Gibson Official Distributor in SA

msch997 · 2010-12-22T19:57:18+00:00

I received an email yesterday from Marshall Music (I am on their mailing list), the email states that they are now the official importers and dealers in Gibson guitars for South Africa. They say that stock arrives early January and they are launching at Tanz cafe also in January. For more information please contact them and not me, I am just passing on what I think may be of interest to the forum members ?. I am in no way employed by or affiliated to them . Regards Mike

AlanRatcliffe

dan77 wrote Alan, I've heard from someone that some of these guitars have even made it to Cape Town Gumtree. Maybe someone can shed more light.

Yeah, I've seen them on there, but I and others always report them, so the ads never last long. You can tell from looking at them (even from GT quality pics, which should tell you something). Usually a suspiciously low price too.

singemonkey

Yeah. Fakes being here or not (I'm sure some of them are) the message is: do you research before you lay out so much coin on a guitar. If you do a little bit of work, the fakes cannot stand up to scrutiny - since they make Behringers look like they were hand-crafted by elves.

dan77

Alan Ratcliffe wrote
dan77 wrote Alan, I've heard from someone that some of these guitars have even made it to Cape Town Gumtree. Maybe someone can shed more light.
Yeah, I've seen them on there, but I and others always report them, so the ads never last long. You can tell from looking at them (even from GT quality pics, which should tell you something). Usually a suspiciously low price too.

Wow! So it's true then!

Very alarming!

deefstes

Just received an SMS from Music Mate Sandton stating that a shipment of Gibson and Ephinone guitars is arriving soon. How do they get these guitars then? Just curious. Do they also have some sort of an agreement with Gibson or are these parallel imports?

Seeing as I've got a platform here, I'm going to use it for a quick off topic whine:
I walked into Music Mate once to find out about prices for an American Standard Stratocaster in a specific colour (which they didn't have in stock). They took my details and said they'd phone me once they've spoken to their agent. They never phoned me and I still don't know how much it would cost if I bought it through them, not that I mind because if someone can't be bothered to phone me when they said they will I don't want to do business with them.

What does bother me though is them putting my phone number straight onto their marketing database and now I receive sms'es every time they think they've got something interesting. I HATE THAT!!!!! Can I opt IN of these lists please rather than having to opt OUT?!?!? Especially if you're so useless not to even phone me back for the reason I gave you my number in the first place. Aaaaaarrrrgggghhhhh!

There, rant over. ?

rikus

deefstes wrote Can I opt IN of these lists please rather than having to opt OUT?!?!?

Nope, sorry. I wish we had an opt-in system in place, but our legislation is opt-out based.

Bob-Dubery

deefstes wrote Just received an SMS from Music Mate Sandton stating that a shipment of Gibson and Ephinone guitars is arriving soon. How do they get these guitars then? Just curious. Do they also have some sort of an agreement with Gibson or are these parallel imports?

What do we know?

We know there is one official Gibson dealer in the country - Marshall Woodmead.

Thus all other Gibsons are non-official though, I'm sure, the real deal.

It will be interesting to see what the pricing is like at Music Mate. If they're having to source them from a dealer or a distributor in another country then their markup chain should be longer than Marshall's and prices higher.

Based on what I've seen here so far Marshall are cheaper than Guitar Tone, though perhaps not enough to warrant a flight from Cape Town to Jo'burg.

singemonkey

Well, based on the original discussion re Marshall, didn't we work out that they were just "an" official seller. Thus any other shop can do the same deal they did?

Bob-Dubery

singemonkey wrote Well, based on the original discussion re Marshall, didn't we work out that they were just "an" official seller.

Yes. That's right

Thus any other shop can do the same deal they did?

I suppose so.

Odd that in both cases it seems to be a shop by shop thing. Neither Marshall nor Music Mate seem to be leveraging group buying power or keeping brand consistency across all stores.

kp247

I know that this isn't really about the original thread, but since we're talking Gibson here I'd like to return to the issue of the fake Gibson Les Paul guitars with actual Gibson logos on them.

