Custom Shop Expert dealers; how did they decide?

[lowrider]

I asked on the UMGF but didn't really get any answer.

How did they decide who would be the Custom Shop Expert dealer?

Some of the biggest CS dealers, like Maury, Mark@Reno's, LA Guitar are not on the list but there are dealers who don't seem to have any history with the custom shop. Is this just something you have to pay for?

What's the deal, how did they come up with the list?

[lowrider]

I guess nobody knows how they came the list of CS Expert Dealers.

Here's the list;

https://www.martinguitar.com/about-m...html#directory

I don't get it. Some of these ''experts'' don't seem to have much of a record with the Custom Shop. I'd rather deal with someone I know and trust.

[sinistral]

There are two or three shops on that list that I’m not familiar with, but the rest are all recognizable, and several are very well-known if not some of the top dealers in the country.

If I were a conspiracy theorist, which I’m not, there are a few well-known dealers that are not on the CSE dealer list who are widely known for offering deeper discounts on custom orders than other dealers. It’s not impossible to think that Martin left them off of the CSE dealer list to avoid price wars on Authentic features. Have you asked Mark at Reno?

[Rumblefish]

I would imagine that one requirement was keeping a certain stock level of expensive Custom Authentic guitars, which I’m sure narrowed the field a bit.

[Slimt]

I was always under the impression that it would be top sellers of the manufactures brand that would get entitlement to have the status of being a Custom shop dealer. 1 offs And are able to move the products with ease.

Or direct access to the Manufacture hub .

[dbintegrity]

I'd imagine its the same in the field I'm retired from... he who spends the most money, gets to be the "CS Expert" Dealer

[warfrat73]

My best guess is that the shops are paying something for inclusion on the list, or making purchase agreements.

As lowrider mentioned, there are several dealers on there that I've never heard of... and after 20ish years of paying attention to the market, frequenting this forum and occasioning UMGF, it just seems that there's no way they are high volume dealers, otherwise I'd have seen mention of them now and again just based on probability.

[sinistral]

Originally Posted by warfrat73

My best guess is that the shops are paying something for inclusion on the list, or making purchase agreements.

As lowrider mentioned, there are several dealers on there that I've never heard of... and after 20ish years of paying attention to the market, frequenting this forum and occasioning UMGF, it just seems that there's no way they are high volume dealers, otherwise I'd have seen mention of them now and again just based on probability.

The dealers I don’t recognize are Instrumental Music and Lightening Joe’s in California, Northeast Music in PA and Strait Music in Texas. That’s not to say they aren’t great dealers, it’s just that I’m not familiar with them. Several are very high-end—Gruhn, TME, Tall Toad, Elderly, Willcutt, etc.

My experience with Rudy’s is that the guy who runs the Martin room in SoHo is more interested in spec’ing custom guitars for the showroom than dealing with individual custom orders. Perhaps others have had a better experience dealing with him.

[warfrat73]

Originally Posted by sinistral

The dealers I don’t recognize are Instrumental Music and Lightening Joe’s in California, Northeast Music in PA and Strait Music in Texas. That’s not to say they aren’t great dealers, it’s just that I’m not familiar with them.

Same. And it seems to me that if they were really high volume dealers, I'd have heard of them in my 15+ years of pretty regularly using this forum (I've actually been using it since before it switched to the current version).

On the other hand, as the OP pointed out there are a bunch of shops that I know do a lot of customs but aren't listed.

All I'm suggesting is that it seems very likely that it's something other than just volume.

[sinistral]

Originally Posted by warfrat73

Same. And it seems to me that if they were really high volume dealers, I'd have heard of them in my 15+ years of pretty regularly using this forum (I've actually been using it since before it switched to the current version).

On the other hand, as the OP pointed out there are a bunch of shops that I know do a lot of customs but aren't listed.

All I'm suggesting is that it seems very likely that it's something other than just volume.

And at least three dealers that come to mind that are absent are LA Guitar Sales, Maury’s and Reno’s. I spoke to Maury at one point about the CSE designation, and he mentioned that one requirement is that the shop has to have a brick and mortar retail presence (which the Music Zoo doesn’t, at this point, but that’s another discussion). The other two are frequently mentioned as dealers to go to for the biggest discounts on custom Martins. Could that have something to do with it? Who knows. I’m sure Martin has its reasons.

[lowrider]

Yes, Music Zoo has no showroom from what I was told about a year ago, they have no intentions of opening theirs.

I did ask Mark why he isn't a ''expert'' and he said that he didn't know but that if he was it would open up a lot more options for custom guitars.

There seems to be a lot of shops on the ''expert'' list that don't have any or many CS guitars for sale. There's one in NJ, that one of our knowledgable posters says he wouldn't trust to place a CS order. And there's one very well known shop in NYC that doesn't seem interested it taking CS orders. It makes me wonder.

But I'm thrilled with the CS GJ-28 that I have coming from Mark@Reno's. I wouldn't want to do any more ''customization'' than I did, and I'm very happy with the price he gave me, even if he isn't a CS Expert.