Boutique Guitar Prices

[That90'sGuy]

Re: Boutique Guitar Prices

So you don't have to spend $2000 or $3000 to get a great electric guitar.

It all comes down to the chemistry of a few particular pieces of wood working the right way together, whether they're plywood or limba.

I've owned some boutique stuff, a Collings 290 (the singlecut version of the one in this thread, except with a TV yellow finish), Grosh Bent Top Custom... and you know what? They weren't heads and tails above the standard Fender and Gibson offerings. One thing I will say is that the fit and finish on both were pretty exceptional (so they're great instruments to buy second hand due to the consistency), but the tone was on par with your average instruments even with the fancy appointments. I've played countless Dave Thomas McNaughts and some of them were deader sounding than the budget Squiers I've picked off the rack at my local GC.

So, at the end of the day, use your ears to find the right pieces and don't look at the price tag.

 

[jmh151]

Boutique prices are worth it in the sense that you're paying more for the extra labor to ensure the guitar is really in optimal playing shape. While I thought my PRS played great, my EBMM Axis that I just had refretted , plekked, taken apart, reassembled, neck shimmed, pickups adjusted, intonated, etc...- now slays any PRS, but it cost me over $800 to have all that work done by a top guy. Factor that into the price of a guitar and you see why boutique prices are so high

 

[Dr. Vegetable]

Re: Boutique Guitar Prices

Boutique prices are worth it in the sense that you're paying more for the extra labor to ensure the guitar is really in optimal playing shape. While I thought my PRS played great, my EBMM Axis that I just had refretted , plekked, taken apart, reassembled, neck shimmed, pickups adjusted, intonated, etc...- now slays any PRS, but it cost me over $800 to have all that work done by a top guy. Factor that into the price of a guitar and you see why boutique prices are so high

I don't dispute that boutique guitars cost more to produce, but I do question whether it makes a tangible difference in many cases. Does a decent $3,000 guitar sound or play 10 times better than a decent $300 guitar? Probably not. Ten percent better? Maybe.

Not that 10% wouldn't be significant - it could be the difference between obscurity and stardom in the hands of the right musician.

 

[dirtyrocker]

Re: Boutique Guitar Prices

I'm Right with you on that.

I have a USA Custom Shop Strat £2,300 in UK., a MIM Road Worn Strat £750 in UK.and a 2009 MIM Tele which I got on ebay for £185. The guy had glued the ferules and stuff. Other than that it was almost like new.
It has since had paint removed and been totally bastardised by me. It just has a Little 59at the bridge. No tone wired in, just volume. It still has the original mex hardware, the tuners are fine.
All in all it cost me £65 for the Little 59 plus some wirewool, etcher, and a decal on top of the £185 I paid.
I get more fun out of playing her plus it sounds great!

Little things please little minds

 

[Chris of Arabia]

Re: Boutique Guitar Prices

I'd swap you this Martyn Booth 'Special' for the Collings any day of the week - it's a bargain by way of comparison and I'm sure Martyn would happily talk to you about anything you wanted too.

 

[Edgecrusher]

Re: Boutique Guitar Prices

I don't dispute that boutique guitars cost more to produce, but I do question whether it makes a tangible difference in many cases. Does a decent $3,000 guitar sound or play 10 times better than a decent $300 guitar? Probably not. Ten percent better? Maybe.

Not that 10% wouldn't be significant - it could be the difference between obscurity and stardom in the hands of the right musician.

Tangible has nothing to do with it. The logic that guitar has to be dollar for dollar better is bogus also. So is the adage that you have to play so good to be able to appreciate it.

The price is determined by the market nothing else. If they can sell x guitar for y dollars they will. The price for a custom shop gibson isnt that its got 3000 dollars more intrinsic value in it the price comes purely from people will pay that 3000 dollars more. If people stopped paying the prices the prices would fall. Demand is what sets the price.

 

[Dr. Vegetable]

Re: Boutique Guitar Prices

Tangible has nothing to do with it. The logic that guitar has to be dollar for dollar better is bogus also. So is the adage that you have to play so good to be able to appreciate it.

The price is determined by the market nothing else. If they can sell x guitar for y dollars they will. The price for a custom shop gibson isnt that its got 3000 dollars more intrinsic value in it the price comes purely from people will pay that 3000 dollars more. If people stopped paying the prices the prices would fall. Demand is what sets the price.

True, and good points.

