Gibson Announce 29% Price Rise for 2015

Sebber

And some reaction:

psyx

Tokai sales are set to rise by 29% in 2015.

Gibson really are not too bright... Year on year they get more detached from the market. Some people actually prefer to tune their guitars themselves. Some people dont want their les pauls chambered. Some people don't care about coil tapping. Some people don't have a spare kidney to sell.

And they're planning on cutting out some models...
http://reverb.com/blog/gibson-to-increase-prices-update-models-for-2015

Corporate greed.

studmissile

Dream guitar, becoming a pipe dream!

Big-G

studmissile wrote: Dream guitar, becoming a pipe dream!

BECOMING??! They have long been way beyond any of my dreams, and for the price they currently go for, yet alone what they are about to become, I would much rather go for many other brands that are arguably better, and significantly less! Its crazy!

Regards
G!

studmissile

Wonder if fender will follow suite? If Gibson is making more money from Epiphone they can afford too increase prices?

ArieRS265

There goes my dream of owning one someday...but then again,i'll take a telecaster over it anyday

Banditman

Reduced range, reduced quality, higher prices, and etune to suit hobbyist wealthy collectors. So they're stopping the satin finish Studios. Hmm, so no-one really went for the paw paw wood quality entry levels in enough numbers then, Henry? So nice to see the &*$! you attitude of another Yankee corporate baron in operation, quoting the company heritage and PR line. For me the writing was on the wall with the Kieffer Sutherland tribute ES335 and the "we swear it's not a Strat" (but we're suing PRS for making singlecuts) Jimi Hendrix guitar. You remember? The blatant Strat clone that never saw the light of sales after Gibson's own fans along with others poured out derision on social media.

The guitars will only sell to people who grow up admiring the people who play them, and the last time I looked the '70s were a long way away. The fans from that era aren't getting younger either, so who will be the new generation fans GASsin for a Gibson?

Harley did the same thing for a while until they caught a wake-up. Still pricey as hell, but they upped the quality and brought back the appeal for the die-hard fans while making new models to draw in new buyers.

The mags are right - watch the 2nd hand market for LPs soar, and Tokai/ESP et al laugh all the way to the bank.

psyx

If I were Mr Henry, I would make different ranges of LP's:

Heritage - Good old LP with PAF's, solid body, deep neck joint etc, top notch stuff 59 reissue
Traditional - Less true to a 59 RI, but still a LP with all the classic traits. Maybe potted pups and a chambered body
Modern - Thin neck, thin body, Robot tuners, coil tap and all that jazz
Modern plus - all that jazz and high gain pups with some metal styling
Studio classic - A studio we all know and love
Studio modern - A thinner studio with the robot tuners etc

It's that simple. They have done those guitars before... Why not stick to that plan?

AlanRatcliffe

psyx wrote: Why not stick to that plan?

Because Henry's plan has long been to move away from the musos (most of whom have limited money), and towards the guys who'll happily pay tons of money for something that's expensive purely because it is expensive. Make small quantities and sell them at exorbitant markups. Costs down, profits up - the MBA's wet dream.

Might even work, considering the number of people willing to spend R14K on a phone that's no better (if not worse) than the competition. Then again it could well kill them, as I would think any real musician will look at anyone playing a Gibson and think "sucker" and/or "poser", which could lead to many players not wanting to be associated with them and all getting rid of theirs, flooding the market and scotching the sales of new instruments to the suckers.

Then again, I wrote off Gibson in the '90s for their business practices and shoddy product ( helps that I've never really taken to them anyway), so I don't actually care what happens to them moving forward. To be sure, others will step in to fill the gap PRS, et. al. are probably smiling with glee.

Also makes me think that this is why Gibson have stepped up their attempts to trademark the classic body shapes. If those that do love them can't get them anywhere else, they might be willing to pony up.

warrenpridgeon

Nuts...

Charlie4

Regarding guitars, 4 things matter:
- Feel
- Tone
- Aesthetics
- Budget

A brand is supposed to exemplify these things and if they don't I move on to the next brand that full fills those requisites. Simple as that. To those that have great Gibby's I'm glad but these days Gibson really is a good example of corporate greed. They are really getting out of touch with who they were - a quality brand, for musicians, that built their empire based on the aura surrounding those musicians.
Only time will tell.

