Re: Guitar tech damaged a new guitar during first setup, could this have been prevent
Well, that's a lie. You just slapped the face of every competent and experienced guitar repairman from Don Teeter, to Dan Erlewine, to Frank Ford, to me, and all the rest across the face of the planet who are happy to serve their clients - putting smiles on their faces.
Agreed... the thing is, there really are a ton of bad techs in the world. Former sandwich shop employees whose dream in life was to get a job at guitar center. Eventually they open their own shops, but it doesn't mean that they have the fine motor skills to do delicate work, or common sense. Many MANY know the right terms and how to sell you, but can't follow through. Same can be said in EVERY industry though..
That's exactly why I started my business. To combat against that. I'm in Austin. Tons of musicians here, and only 1 other shop that I personally would take my guitars to. Literally everyone that comes to me, took their guitar somewhere else first and has horror stories. I've fixed so many botched bridge installs, botched setups, you name it.
Personally, when anyone comes in for a setup, I don't care how busy I am, I talk to the customer, I plug them into an amp and let them play. I change the subject so they don't feel like their on the spot and actually play like normal... meanwhile I'm watching them.... seeing how they play, where their fingers are slipping, where they miss notes, and where on the neck they play. I'll hand them 3 different guitars.. I'll tell them the stories about those guitars while they're playing.. one has super low action, one has medium action and one has high action. I watch their faces and reactions to each. I see which one they can actually play....
Then......... I ask them what THEY want.... it's usually not what I SEE that they need... so I'll explain it to them...
Then I give them WHAT THEY NEED.... and I'll give them little pointers and actually work with them. I've had people literally double their picking or finger speed just by setting their guitar up how they needed it, vs "properly" ...
I literally spend a good hour with everyone.
Then I play the guitar myself for a good half hour to hour... then i meticulously set the guitar and play it for another hour, sometimes more while tweaking it to make it absolutely perfect..........
When a grown man plays his guitar and starts tearing up, and says "this guitar is finally something that I'll be proud to pass down to my son" you know you did your freakin job.....
With that said. I won't say that I've never messed something up, but o sure as crap never knocked a paint chip off of a guitar.... ever...
And if I did, I would tell them it happened, and the repair I made would look factory original and no one would ever know it was there, because, I know how to do so, through 2 decades of auto body experience, building hotrods and motorcycles that one awards, before I became a mechanical engineer, designing and manufacturing things for government and military agencies that required tolerances of less than 100,000ths of an inch.
I'm very detail oriented.
But yeah, almost no one else is that way.
I hate to sound preachy..... but this annoys me, and like i said, it's exactly why i went into business, and its exactly why I'm the fastest growing shop in my city and exactly why there are major brands chomping at the bit to put stuff on my house brand guitars, and exactly why I am one out of 22 certified installers of Evertune bridges in the entire US.
I'm attempting to add photos of 3 different guitars who have other "highly qualified tech's" handy work that I've had to fix THIS WEEK so far...
