Why do big guitar stores suck so bad?
Why are they so awful? I took the opportunity to check out our brand new Long & McQuade location, which merged at least two older stores into one new colossal two-story building. I don't know quite what I was expecting, but I came away pretty disappointed. Here's an entire brand new building, but still relying on the old, slightly nauseating showroom formula whereby you string up several hundred guitars: 50% of which are cheap, crappy, gimmicky, or some blend of the three; 40% which are insanely overpriced boutique/vintage fetish objects (which utterly fail to impress me—is there something wrong with me?); and maybe 5% are some kind of middle-of-the road things that they probably flog a lot of (L&M seems to sell—or at least stock—a lot of mid-range Godin axes).
The amp department is exactly the same: a great wall of Marshall stacks ('cause everybody needs one of those, right?) a couple of obligatory Fender Twins and Vox AC30 combos (an amp so heavy it must have been designed by underemployed chiropractors—but everybody needs one of those these days, too); and then a staggering variety of cheap junky things that no one needs yet which must be out there by the million.
Who is being served by this kind of selection? It must cost them a fortune to maintain this inventory. But who is it for? The kids who come in and buy a $200 guitar or a $200 amp can't seriously be interested in the wall of $3000 Gibsons, and how many of those things do they sell anyway? Anyone looking for a decent Les Paul must surely be working the used market, no? It's not like these guitars have changed a whole lot lately! Is it simply that you need to have this ridiculous mock-opulence in order to be credible as a destination store? What a sad business to be in.
While I'm at it... what the heck is Fender playing at with these "relic'd" vintage strats? They had another whole wall of these at L&M, with $3000-and-beyond price tags. They look exactly like somebody went at them with a belt sander. Who are they fooling? And who on earth is buying these things? At least the overpriced Gibsons give the impression that the people that make them take them seriously.
Personally, I see a great future for outlets like Sweetwater, where they can keep an enormous inventory on tap, dispense with the cost (not to mention the silliness) of the expensive showroom, and succeed on price and personalized customer service (not something that big guitar shops have ever been any good at). The only thing the online places need to complete the experience is an appropriate soundtrack: short snippets of licks played through a particularly loud and bassy Marshall would fit the bill perfectly.
The amp department is exactly the same: a great wall of Marshall stacks ('cause everybody needs one of those, right?) a couple of obligatory Fender Twins and Vox AC30 combos (an amp so heavy it must have been designed by underemployed chiropractors—but everybody needs one of those these days, too); and then a staggering variety of cheap junky things that no one needs yet which must be out there by the million.
Who is being served by this kind of selection? It must cost them a fortune to maintain this inventory. But who is it for? The kids who come in and buy a $200 guitar or a $200 amp can't seriously be interested in the wall of $3000 Gibsons, and how many of those things do they sell anyway? Anyone looking for a decent Les Paul must surely be working the used market, no? It's not like these guitars have changed a whole lot lately! Is it simply that you need to have this ridiculous mock-opulence in order to be credible as a destination store? What a sad business to be in.
While I'm at it... what the heck is Fender playing at with these "relic'd" vintage strats? They had another whole wall of these at L&M, with $3000-and-beyond price tags. They look exactly like somebody went at them with a belt sander. Who are they fooling? And who on earth is buying these things? At least the overpriced Gibsons give the impression that the people that make them take them seriously.
Personally, I see a great future for outlets like Sweetwater, where they can keep an enormous inventory on tap, dispense with the cost (not to mention the silliness) of the expensive showroom, and succeed on price and personalized customer service (not something that big guitar shops have ever been any good at). The only thing the online places need to complete the experience is an appropriate soundtrack: short snippets of licks played through a particularly loud and bassy Marshall would fit the bill perfectly.
posted by jmax at
2:46 PM
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