From the mid 90's - 2010, Gibson had access to a lot of good wood, and unfortunately for them, they got busted by the EPA/FBI, mostly for their illegally harvested rosewood. Luckily for me, my fretboard is dark and probably that good rosewood. The tops were also better before the beginning of the 08 recession.
After the beginning of the recession, Gibson began cheapening things quite a bit, like cutting back on monster flametops, and made more models with satin backs, like the Traditional Pro. Then in 2010, Gibson was affected heavily by the Tennessee flood, where it crippled the company for awhile. Around 2011 to 2012, our own crappy government practically toppled a great American business by raiding them, and who knows how many skilled workers they lost around this time. They took a lot of Gibson's good wood, and forced the factory to start making fretboards out of maple and Richlite, a laminate composite material. There may be nothing wrong with that from a playing/tone standpoint, but those guitars will always be less desirable to collectors.
Moving along, Gibson began installing the robot tuners on too many good models, which most guitarists didn't want or need, and then in 2015 Gibson (Henry J) lost their damm minds. Nobody asked for Gibson to widen their fretboards and add a brass nut!!! Doubled with robot tuners, PCB electronics, cheaper finishes, and the horrible "Les Paul deathbed scribble logo".....I patented that by the way! LOL 2015 will always be the year of the Gibson mistakes. They even had to send normal tuners to be installed by their dealers to boost their waning sales. At the end of 2015, they heavily discounted the models to get them to sell. In 2016, they started getting back to normal, but slowly.
So, 2008 is a prime year for Gibson....and pretty much all music equipment made before this time.
