Is Collings ending production of Waterloo?

cc132 · #1 02-13-2022, 09:34 PM

I live in the Austin area, and a few months ago, a guy who owns a local shop told me to hold on to my Waterloo because the word on the street was that Collings was ditching them. I didn't really ask any follow-up questions and didn't pay it any mind.

Gryphon Strings posted a Waterloo on their Instagram today, and the accompanying description describes Waterloo as a casualty of Covid. It also indicated that Collings would only be producing them in very limited quantities moving forward.

So, is that it? One of the coolest guitar lines of my lifetime just suddenly ends unceremoniously, without anything being said by the main company? It seems extremely weird to me.

6L6 · #2 02-13-2022, 10:28 PM

Gryphon would certainly have the inside track on such matters.

pagedr · #3 02-13-2022, 10:36 PM

That would be wild if so, those guitars still fly off the shelves even with prices going up significantly over the last few years. Maybe Gryphon just meant production levels were a casualty of COVID? Curious if the guys at AMW have any insight as they’re super plugged into Waterloo.

Rudy4 · #4 02-13-2022, 10:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cc132

I live in the Austin area, and a few months ago, a guy who owns a local shop told me to hold on to my Waterloo because the word on the street was that Collings was ditching them. I didn't really ask any follow-up questions and didn't pay it any mind.

Gryphon Strings posted a Waterloo on their Instagram today, and the accompanying description describes Waterloo as a casualty of Covid. It also indicated that Collings would only be producing them in very limited quantities moving forward.

So, is that it? One of the coolest guitar lines of my lifetime just suddenly ends unceremoniously, without anything being said by the main company? It seems extremely weird to me.

I didn't interpret Griphon's posting to indicate that, but I could see where someone could read that into it.

Waterloo is a somewhat small "side project" of Collings. I know that the production department is only a handful of staff. I suspect that the lull in production is to satisfy the demands of their more lucrative Collings brand, and things will eventually get back to a normal level of production.

sinistral · #5 02-13-2022, 11:15 PM

Last month, a Waterloo that was shipped to me from Hawaii arrived with a crack in the lower bout from being dropped during shipping. I took it to Tom Crandall, who is a Waterloo dealer, to see if it was worth repairing or if I should send it back. He said that that it could definitely be repaired, and was worth repairing. He recommend that I keep it since it “would be a while” before Collings made any more of them (the guitar is left-handed, to boot). I didn’t get the sense that Collings was dropping the line, but that they had slowed/stopped production for an indefinite term.

Also, Collings just raised their prices on Waterloo guitars, which would be an odd move if they weren’t going to make any more of them.

Wingz9 · #6 02-14-2022, 12:11 AM

I talked to an employee of a dealer here and he said Collings completely shut down for a period of time when Covid hit and a bunch of the employees cashed in by selling their houses due to the skyrocketing real estate prices in Austin. When they opened back up and tried to get those employees back very few of them could afford to or wanted to come back and now they have a smaller staff building guitars. He said custom orders used to take six months and I had one built and that’s about how long it took when I did it. Now they are almost a year or more. He said the guitars they have on order now won’t show up until early 2023. Not sure if anyone else heard this but this is what I was told by one person that works for a dealer.

BluesKing777 · #7 02-14-2022, 01:37 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cc132

I live in the Austin area, and a few months ago, a guy who owns a local shop told me to hold on to my Waterloo because the word on the street was that Collings was ditching them. I didn't really ask any follow-up questions and didn't pay it any mind.

Gryphon Strings posted a Waterloo on their Instagram today, and the accompanying description describes Waterloo as a casualty of Covid. It also indicated that Collings would only be producing them in very limited quantities moving forward.

So, is that it? One of the coolest guitar lines of my lifetime just suddenly ends unceremoniously, without anything being said by the main company? It seems extremely weird to me.

Unlikely!

Just Covid related production problems, my guess.

Now I just played my Waterloo WL-14x and the more years on it, the better and better it gets. Yesterday, I played my Waterloo WL-14L and ditto for that, maybe more.....ladder braced sings out.

