Re: Why I'm frustrated with Jackson
Well, this would probably be better presented over at he Jackson / Charvel forum where at least occasionally someone from JCMI drops in to read, over here at the SD Forum Jackson reps aren´t really too interested in what goes on for the most part
While many or your bones are valid ones, There´s one important thing to note here. The 2 companies in this comparison also operate with completely different mentalities.... and this directly affects their product lines. Essentially one refuses to devalue it´s name by catering to every budget minded beginner on Earth, and the other does exactly that on purpose. Let me try to explain...
The Jackson USA Select Lineup and before it the USA Professionals have ALWAYS been comprised of the most commonly ordered Custom shop options. If more people ordered for example Warriors without a Trem from the CS, then it would become a USA select model. Jackson has always been a Custom Shop first and a production line catering to instant gratification second. And this is one of the main reasons that the production offerings in the USA line have stayed the same for quite some time, because the people ordering custom Jacksons are still ordering the exact same things for the most part, and as a result the exact same options get offered in the not quite as prestigous USA select line.
ESP on the other hand simply copies what it´s endorsees want, and markets these as ESP signature models most players won´t be willing to spring for. Then they come out with a significantly lower cost (and quality) LTD version that is cosmetically identical and boasts many of the same features, and the kids go wild thinking they now have the exact same thing as a $4k guitar for $1000. This is an industrial mindset: Advertise the best of the best, sell primarily lower cost versions of it, and blur the customer´s sense of quality in the process so as to save even more next year. And this marketing has worked for ESP ever since the days where they designed their first unique body shape and stopped producing outright forgeries of Jacksons, Gibsons and Fenders. ESP also leverages things like copyright laws and similar wherever they can, for example outside the US market they still produce forgeries and call them Edwards. They can´t import them into the US for exactly that reason,. they´d be confiscated and destroyed at customs because they´re clear violations of Intellectual Property. But as soon as a private person imports one from Ishiubashi or whatever they´re called, it suddenly becomes legal to import the instrument.
Looking at these practices, it´s pretty clear that ESP more or less embodies the term "Evil Corporation". And that´s where most peoples` gripe with ESP lies, not only that of Jackson afficionados.
Re the basses...
Jackson Basses were around for years, constantly being introduced and then discontinued 2-3 years later, and some of them such as the Antigrav series were years ahead of their time. None of them ever had decent sales numbers, essentially everytime Jackson makes a Bass it gets torn apart by tha bass playing community for either being not innovative enough or too whacked out.
The whole reason ESP, Ibanez and such are constantly offering such unbelievably diverse models at almost any price point is that they´re after anybody that they can possibly get, both as customers and endorsees. This is a typical Japanese industrial mindset, hook them as young as possible, to raise your chances of a followup sale when then buy their next guitar.
Jackson on the other hand doesn´t even offer free guitars to their
endorsees, just cheaper. The mindset here being that the small fish will often switch from their 500$ budget guitar anyway to a moire prestigous brand that is known to offer higher quality. As a result, Jackson´s budget offerings are intentionally sparse, because Jackson was never intended as a budget guitar line for every Tom, Dick and Harry. So they don´t attempt to do so.
One of the overall results of this is that these days there are tons of ESP endorsees getting IMO shafted by being "directed" to play LTD instruments (Thereby fuirther marketing LTD as a top of the line instrument which is an obvious lie), wheras a Jackson endorsee is still playing a USA Jackson, which IS a top of the line instrument and doesn´t need huge marketing campaigns and dozens of cheap endorsees to prove it