I guess it's poor old Tokai or PRS from now on. ?

babbalute

Any playing a real Gibson in this SA of us ? 29% less customer the coming year I think, that is if there were any at all in the last year.

Keira-WitherKay

absolutely agree with what Alan posted ,

i see it in the Boutique, one off/hand built instruments that float around the jazz scene a few go to the big name players who can afford it and most likely get it at cost or even free to help promote the brand ... and the rest don't get sold to the "working muso's" but get sold to the well off exec who has the budget to buy these instruments ...and yes they do become exclusive and priced way high ... but then those same people buy top end watches and phones and clothes and cars so why should guitars be any different ?

Wormwood

Banditman wrote: the Kieffer Sutherland tribute ES335

The what now?

singemonkey

Those saying you'll never be able to own one, just remember that the 2nd hand prices are not nearly that crazy. And in many repects the older product is better. I've said it before: guitars are not cars. Among musicians there's no cachet in buying new. Nor does it make the instrument more 'yours' that one than you bought 2nd hand but you've played and loved for years.

Saying that, 2nd hand prices will increase.

I can acknowledge that the guitar companies are in a bit of a fix - especially in the recession. They make a product that practically never wears out, and keeps its value over time. By now, there are so many damn Stratocasters in the world, that if every guitar player had to buy one, no one would technically need to go into a shop for it (that said, a lot are in the hands of hoarders with 40 Strats or whatnot). The longevity of their product means that the market is flooded.

I think maybe, with Fenders being more affordable it's easier to say, "Buy another one. We've put bells on this one!" Whereas probably most Gibson owners have that one Les Paul Standard/Classic/Traditional/Historic that satisfies their yen and can't really justify another at the price.

But Gibson does risk their brand collapsing like this. They risk, as Alan says, being seen as a 'poser' brand (and that's already started to happen - working musos telling me they can't 'risk' their Gibsons for actual work is a problem).

The weird thing was that this director had Gibson riding high in the nineties with the idea that they were the best they'd been since the '60s, desirably expensive, but attainable to an American kid who saved for six months on their first job.

The price of a Les Paul Standard in SA is going to be hilarious. I've heard talk of the price after discount topping R50k.

Wormwood

A friend and I often share links to nice looking les pauls and the joke is how high the ridiculous the prices are.
The higher the price, the funnier the guitar is.
My fave so far is the paul kossof collectors edition which looks like a monkey and an eagle had sex on it, which makes it worth a kings ransom apparently.

That said I do own a studio, which was affordable second hand, but only because I was living in a different country.
I try to love it a lot but i think the nut is not cut properly

singemonkey

Wormwood wrote: I try to love it a lot but i think the nut is not cut properly

The nut on my Angus Young SG is a disaster - particularly because the guitar has a vibrato tailpiece. I can't use that at all. It also looks super-cheap (even if it isn't) this synthetic "corian" or whatever they call it. I'm sorry, it looks like cheap plastic. Looking forward to getting it replaced with well cut bone (like my Tokai came with ? ).

chris77

singemonkey wrote:
The price of a Les Paul Standard in SA is going to be hilarious. I've heard talk of the price after discount topping R50k.

I'm not too sure how much longer we will have a local distributor then. Marshall will need to pony up some serious cash to meet Gibson's minimum order qty requirements and won't be able to bring in a proper variety of guitars for potential buyers to choose from. Sales will then drop even further because the already greatly reduced number of players who are willing to splash the cash for a Gibbo won't necessarily find what they are looking for available locally and import a guitar unseen privately at a lesser cost than ordering one unseen at an inflated price through Marshall. It depends on their business model and how much capital they can afford to tie down in high risk stock, but I don't see to many possible scenarios where it is worth Marshall's while to keep stocking them.

But aaagh what the hell, if Gibson wants to become a luxury goods merchant instead of an instrument manufacturer then so be it. If they succeed they won't be a brand I am willing to endorse and if the fail they will hopefully go back to their roots and produce proper guitars at fair prices again.

Wormwood

Who are you getting this done by and what s the damage, if you dont mind me asking

singemonkey

Wormwood wrote: Who are you getting this done by and what s the damage, if you dont mind me asking

I'm not at the moment - other priorities. But I'll probably ask if lapdawg can do it. He seems to have become a bit of an expert on this style of guitar recently ?