So...I have mine ...ha ha ha....and now I should tell everyone that after playing my older broken in ones, I think ...gulp...I would have paid....gulp.......gasp...double! GASP.

Just perfect for what I mainly play...fingerpicked blues plus whatever takes my fancy....they handle it. I did not know they were what I searched and bought all kinds of things for....

I did once envisage having the whole collection.

Oh well, not greedy.

BluesKing777.

Maryc-k · #8 02-14-2022, 05:53 AM

Collings has about 30% of their staff. I’m not sure their headcount is going to increase anytime soon. There are other threads on this but since they are booked order-wise through 2023, I doubt you will see a lot of new Waterloos since they ceased taking new orders a year or so back. They dropped the mandolin model completely.

The pandemic is going to permanently change things in a lot of industries and for a lot of companies. Some for the better, some not. I know Angela, who ran the administrative office, has left Collings to sell real estate full-time.

pszy22 · #9 02-14-2022, 10:40 AM

I'm guessing it is going to be impossible to find a new one, probably driving up the price of used ones. They may have become almost instant classics.

Mr. Jelly · #10 02-14-2022, 10:44 AM

Some time back I got the feeling from reading an interview of the gal that ran the Waterloo shop that the department was on shaky ground. She didn't say that right out, but the department was shut down and she was working in another department. At the time I was shopping to replace the Waterloo WL-S I had sold and there wasn't any to be found. That's when I decided to get the first one I could find and purchase it as fast as I could. So, I paid more than I wanted to, but I did end up with a special one. I'm happy. My ladder braced Waterloos are going to the grave with me.

A.Wilder1 · #11 02-14-2022, 12:12 PM

It’s impossible to know without official word from Collings.

It would really be a shame if they stopped production all together, I’d like too see them hang around.

AMW · #12 02-14-2022, 01:31 PM

Hey all... can't offer much new information, but I can confirm a few things and tell you where we sit, as one of the world's top Waterloo dealers since the jump.

Mary is right, the workforce is much smaller. We've been told that all workers are going full-out on Collings. The building that housed Waterloo and the Collings case program is currently being leased out. What little work that might be happening on Waterloo right now is happening in the main Collings building, and the cases are done.

Are we bummed? Yes. Waterloo started as a unique/boutique idea that came out of the Collings shop and could be in players' hands for under $2K. That didn't last very long, but oh well. The cycle of yearly NAMM shows saw the offerings expanding at a quick clip, and there were always clear winners (WL-14 XTR, WL-S Deluxe) but they never took anything off the table completely until this year, when the mandolin was removed from the price list.

As of now, we have 30 Waterloo on order, which were all in place before the cut-off last year. Several WL-S Deluxe with deposits. All of these are status "waiting" on our order list, meaning that they are not moving in production, so no target dates for completion. Ouch!! At the beginning of the pandemic, we probably had 20 Waterloo guitars in stock, and now we're down to exactly (1) Jumbo King.

The small guitars have all but disappeared from dealers and Reverb, so I would strongly recommend grabbing up something that interests you, even if the price is slightly inflated. They are wonderful boxes, musical and very inspiring, and at this time pretty darned rare!

Br1ck · #13 02-14-2022, 03:32 PM

Weber mandolins stopped producing for almost a year so they could get their Breedlove guitar backlog somewhat caught up. They are producing now, but I imagine Collings has needed to focus on paying the bills, much the same.

I know Collings joined the mandolin world during a time their guitar production was down. Situations come and go. Companies need to adapt.

BluesKing777 · #14 02-14-2022, 03:40 PM

If you go to the Waterloo Guitars webpage and click on their Facebook link - it has stories of the new recent Waterloos going out to shops for orders....

https://www.facebook.com/waterlooguitars

BluesKing777.

gr81dorn · #15 02-14-2022, 03:53 PM

The materials are an itty bitty fraction of the cost of a guitar, the skills and talents and time are the rest. Put them where they can be most profitable. Pretty simple business equation for Collings, frankly, despite the love of Waterloos. If you can only pump out (pick a random number) 1000 guitars a year and they could be $2500 each or $5k+ each, you're gonna put out 1000 $5k guitars. Focus your remaining staff and materials on the profitability.