Still, one factor in the price of anything is the cost to produce it. Any company must take the money invested in making their product and multiply that by some number to determine the price they must receive in order to make a sustainable return on their investment. A mass-produced guitar put together by unskilled workers with inexpensive materials will cost less to produce than one where highly paid artisan craftsmen spend weeks hand-selecting pieces of wood and gently caressing the fretboard with pixie oil.

Does any of that make a tangible difference in the hands of the customer? That is the debatable part. Some people can probably tell the difference; others may have enough wealth at their disposal that they just don't care. In the end, boutique shops set prices based on what they can convince people to pay, but there is a minimum amount any company can let their products go for before they start losing money. I truly believe many of these companies would go belly up if they tried to sell these instruments at a price that everyone could afford.

I'm a proponent of the idea that, for most players, there is little value in paying 5X or 10X the amount to get the pixie oil treatment, but I don't fault those who feel that it makes a difference to them.

 

[stevie_bees]

Re: Boutique Guitar Prices

I'd swap you this Martyn Booth 'Special' for the Collings any day of the week - it's a bargain by way of comparison and I'm sure Martyn would happily talk to you about anything you wanted too.

I like Martyn Booth's guitars. I've been gassing after an MSG like yours for years!

 

[stevie_bees]

Re: Boutique Guitar Prices

I think for me it is as much the irony that the Collings guitar is based on what was a budget guitar by Gibson when they were first released. For me, and only me, that would have to be one hell of a LP Jnr to command that sort of price...

 

[Chris of Arabia]

Re: Boutique Guitar Prices

I like Martyn Booth's guitars. I've been gassing after an MSG like yours for years!

Here's a scary thought, I've had that MSG for around 21 years now - it's damned near vintage

 

[uOpt]

Re: Boutique Guitar Prices

I don't like playing for some boutique things.

An example is a bolt-on neck Fenderish guitar that is very expensive because the utmost care has been put into fretwork, leveling, QA, nut, setup and the like. Although it is a bolt-on poly finished 2-point trem non-vintage thing. Not for me because I do my own "neck TLC" anyway.

A neck-through bass with spectacular woods for the wings, carefully crafted at a rate of very few per month, that's more like it.

There is some in-between. Suhr would normally be an example of the first, and I can have that by buying a Music Man. But Music Man is generally fuzzy and doesn't offer the neck width I want. I could go to Suhr and order the things with the specs I want. But them I'm royally ****ed if it doesn't come out the way I wanted. Better get a Fender Custom Shop with the specs I like, can be re-sold.

And of course it isn't Suhr's fault that bolt-on guitars are very good.

 

[Ashurbanipal]

Re: Boutique Guitar Prices

I think we should be glad we don't have to spend $50,000, $100,000 and a lot more for a fine instrument, the way classical musicians do.

We're spoiled silly. Maybe we're not as serious about music as we think we are.

On the other hand, my favorite Strat that I've ever owned is my Japanese Squier that I paid $180 for and then spent more than that putting Duncan pickups in - Custom Shop Pickups that Seymour and MJ wound for me.

But that guitar sounded resonant as all get out in the pawn shop and is a very special guitar.

Shouldn't have been...but it is.

So you don't have to spend $2000 or $3000 to get a great electric guitar.

Completely agree, especially about the classical musicians and seriousness comments.

When I clicked on this thread, I did it with the idea of 'boutique = one guy spending two months making a guitar from scratch'. In this case, you're paying for a combination of labour skill, time, and materials. So, 2-3k isn't much; I don't mind paying someone like that, as the $$ goes straight into their pocked and I'm getting something to my spec which we've discussed intimately.

The irony is that if CS Fenders, VOS Gibsons, or PRS private stock were only 1-2k, people wouldn't bite - they'd think, 'oh it's not much better than the regular one, which is about $300-500 less, so why should I get it?' That's one reason they have to be pricey. Plus you're paying the industry machine, which is going to make things cost more by default - people have higher pay than in eastern countries etc. With F & G, you're also paying for the abstract historical associations - 'this axe captures the specs and character of a 1955...', which is predicated upon the idea of things being premium, therefore justifying the cost. Bit of a simulacrum, really.

 

[jmh151]

Re: Boutique Guitar Prices

IMO, you either pay on the front end- i.e.- spend $1500-$2,000 on very well built guitar, or in the back end- i.e.- spend $700, then spend another $1300 on new pickups, hardware, pro level refret and setup. I think most of us here eventually spend that much on the pack end, especially with the endless pickup swaps.

