Gibson files for bankruptcy protection

[chef free]

https://www.wsj.com/articles/guitar-maker-gibson-brands-files-for-bankruptcy-1525177170

[gibsonfan159]

😢

Oh well, that's what happens when a company gets too big for it's britches. Maybe they'll auction off the thousands they haven't sold and I can afford to buy a few.

[Stryder1978]

....much like McDonald's did in supplying "gourmet" burgers and an ever expanding menu, Gibson killed it's own brand by pricing itself out of the market.  Give the people what they want at a price they can afford!

[reids]

Mismanagement, bad investments , wrong decisions in price increases over the years. Fender has got their prices out of hand, too, but they haven’t made the series of mistakes that Gibson has made.

R😎

[Mithril46]

This is very interesting. Over the last 5-7 years arguably, Gibson has half turned into a company which is more interested in

having their instruments be looked upon as sound investments more so than fair price for a great guitar for musicians. And I

have tried quite a few Gibson guitars from $1200-$2000 that have technical/cosmetic issues which should never be there at

that price point. Of course if you try enough out in that $ range, you'll find a winner. But compared to PRS or Fender, at least,

those companies above $1000 tend to have better quality control and value for your purchase. Actually, to be fair, all three

of the companies mentioned have headed into the now considerable amounts of "boutique" versions of their stock instruments,

$3000-$5000 +++. There is now a growing market active for a while making hand-made instruments, and those small batch

makers usually command $2-10,000, so the giants wanted in as well, as the resale values are obviously higher than craft

builders. Although if someone famous endorses or gets on stage with a craft guitar, possible jackpot. Anyway, Mesa Boogie

amps ratcheted up their prices, and many stores dropped them. However, they are a gold standard for quality, build, and performance, and they did much R&D to build all kinds of different sounding amps, not just the Rectifiers for metal and the others for the Santana "sound", etc. What R&D did Gibson do ??

[SymphonyX]

Maybe some Transhumanist Entrepreneur will scoop up Gibson and lead human evolution.   Maybe down the road humans will have different musical farts or something. 

[IpMan]

1 hour ago, Mithril46 said:

This is very interesting. Over the last 5-7 years arguably, Gibson has half turned into a company which is more interested in

having their instruments be looked upon as sound investments more so than fair price for a great guitar for musicians. And I

have tried quite a few Gibson guitars from $1200-$2000 that have technical/cosmetic issues which should never be there at

that price point. Of course if you try enough out in that $ range, you'll find a winner. But compared to PRS or Fender, at least,

those companies above $1000 tend to have better quality control and value for your purchase. Actually, to be fair, all three

of the companies mentioned have headed into the now considerable amounts of "boutique" versions of their stock instruments,

$3000-$5000 +++. There is now a growing market active for a while making hand-made instruments, and those small batch

makers usually command $2-10,000, so the giants wanted in as well, as the resale values are obviously higher than craft

builders. Although if someone famous endorses or gets on stage with a craft guitar, possible jackpot. Anyway, Mesa Boogie

amps ratcheted up their prices, and many stores dropped them. However, they are a gold standard for quality, build, and performance, and they did much R&D to build all kinds of different sounding amps, not just the Rectifiers for metal and the others for the Santana "sound", etc. What R&D did Gibson do ??

This! It cannot be said enough. I know personally several professional musicians who are completely fed up with Gibson. You drop $3,000 on a LP the damn thing better be perfect and have a sweet setup right out of the case. That is rarely ever the case though as there are issues galore in manufacturing. I know a guy who dropped $6,000 on the Alex Lifeson LP with Floyd Rose and he had to send it back due to bad wiring. WTF!!! For $6,000 I expect the fucking corpse re-animated of Mr. Gibson himself making the fucking guitar, and making it perfect at that.

It seems their whole approach since 2004 has been, "Well, we're GIBSON, so we will just trade on the fact we made some sweet guitars back in the day, so...yeah."

[mknopfler]

Was it Gibson who the Obama administration targeted for their use of some types of wood ?
Didn't thee feds raid them at least two times and confiscate tools and computers and equipment etc. ?

[IpMan]

1 hour ago, mknopfler said:

Was it Gibson who the Obama administration targeted for their use of some types of wood ?
Didn't thee feds raid them at least two times and confiscate tools and computers and equipment etc. ?

Yes, it was Gibson. Ebony & Rosewood in particular.

https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2012/08/06/158203277/gibson-guitar-settles-criminal-case-over-exotic-wood-imports

[Brigante]

15 hours ago, Stryder1978 said:

Give the people what they want at a price they can afford!

Exactly. And it pretty much is that simple. Cover that and you're solid, you can go from there - but lose track of it and you're on your way up shit creek.
Gibson appear to have brought this on themselves. Well, as ye sow and all that...

 

[Urozep]

While I don't disagree with comments made. The Ultimate problem is that young kids simply don't play the guitar!! It's. Oy congruent with " modern music" and can't be played on an iPhone. I'm afraid it will slide into the realm of rare players and artisans 

[EaglesOfOneNest]

Wow, this is interesting news. I am not a musician (just a fan!) but years ago, I was on a business trip in Memphis and the company I worked for arranged a private, after-hours tour of their facility there. It was fascinating! 

[chef free]

Rumors are flying about Joe Bonamassa buying Gibson Guitars.

