can respond with our feelings about American Protectionism (which I don't think you were suggesting as the answer). What caused offence were some of the words used (ie monkey) and as I already pointed out, I have no question that neither you, nor others, realized the connotations some of these words imply and in no way intended them as a racial slur. But please don't call us narrow minded. Nobuddy flipped out over it but just pointed out they were offended. You obviously had no idea what the term monkey implied when refering to an ethnic minority so no one is truly offended. It is a shame you removed your orriginal post though because I believe you were making a good point even if you chose a few poor terms in making it.

Very good point Jim. I guess we're all to blame. Our society IS very materialistic. But I think that's probably human nature.

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"I want to know what kind of pickups Vince Gill uses in his Tele, because if I had those, as good of a player as I am, I'm sure I could make it sound like that.
Only badly."

I've found this an interesting thread because of the business venture I'm embarking on (exporting guitars from Nicaragua to the states). The likely price range of my guitars will be the same as Blueridge guitars.

I don't know Blueridge's factory situation or what wages they pay, and I would guess that Saga and whoever directly administers the factory are very bottom-line driven and seek to maximize profits by minimizing wages.

Just one thought as far as the whole "slave labor" thing. The reason I will be able to provide good guitars at such a low price is because I will be purchasing them from the maker at prices far, far below what a similar instrument would cost in the U.S.. But to put things in perspective, this guy is a third generation luthier who has been making guitars for a living for some time. I will be paying a higher price for each of my guitars than 98% of the guitars he's sold in the past, and the money he's received for the guitars he's built in the past was enough to support his family.

So please don't always think that low-priced labor in other parts of the world automatically equates to "slave labor". I prefer to think of this type of arrangement (which I'll acknowledge is fairly rare in our outsourcing, profit-maximizing, exploitational world) as completely fair and mutually beneficial.


Andy Wright
Managua, Nicaraguaharmonist3438656.5123148148

And it's not just that, too many Americans are satisfied with mediocrity. We've got a couple of generations that have never tasted a real hamburger, because the masses eat 4537 billion cardboard hamburgers a year. There's nothing wrong with that, but it helps explain some of our problems.
Only a few people will demand the finest quality guitar, built with love for the craft and the wood. There will always be a market for fine instruments. Even if foreign guitars are very good and very cheap, they are not custom.
They do not fit the hand of the player exactly, etc. If you perform your magic on a pile of wood and hold it up for the world to see, it WILL stand above any factory creation, and the buyers will come.

Ron

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OLD MAN formerly (and formally) known as:

Ron Wisdom

Somewhere in the middle of Arkansas......

Russell, least you think I'm taking any offense to any of this, it's all just an interesting debate for me also.

Don, that materialism is just the consumer side of capitalism. Good or bad, It is what drives our economy. It also manifests intself in the fact that people are willing to pay top dollar for a status item like a custom made guitar.

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Scott Thompson
Port Townsend,WA

"In a perfect world we'd all sing in tune
But this is reality so give me some room"
-Billy Bragg

Hey Ron:

I agree. American heritage does play apart. Harley Davidson was shutting down, closing its doors. Then the Staff stepped in and started it again. Now they are doing OK with sales all over the globe. They created a market that people desired. That other companies from other lands have copied them to try and capture their share of that market.


I said that the BlueRidge guitars that I played at the local shop didn't seem to sound as good as the Martins or collins that were there. It does not mean that they do not or will not produce great sounding guitars. I have played good sounding Martins and some not as good sounding ones. The player decides if the sound is good for him or not. Not all handmade guitars are killer guitars.
But we need to create a market for the product we build. Just like H.D. If we succeed in that, we will do well. If we don't, who knows what will happen. But there will always be those who strive to produce a excellent guitar or instrument. Likewise there will be someone who will have to have that instrument. So my friends looking at what others are producing and selling is not wise. Keep learning and building better guitars. That will create the market place we want to be in. This will cause us to succeed.

