Brand Hype

[Jaxon]

Just has me wondering and I don't have much to go on. Reading around on different guitar forums I see all level type of players making comments on their purchase(s)...most saying it's the greatest thing since sliced bread and then there's those that didn't get what they thought they'd get, altho few admit that especially having purchased a major brand it seems but there are some not overly impressed.

Just going on my limited experience I just bought a highly thought of name brand acoustic in the middle 2K price range and I didn't like anything about it so I returned it. I had bought my son the same name brand acoustic that cost $500 a few months earlier and it played and sounded 100 times better, day and night difference. Now how is that?

I was told on that name brand forum that it was basically my acoustic unknowing because I should have taken the guitar to a luthier and had it setup correctly to my liking. And I thought oh really...I just bought a $2500 custom shop acoustic and I needed to make a 300 miles round trip and leave my brand new acoustic with setup guy and take a chance that it could be setup to my liking and then make another 300 mile round trip to go get it and all the expense and time spent included. And I was in no way guaranteed that I'd even like it then and my return policy would have been null and void.

I have a $1300 acoustic that I bought online and its sounds wonderful and plays like butter and came in the mail like that. So this has put a bitter taste in my mouth for the doubly expensive brand I returned.

[TheSaint]

I've had the same motto for years when buying guitars.

Use your ears, not your eyes.

So often you're drawn to the name on the headstock and you convince yourself that the 'bigger' brand name must be better. I really don't care what the logo is, if it feels and sounds right for me, then it is.

Most non-players wouldn't know the difference between a Taylor and an Eastman. And why should they..? If you're performing live, most people won't have a clue what you're playing.

And if you're playing at home with other guitarists, then to buy the brand rather than the sound is pure vanity.

[TTiimm]

A setup won’t void a warranty. It’s just adjustments, that’s all.

All guitars need a setup once in a while. It’s part of normal maintenance, like a tuneup for a car.

[Jaxon]

Originally Posted by TTiimm

A setup won’t void a warranty.

A setup is just adjustments, that’s all, just like a tuneup for a car.

Not the warranty, the store return policy

[baw3]

I agree with a lot of what you said. I wont mentioned any names, but I paid 3800 for a major brand guitar and I never really bonded with it at all so I finally sold it. The guitars in my signature right now didnt cost more than 1500 bucks and they sound great. I didnt even have to have them set up, I just sanded the saddle a little bit and they play great. I have played my guitars for my family sometime and they really dont know that much about guitars and I ask them to pick out which ones they think sound the best when I had a few more guitars then I have right now. A couple of the guitars would be 2 to 3 times the price of some of my other guitars and it would really surprise me the guitars that they favored. It wasnt the more high dollar ones. My own ears had told me the same thing, but it was kind of nice hearing other people agree with my opinion. Bottom line, you dont have to spend a lot of money for a great sounding guitar. IMO.

[jaymarsch]

The power of marketing can get to the best of us. Lots of choices in guitars these days for all sorts of ears and budgets. It’s great that we have so many to choose from but, yes, it usually works out best when you use your ears and hands to explore the options and not just the name on the headstock.
Best,
Jayne

[Robin, Wales]

From living outside the US, what I see is that the US branded and US built guitars are not built for export. They have a large enough internal market to be sustainable. They are just keeping tabs on each other, and know that they have a strong internal following. They do export but that is certainly not where they focus. Buying US made Martin, Gibson, Taylor, is both expensive and difficult outside the US. They are highly uncompetitive.

Other guitar companies around the world tend to build for export. This requires a very different business focus, and they must be competitive in terms of quality and price across a global market. They cannot rely on home country brand loyalty, so have to compete when hanging on a store wall anywhere in the world.

The US companies could build for export if they felt there was a need to do so, but they don't seem interested (take Martin's guarantee, or rather lack of it overseas, as an example). You just have to look across the boarder to Canada to see a guitar company with a build for export ethos.

[Tnfiddler]

Did you buy it online and have it shipped to you? If not and you went to a shop to buy it, why’d you buy it in the first place? If it was that horrible that a $500 guitar was SO MUCH better, why’d it exit the store in your name? It really comes down to what you want out of an acoustic guitar. Am I saying that there aren’t some great guitars out there for $500, no. What I am saying is that an Eastman E6D is the ONLY sub-$1k guitar that I’ve ever played that I’d want to take home with me, but only to use as an outdoor festival guitar. Have I played some subpar $2500+ guitars, yes. But only a few. The overwhelming majority have been fantastic and The only guitars that still haunt me cost north of $5k! There’s a reason why Pre-War guitar co., Preston Thompson, Collings, Bourgeois, Martin Authentics, etc. are in short supply and have waiting lists to get them and it sure isn’t just the name on the headstock, but yet every mom and pop music store around is full of $500 guitars. If a $500, or your $1300 guitar does it for you, that’s awesome! Enjoy it.

