EVH "Frankie" Replica to be at NAMM

[Joe_Steeler]

Well I don't know if that was a typo or what.
But we all know that a concerted effort has been put on by FMIC to consolidate all CS operations into one shop, one overall managing head, one marketing dept, etc.
The team leadership by M. Eldred and then each "make" has a local manager.
Maybe it will emerge that Fender IS the mothership and the rest are "brands".

As I understand it from my dealer contacts is that they are not too shure themselves (FMIC) on how it will all fall out. They are still putting teams and people in places. M. Eldred and friends have gone around the nation visiting key dealers to deliver the news and explain plans for the future. Some I know and some others are being kept close to the vest.

[AK47]

In case you were not taking notes look at what the paperwork says nothing about Charvel.

As for it all becoming one custom shop remeber our biggest fears as Jackson/Charvel fans during the FMIC buyout. Looks like they came true and I will not be suprised if they slowly kill the whole CJ line in the next 10 years.

[Jack Napalm]

I think it has yet to be determined if it is a Fender or not, exactly who Chip Ellis works for and how the EVH Brand fits in to all this.

Chip is a Charvel/Jackson employee.

[mattsmusiccenter]

This guitar is ONLY being sold through Charvel dealers and Chip works for JCMI... Do the math.

[Jeff Albertson]

Looks like EVH branding to me, especially with the glam on the EVH gear website. Similar to the way the hand striped ones were linked to Charvel ala http://www.evh-guitars.com/ . Of course, there is an inevitably visible association to FMIC. Eddie got more brands than GM.

[sully]

This guitar is ONLY being sold through Charvel dealers and Chip works for JCMI... Do the math.

i hear ya matt, and i get the evh branding thing. i guess i don't understand why there's zero mention of charvel in this. then again, it's nothing that i really care about; it was more of a head scratcher than anything else.

sully

[dg]

I think it all has to do with marketing the new EVH brand and its relationship w/ Fender. I agree with AK47 that this kind of shows that JCMI isn't the completely separate entity that some of us wanted to believe it was.

[LastInLine]

This guitar is ONLY being sold through Charvel dealers and Chip works for JCMI... Do the math.

I don't doubt you. But then you see something like this.....

In case you were not taking notes look at what the paperwork says nothing about Charvel.

......and it kind of muddy's things up a bit.

[shreddermon]

Some of you guys are reading way too much into this. Geesh. FMIC - as in Fender Musical Instruments Corp - is the corporate parent of J/C. So freakin' what if the flyer says "Fender" on it? Whether Charvel or Fender, they're both under the FMIC umbrella, so "Fender" is accurate for both. It's the EVH "brand", as done through FMIC. And within FMIC, it's produced by the J/C custom shop and sold through Charvels dealers.

Bottom line: it's EVH's guitar line, as made by the J/C custom shop and sold by Charvel dealers.

[mattsmusiccenter]

The new EVH amp sounded pretty freakin' good last night, especially with Eddie playing through it... All his products will have the EVH brand name, which is it's own company. The products are being built, distributed and marketed by FMIC. So on top of being a Charvel and Jackson dealer, I'm also an EVH dealer now. It's not clear yet if the EVH line will be offered to Fender dealers, it's Charvel dealers only at this time though.

[btx109]

I was at the NAMM Show yesterday and spent several minutes in the Fender room checking out the Frankenstein replica. A few thoughts...one, that guitar IMO is a work of functional art, if one is into that kind of thing. The amount of work and detail in that thing is nothing short of amazing, for what it is and represents. Two, the way Fender has the room arranged, it seems to me that the EVH brand is akin to the relationship between Michael Jordan's products and Nike (if you follow sports marketing). It's not a Fender or Charvel product, it is a separate entity within the Fender organization (my interpretation from seeing the display and information cards) using its marketing and manufacturing resources. Three, even at what, $25 grand, that guitar is a better deal than what Charvel is doing with the $10,000 line of Grover Jackson limited editions. Now, that struck me as attempting to rape the Charvel customers and collectors by inventing some kind of "vintage, classic" vibe for what is essentially a bolt-on guitar with a standard graphic paint job you could get through GMW for a couple hundred bucks. I thought that was worse and more transparent gouging than PRS's Private Stock line or some of Gibson's high-dollar reissues.

[sully]

glenn, the jordan/nike analogy is a good one. makes sense to me.

[777]

Frankinstrat sold OUT in 15 minutes!!!

http://news.yahoo.com/s/macworld/20070121/tc_macworld/evh20070120_0

[MEX3]

That is sold to dealers, not actual customers right?

[VinceV]

That is sold to dealers, not actual customers right?

Exactly, that means it sold out to Dealers in 15 minutes. Big Fn Deal. I heard that some stores took a dozen or more. Of course many of these will sell, there are many collectors/fans who want them. At the show this guitar was a huge draw everytime I went up to the Fender room, there was a crowd around this thing, and from what I got from the conversations I could pick up, lots and lots of people thought it was the coolest thing they had seen.

Just watch though after the 1st batch of customers pick theirs up. I think you will see lots of these just sitting at dealers stores, or popping up on Ebay never getting a bid. Just like the Blackie guitars that have popped up for sale in Forums or on Ebay.