I've been thinking about this and I'm wondering whether it's actually illegal to buy one or not. I mean sure, it's unethical, but is it illegal? The folks who have been buying these guitars from wherever have probably made legal purchases, since I'm not aware of a law that prevents one from buying any musical instrument. After all, it's just a piece of wood with some electronics screwed onto it (technically).

Even if they were to sell them on Gumtree it's probably not illegal. A prospective buyer can make the decision himself whether he still wants it after doing an inspection, not so? So I'm thinking about Alan trying to stop these ads from appearing. I mean, is it ethical to attempt to stop an ad if one doesn't like it. What proof do we have?

Copyright infringement? Probably in the US yes, but here? Does SA really fall within these Gibson copyright laws? I'm not going to put links up here to point to specific websites, but suffice it to say that I have seen some of these guitars on the web that looks remarkable, even under close scrutiny. There are also thousands being imported into the US by private people through the Internet, and this isn't illegal, at least not for anyone importing one.

I suppose it's up to the great Gibson Company themselves to sue these manufaturers and put an end to this.

Just wondering about this stuff since SA are now getting "proper" Gibsons again and I'd hate to see originals and fakes doing the rounds at the same time.

singemonkey

Since the SAPS happily burns piles of fake Levis, I'm sure fake Gibsons are no different.

I'm guessing it's not illegal to buy them, but it's definitely illegal to sell them. It's fraud apart from anything else.

kp247

singemonkey wrote Since the SAPS happily burns piles of fake Levis, I'm sure fake Gibsons are no different.

I'm guessing it's not illegal to buy them, but it's definitely illegal to sell them. It's fraud apart from anything else.

I can indeed understand the Levi issue since we manufacture clothing here too and there must be some kind of laws locally, trade, copyright or labour related, however!

What prevents someone from bringing in a whole lot of these fake (with Gibson logos) guitars and selling them exactly for what they are, as "Replicas of Gibson guitars". Who's going to stop them? Think about it, I mean people will bleet and complain but in the end they'll still be here.

It reminds me of the famous Stradivarius violins. I think there were only about 200 - 300 originals made by the man himself, yet in his own time (1700's) his instruments were widely sought after and as a result there were thousands of identical copies made because he couldn't keep up, even with the name "Nachahmung von Antonius von Stradivarius fecit anno 1705" written on the inside. I know this since we have one in the family dating back to the 1700's that came here via Poland during WWII.

Anyway, let's hope these things will go away once we have real Gibsons on the market again.

?

Keira-WitherKay

kp247 wrote
singemonkey wrote Since the SAPS happily burns piles of fake Levis, I'm sure fake Gibsons are no different.

I'm guessing it's not illegal to buy them, but it's definitely illegal to sell them. It's fraud apart from anything else.

Anyway, let's hope these things will go away once we have real Gibsons on the market again.

?

the thing is one will never stop copies or fakes as in direct replica's even with the gibson name.why cos there's always someone wanting to find a cheap deal and if a fake can con someone to pass over cash believing it's genuine gibson ....and in the con world ? and the retail sector there's a saying that "there's a sucker born every minute" so i doubt this practise will stop...... just be aware that they out there.....

and the temptation is great cos amongst musicians NOT everyone can afford the 20 - 60 K for a top end guitar so people are all gassing for a gibson and when one pops up for 5K one ussually jumps at it ......... the scary part is that once in a while there are the genuine bargains out there especially when people need cash immeadiately and can't afford to wait for a buyer at a good price..... so i would check it out and not dismiss a cheap price as a sign of a fake but it could be....

i lived in thailand for a short while and there fakes are big biz of everything from clothing to bags to sports gear and watch's ect ect and they sell it all openly at the street markets....... so the fake biz is alive and well in almost every sector ...so having fake guitars of famous brands is a reality

AlanRatcliffe

Trademarks are subject to international law, so yes, fakes with the Gibson logo on are illegal. So even if you bought one "by accident", you may not advertise it for sale anywhere.

