To clarify, GC, by their own design, is contractually obligated to give the majority of their guitar space to Fender and Gibson. That is what Fender, Gibson, and GC want. It leaves little room for everyone else on PURPOSE! With GC employee incentives to sell guitars, they are going to sell what is in front of them and what makes their bosses happy and that is selling F&G. If the salesman gets incentives for moving merchandise, you know the manager does. How do I know this? Many conversations with present and former GC employees and managers. When a clueless or unknowing customer comes in the door, they are guided to what is on the floor. A I demonstrated in my previous post, they lie or mislead potential PRS customers to the other brands. I have seen this more than once with my own eyes and ears. Sad but true.
Additionally, in the past, I had an evening conversation over Beers with an Ibanez employee. We were discussing this same topic, but insert Ibanez in place of PRS. GC does not carry the best sellers from Ibanez, only very few niche market priced guitars that are out the door quick. If you want an Ibanez from GC, you are going to have to order it, just as you would a PRS. He explained GC will simply not represent the entire, or even half the Ibanez line. He said Ibanez had to build specific exclusive guitars for GC at low low prices for GC to expand their Ibanez line just slightly. It is a no brainer that cheaper guitars are cheaper in quality. Furthermore, when the exclusive guitars were gone, so was the extra wall space for the Ibanez line. Now think about why that is. GC has the luxury of not representing the full line of brands to please F&G who pump out tons of cheap guitars that many of which are overpriced and some of which that are sold as premium guitars. . Meanwhile, they screw the mom and pop shops by having the ability to order in a guitar at a cheaper price than the mom and pops who cant afford to carry the whole line anyway. Who wins, it is not the branded company, it is GC only. Imagine that! I know of three people who closed their music stores when GC was on the rise after the buy in/out of Musiciansfriend because F&G came to these guys and told them to order an outrageous inventory or lose the line. Not only did they lose the line, they lost their stores in the process. Two other store owner friends had this happen to them as well. They survived because one carries PRS and sells the hell out of them and the other carries brands GC does not. To that end, it is not the economy, PRS is maxing production ( save two crazy good years) and those guitars are not going to GC. They are going to the mom and pop stores that some of which are represented here on this forum Stores that have top sales of PRS. So it is not the economy, it is bullying practices by GC that PRS cannot and will not exploit without compromising their brand to please GC. That is the reason GC says "PRS just aint selling" BULL$HI#! Kudos to PRS for not taking their crap and enough sensible musicians and guitar affiicanados out there to offset all the GC lies that PRS aint selling. The company is not hurting and kicking butt and doing so without GC. That says alot.