[Kh1967]

Don’t throw the baby out with the bath water!

It sounds like you have a wonderful guitar that suits you, and it cost $1300. That is fantastic and a guitar you should probably hang on to. But, it sounds like the “expensive” one you purchased did not do it for you. It happens.

Yet, this is not always the case and likely would not be, the more you evaluated more and more “higher end” guitars. Of course, there is brand hype, but not all $1300 guitars sound incredible, nor do all $2500 - $5000 guitars. It is important to sample many before saying that all guitars in a certain price range are the same.

And, I am the first to admit, there are some real gems that by comparison sake, don’t cost that much. You might have to look longer to find them, but they do exist.

[ish5]

I was thinking about this recently also. And you notice you can’t even hint to not liking some of those companies on this forum without hearing the vitriol from the “American made, standard series, must be over $2500 or I won’t slum around with it” crowd.

Don’t get me wrong, I lust after some of the iconic guitars as much as the next guy, but the name brand carries a lot of weight for some. (I’m a bit of a hypocrite because I just got a delivery of Martin swag from the sale they just had)

God bless these companies, particularly Martin, that have built the following they have. Yes, there is quality there, but there is also a “coolness factor” that every brand in the world would kill for.

[volman]

If the tone is right, then get a set-up to make it fit you. If the tone isn't there, then take it back.

A brand isn't always a guarantee that you're going to love every guitar they build. I've played many $6k+ guitars that just didn't impress me...build quality was always good but the tone didn't do anything for me. I think when you jump to much more expensive boutique guitars ($10k+), then the odds are extremely high that every guitar you play will be great all-around with some being incredible, but even then a "great" guitar still might not have the type of tone you want and would possibly need to be set-up to your liking. It's all heavily dependent on your preferences.

[The Bard Rocks]

There are so many variables that contribute to a guitar's sound and feel. And we are all so different in what we like, that there is an overwhelming choice out there. And then add in the tonal contribution of the room, the sound equipment and comparing apples to apples gets further complicated. And on our personal voyage with the guitar, some of us change our playing styles and the kind of music we play...

And, yes, each guitar company makes some on a Monday morning.

So... no surprise. Just keep searching...

[Tnfiddler]

Originally Posted by ish5

I was thinking about this recently also. And you notice you can’t even hint to not liking some of those companies on this forum without hearing the vitriol from the “American made, standard series, must be over $2500 or I won’t slum around with it” crowd.

Don’t get me wrong, I lust after some of the iconic guitars as much as the next guy, but the name brand carries a lot of weight for some. (I’m a bit of a hypocrite because I just got a delivery of Martin swag from the sale they just had)

God bless these companies, particularly Martin, that have built the following they have. Yes, there is quality there, but there is also a “coolness factor” that every brand in the world would kill for.

Are there some who think the price is what makes their guitar great, possibly. But, I've yet to see a thread on this forum(not saying it's not on here, I just haven't seen it) where someone who plays a higher-end acoustic purposefully starts a thread downing cheap guitars. Folks, if you can't or don't want to spend over a certain amount on guitars, that's your choice, but like I said in my above post, there's a reason why high-end guitars are in short supply and have waiting lists to get them and 99% of the time, it's not just because they have a certain name on the headstock. They're almost always GREAT guitars that have tonal qualities you don't, or rarely get out of mass-produced guitars. My D41 is great, the D28 Authentic Aged that I played at NAMM was PHENOMENAL!! There are some Eastman guitars that I'd own in a heartbeat IF that was the price point I was looking at. I played quite a few Martin guitars at the Music Outlet last year(15-18 Style Martins) and an Eastman E10D sounded better than all of them and an E6D was on par with all of them and was only bested by a D18. Did it make me want to take them home with me? Only as an outdoor festival guitar, but not as an everyday guitar. Yes, there are high-end duds out there. I played an HD28 while I was on my search for my first Martin, that sounded horrible, but I believe they're rare. Most upper-end guitars are great instruments. Play what you want and like and don't question why others play what they play. If you don't think $2500+ guitars are all that, good for you! You'll never have to figure out which toy you need to sell to fund the purchase of one.

[RP]

Nobody is going to accuse Wayne Henderson of building anything but an outstanding instrument; but playing his stage dreadnought and then an O-body that he'd just completed for a customer in the audience, the O-body just left me unimpressed. I wouldn't second guess his ability to craft an O-body guitar; I'm just not a fan of smaller bodied guitars even if Wayne makes them...

[ewalling]

Originally Posted by TTiimm

A setup won’t void a warranty. It’s just adjustments, that’s all.

All guitars need a setup once in a while. It’s part of normal maintenance, like a tuneup for a car.

However, a $2,500 guitar should not need the added expense and hassle of a setup to sound like a $2,500 guitar.