It goes further than that. Consider that during the Gibson/PRS singlecut lawsuit, Gibson actively stopped people from advertising and selling their second hand PRS Singlecuts on Ebay, Craigslist and Gumtree. Ads would be removed within hours of posting.

What prevents someone from bringing in a whole lot of these fake (with Gibson logos) guitars and selling them exactly for what they are, as "Replicas of Gibson guitars".

There is a difference between a replica and a fake and if they have the Gibson logo they are fakes.

Who's going to stop them?

Customs & Excise. They take it quite seriously. The police too.

singemonkey

What Alan said.

On Keira's point, there is some difference with guitars, because the outlay to make a pair of Levis is not huge. Levis themselves may be reasonable quality, but apart from the design they're not much different to other jeans. So it's possible to make high quality fakes and still sell them cheaper than the originals.

With a guitar on the other hand, quality is paramount. You need high quality woods, you need high quality electronics, they need to fit together really well to be playable. All that costs bucks. If you make a fake Gibson that will pass as a Gibson, you can't sell any cheaper than the Japanese clone guitars and still make a profit. You'd do just as well to sell them under your own brand name.

The fakes are all absolute rubbish as instruments. So the temptation to buy one because you can't afford a Gibson is foolish. You're getting something that looks like a Gibson, but isn't actually the same kind of thing. It's worse than the guitars you buy in cash-converters. You haven't saved money on a Gibson. You've wasted money buying a really poorly made guitar that would have cost less if it wasn't a fake Gibson.

The only exception to this is when skilled luthiers unethically make replicas with the Gibson logo up top. The initial customer knows that it's not a Gibson, and actually pays more than they would for a Gibson due to the guitar being hand-made by a skilled craftsperson. But most replica builders now days are happy to put their mark on their vintage Gibson replicas.

I think the real reason that musicians sometimes knowingly buy the fakes is out of a warped idea that they'll get some prestige from "owning a Gibson." Some kind of twisted desire to be envied by other musicians for owning the guitar.

kp247

Alan Ratcliffe wrote Trademarks are subject to international law, so yes, fakes with the Gibson logo on are illegal. So even if you bought one "by accident", you may not advertise it for sale anywhere.

It goes further than that. Consider that during the Gibson/PRS singlecut lawsuit, Gibson actively stopped people from advertising and selling their second hand PRS Singlecuts on Ebay, Craigslist and Gumtree. Ads would be removed within hours of posting.

What prevents someone from bringing in a whole lot of these fake (with Gibson logos) guitars and selling them exactly for what they are, as "Replicas of Gibson guitars".
There is a difference between a replica and a fake and if they have the Gibson logo they are fakes.

Who's going to stop them?
Customs & Excise. They take it quite seriously. The police too.

Thanks for the info Alan. I guess it would be ok then for someone to take a chance and import such a fake via an eastern online store.

The real financial risks would be purchasing online form the east in the first place since there's no guarantee of actually getting what you think you're getting and you could well end up not get anything at all. I mean what are you going to do if you buy something online from South Korea and it just never shows up. It's not like you're going to lay a complaint with the police right. You'd just have to accept that you've been had!

These online stores operate from behind non-western borders and are protected by their own unethical capatalist systems. It is also widely known that they often sell goods with pictures that are completely different to the item that eventually shows up at your post office. I know! I bought a supposedly "high end Dell Laptop" for $240 from one of these stores (no names will be mentioned). Everything was transparent and appeared normal, I even chatted with the sales person in their chat forum who was very polite and I was reassured that everything was fine. The thing arrived within 3 weeks, but when I opened up the box it was some kind of kiddies palmtop thing without an a/c adapter that was just a worthless piece of plastic sh** and worth no more than R50.00.

So there you go - KP Marais is warning you!

If you want a Gibson BUY the real thing! If you can't afford it put a picture of the real thing on your wall to remind you and start saving up!

?

PS: I apologize for straying from the subject of the initial thread here

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