Does everyone NEED an expensive guitar to make good music? No, many of the guitars that were used to record most of the music from the 50's-80's were unplayable by today's standards, but the artists managed. However, it's a much more enjoyable experience not having to struggle with your instrument to perform.

Now even though I love PRS and have one, their Private stock guitars are IMO absurdly expensive, but there is a market for them.

 

[aleclee]

Re: Boutique Guitar Prices

After reading this a number of things come to mind:

First, what's "boutique"? Though I once had a wall full of 'em, PRS has priced themselves out of the Alec Lee market. Even so, their instruments aren't really any more spendy than a lot of Gibby's stuff. So is PRS really booteek? While they have a number of very pricey instruments, I dunno if they're that much more expensive than other US-made instruments with similar specs. PRS production volume has exploded over the past decade, so what's boutique about 'em?

While we're talking prices, I'll echo Lew's sentiment about how spoiled guitarists are. A guitar-playing buddy of mine was shocked last year when he dropped over 2K on a student-level trumpet for his kid. I don't think anyone here will argue that two large can definitely get you a pro-quality guitar.

I've been saying this for a long time but I'll say it again: A lot of what you get with an expensive guitar is a decreased likelihood of disappointing quality. That means that you might not be impressed with an expensive instrument but those issues are more likely a matter of taste than an issue of materials or construction. I have a MIM Tele that kicks ass. While I scored it for $400, I spent two years running the racks before I found it. What's two years of your time, of checking out dozens and dozens of guitars, of not having that guitar worth? It was like shopping for Teles became a hobby in and of itself. If you don't have the dough, then you don't have the dough. If you do, you might be willing to part with some of it so you can spend more time enjoying the instrument and less time walking around music stores and playing guitar tech.

 

[Luke Duke]

Re: Boutique Guitar Prices

I think we should be glad we don't have to spend $50,000, $100,000 and a lot more for a fine instrument, the way classical musicians do.

We're spoiled silly. Maybe we're not as serious about music as we think we are.

On the other hand, my favorite Strat that I've ever owned is my Japanese Squier that I paid $180 for and then spent more than that putting Duncan pickups in - Custom Shop Pickups that Seymour and MJ wound for me.

But that guitar sounded resonant as all get out in the pawn shop and is a very special guitar.

Shouldn't have been...but it is.

So you don't have to spend $2000 or $3000 to get a great electric guitar.

Great post Lew! Makes for a real head scratcher.

After reading this a number of things come to mind:

First, what's "boutique"? Though I once had a wall full of 'em, PRS has priced themselves out of the Alec Lee market. Even so, their instruments aren't really any more spendy than a lot of Gibby's stuff. So is PRS really booteek? While they have a number of very pricey instruments, I dunno if they're that much more expensive than other US-made instruments with similar specs. PRS production volume has exploded over the past decade, so what's boutique about 'em?

Good call, I wouldn't call them any more boutique than Gibson or Fender.

While we're talking prices, I'll echo Lew's sentiment about how spoiled guitarists are. A guitar-playing buddy of mine was shocked last year when he dropped over 2K on a student-level trumpet for his kid. I don't think anyone here will argue that two large can definitely get you a pro-quality guitar.

+2

When I switched from being a full time tuba player to guitar player I was AMAZED how cheaply you could get a "pro level" guitar. Entry level tubas were 2k, gigging/mediocre tubas were 4k, and a pro level tuba started STARTED at 6k.

I've been saying this for a long time but I'll say it again: A lot of what you get with an expensive guitar is a decreased likelihood of disappointing quality. That means that you might not be impressed with an expensive instrument but those issues are more likely a matter of taste than an issue of materials or construction. I have a MIM Tele that kicks ass. While I scored it for $400, I spent two years running the racks before I found it. What's two years of your time, of checking out dozens and dozens of guitars, of not having that guitar worth? It was like shopping for Teles became a hobby in and of itself. If you don't have the dough, then you don't have the dough. If you do, you might be willing to part with some of it so you can spend more time enjoying the instrument and less time walking around music stores and playing guitar tech.

Good call.

...and to give Alec a little extra props it was his glowing recommendation of EBMM to everyone within ear shot that made me take the company more seriously. EBMM isn't any more boutique than PRS, but I know where every dollar I spent went on that guitar.

Luke