 

[Urozep]

 He will lose his cash

[anniemouse]

Are other guitar firms in good shape ?.

[gibsonfan159]

Gibson isn't actually going anywhere. Filing chapter 11 has more to do with bargaining with the shareholders than going out of business. They're still gonna produce and hopefully will get their shit in order. Looks like Gibson is "Too big too fail".

[Silverseas]

Meh . . Their guitars have sucked since they left Kalamazoo. Tokai (MIJ) has made better guitars for decades. 

[IpMan]

1 hour ago, Silverseas said:

Meh . . Their guitars have sucked since they left Kalamazoo. Tokai (MIJ) has made better guitars for decades. 

Pretty much. I bought a 2007 Studio a few years back. Good quality but the setup sucked. Had to adjust the truss rod & the bridge until perfect. Now I understand some setup for personal preference is required but when you get string buzz on every fret south of the 12th fret on all strings except for the A WTF???

I have a PRS Custom 24 which is one of my go to guitars and I love the shit outta it.  Only problem is the whammy bar, just like a standard Strat bar you dive that bitch more than twice and BAM! out of tune. Maybe I will upgrade to a Floyd Rose. Those Floyd Rose bars are the shit!

[Mithril46]

Perhaps another issue is that Gibson Jr.( Epiphone) really makes awful guitars in general, although for some reason the

acoustics, semi-hollows and jazz boxes above $500-$600 tend to be fair to pretty good. Below that, you have dried out necks,

dead frets, fret buzzing unless the action is set unacceptably high, although some of the pickups are actually good. But Fender

and PRS can build almost professional instruments for less than $500, just trying a few to get a winner. I have sometimes tried

3 or 4 $1500+ Gibsons in a row, and even allowing for drifting setups and such, most of the guitars were maybe 20% better at

most than $500 various offshore brand versions. What's happening now is online and retail quite a few Gibsons' are being

discounted unlike anytime before, so I would wait a little more, regardless of a takeover or restructure, you could get a great

deal,  not just good. I have a 71' Les Paul that sounds great and almost magically needs almost no attention to work fine, and the same for my 02' ES-446. These guitars don't need constant adjustments, daily nut lubes, or retuning every song, etc.. There

is a reason Gibson is a legend: hope they find they're way back !!

[IpMan]

15 minutes ago, Mithril46 said:

Perhaps another issue is that Gibson Jr.( Epiphone) really makes awful guitars in general, although for some reason the

acoustics, semi-hollows and jazz boxes above $500-$600 tend to be fair to pretty good. Below that, you have dried out necks,

dead frets, fret buzzing unless the action is set unacceptably high, although some of the pickups are actually good. But Fender

and PRS can build almost professional instruments for less than $500, just trying a few to get a winner. I have sometimes tried

3 or 4 $1500+ Gibsons in a row, and even allowing for drifting setups and such, most of the guitars were maybe 20% better at

most than $500 various offshore brand versions. What's happening now is online and retail quite a few Gibsons' are being

discounted unlike anytime before, so I would wait a little more, regardless of a takeover or restructure, you could get a great

deal,  not just good. I have a 71' Les Paul that sounds great and almost magically needs almost no attention to work fine, and the same for my 02' ES-446. These guitars don't need constant adjustments, daily nut lubes, or retuning every song, etc.. There

is a reason Gibson is a legend: hope they find they're way back !!

Those Norlin era (69'-77') LP's are awesome and very underrated. I always thought the cross banding was a good idea and produced some damn fine instruments. Page's Purple'ish #3 LP was a 1969 and was my favorite of his LP's.

[gibsonfan159]

On 5/3/2018 at 6:19 PM, anniemouse said:

Are other guitar firms in good shape ?.

I've never played one, but I've seen a lot of comments on PRS that say they're going down the same path, rising prices and shitty QC. 

[Mithril46]

PRS is getting weaker on the QC, but not yet in the Gibson range. I bought a Santana SE( first non U.S. guitar, made in Korea) in

2001, $549 with exc soft case, great guitar, a serious instrument. You can spend the same now, but not with the "free" substantial soft case, and the fretwork, fit, and finish, can vary a bit within the same non U.S.model. But still almost always on 

par with Fender at that price point and almost always superior to Epiphone. U.S.PRS prices have increased, but my U.S. 2014

custom 22 semi-hollow body( 2-day promotional demo model, A+, $1,050 ebay) is far superior to any Gibson at that price, although fully new at the time, $1,400, still a Gibson killer. Although now new the guitar is $1,800, the value factor is narrowing,

some arrogance seems to be evident. Many feel that PRS has been superior to Gibson to a degree for a long time as far as

guitar  ergonomics, tuning stability, tonal versatility and overall quality, but only recently has it seemed that the cheaper U.S.

models have started to approach the "personality" of great Gibson pickups. I remember trying out in 2000 or 2001 some U.S.

PRS models, only the $2200 McCarty had the "rainbow" magic of great Gibson pickups.Ah, whatever, it's all debatable.

[76229]

On 5/4/2018 at 12:41 AM, gibsonfan159 said:

Gibson isn't actually going anywhere. Filing chapter 11 has more to do with bargaining with the shareholders than going out of business. They're still gonna produce and hopefully will get their shit in order. Looks like Gibson is "Too big too fail".

This. Chapter 7 is fatal, chapter 11 at least allows you to come out of it.