In 1933 Harmony sold almost a million guitars, at least I believe I read that figure somewhere. And the United States , Canada and other countries have more population then at that time. There is room for us in the market place.
I build because I have learned that I love the craft. It makes me feel good. Even the mistakes become just learning experiences that are acceptable. Otherwise it doesn't matter to me if I get into a position of a full time, paid luthier. What matters is the relationship and community I feel from others who share my passion of luthiery. I have so much appreciated the help and encouragement of all folks on this forum. It is a great vehicle for perfecting your workmanship. So thanks and keep up the good work.

yep.... they need to pull an "Apple".

Start with design to ramp up sales, then follow it with innovation.

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Brock Poling
Columbus, Ohio
http://www.polingguitars.com

Sometimes there is nothing you can do. I recall listening to a story on the radio where they interviewed the owner of the last wooden clothespin factory in the US. It was closing. The owner said that he could go down to Walmart and by a bag of clothespins retail for less than what it cost him for the raw wood. That means that if he cut his manufacturing costs to zero, ie. no labor, no rent, no tooling, and only payed for wood he still couldn't compete.

It is not just that labor is so cheap in foreign guitar factories. It is the whole supply chain cheep. Chinese loggers get paid a lot less than American or Canadian loggers. The rent on the factory is cheaper too.

As for Eastman and Blueridge taking a bite out of American manufacturers, the Americans left the entry level market a long time ago. With improvement in quality Asia will (have) move up the market to mid level. And why not? If they make a good product they should sell it and make money. What could Martin do to compete? Consider a D-18, a Martin work horse product, How much could they improve the quality to make a serious dent in the foreign competition? I argue that there isn't enough room for improvement. A $5K D-35 doesn't sound that much better than a $1500 D-18. If the D-18 was as good as a D-35 for the same price, it still wouldn't affect that some people would buy a $900 Blueridge. It is a sad fact that many (most?) of the guitar buying public don't have the ear to tell the instruments apart. They can see the difference in fit and finish and if there is no difference there, the cheaper one will win. So Martin has to do everything they can to reduce cost.

Suppose they could sell their D-18 for $900 like our hypothetical Blueridge. If the Blueridge is as good as they say it is, (Let's say it is as good as the Martin) they will sell a bunch of them. Those Blueridges are guitars that Martin didn't sell. Martin would lose markets share, lose total sales, and lose money. All they did was to maintain quality and reduce costs.
Since, as I argued earlier, there isn't enough room to improve the quality, Martin has to sell something else. Tradition and prestige is clearly one thing they could try.

Of course, it is a bit more complacated than that. Those Blueridge buyers might be buyers who wouldn't have otherwise bought a guitar. I think that is unlikely, however.

We, as luthiers, have a very knowledgeable clientele that is passionate about our products. This is not the case for the vast majority of the guitar buying public. The customers we see are not the customers Martin or Taylor see. When we play a Martin and yawn it is because we have very high standards. Standards that Martin can't expect to meet.

Last week, A good friend asked me to build her a guitar for her double-nickel birthday - apparently assuming that I would just GIVE it to her. She is a beginner and I am CERTAIN that her thinking runs like this - " a new guitar costs 100 to 500 dollars ....so, his cost is under a hundred bucks!".

Now that Walmart has established footholds in ASIA, I wonder whether we will see a sea-change in commercial instrument building.

I have no problem with the idea of getting better quality for less money. If I could buy the guitars I want for (what I consider) a bargain price, my interest in luthiery would have remained dormant. But, cheaper at any price, does not ultimately lead to quality products - or lives.

What concerns me is that the Walmart mindset, the race to the bottom dollar, is so insidious that otherwise intelligent and caring human beings do not see what we lose when the lowest bidder gets most of our business.

I believe that hand-built homes, furniture and guitars will continue to claim the hearts of those who want something different, something better and more personal than a corporation can produce. My FEAR is that this is another path to the world being run by 3 or 4 corporations who'd have no competition in their respective businesses. The good news is that building your own will be an even greater act of defiance - art & craft versus mediocrity.

Thanks for making me think about this!

I may just give my friend a guitar but only if she sits in on several phases of the build.