Rant: The Jackson dealers in my area SUCK

[PowerTube]

Several months ago, I called one of the Jackson dealers in a little podunk town about 100 miles away. He said that he had a transparent blue SL2H and he quoted me a decent price on it. One week later, I decided that I would make a road trip on Saturday and possibly pick it up. I called late in the week to make sure he still had it. No dice. It had already sold. But has he brought another USA in since? Of course not, because "we don't have the market for them around here. This is Fender and Gibson country." Hello? Is this thing on? Excuse me, but you just SOLD the one USA Jackson you had!

It makes absolutely no sense to me. It's almost like they're actually saying that they don't buy them because they can't keep them in stock. This is like if the guy who owns the snack machine stops putting honey buns in because they sell out too quickly.

And of course, they all give me the obligatory line about how they can order anything I want. Sure, but so can Guitar Center and they're only about eight miles away.

I seriously wish that Jackson would partially go "Gibson" on them and demand that they order at least one USA for every certain number of imports they order. I can understand the little small town dealers being a bit scared of a USA, but when there isn't one to be found within a 300 mile radius, it tells me that Jackson (or Fender, as the case may be) needs to do something.

[thetroy]

It's my belief that more people would be interested in USA Jacksons if they knew that they exist and could try some.

[Special-K]

Guess what me and Nazgul(and other guys from Slovenia, EU) know this problem...
I have ordered my RR-3 without testing it...I`ve tested it when it came here...

Before that I tested (3 or 4 years ago) a RR-1 and a Soloist(I think...I can`t really remember) in Germany...

[UFORocks]

It's my belief that more people would be interested in USA Jacksons if they knew that they exist and could try some.

I agree, you dont know what you dont know, and probably wont think to ask.

Until my old man introduced me to Jackson gutiars (about 10 years ago now) I had never heard of them. If its not a gibson, fender, or Ibanez then most gutiar shops act like it doesn't exist.

[777]

All they carry are the imports and only a few of those. I asked a few why that is and the answer was pretty much the same: "The kids, by and large, are the only ones interrested in those kind of guitars and they do not have the money for the high-end stuff. The older folks who do have the money for high-end guitars only know Fender and Gibson and that is what they ask for."

Exactally! it's what sells (quick) that hangs on the shelfs, not the tire kickers that want a USA for import prices! (Sounds like the classifides here......)

[Monster Joe]

In Belgium there is one (1) store that has USA Jacksons in stock.
He sells them over list price... 3300€ for a USA Jackson.
Of course, if you have to order them from somewhere else, you'll pay 2300€ and may have to wait for a year or two

[Boomdoggy]

I agree.I have not been to the one big Pittsburgh Jackson store for awhile,but GC never has USA Jacksons.I call them to check.Sometimes the guitar guys there don't even know what a Soloist or Dinky is!!!!
As far as pleasing Gibson,I was under the impression that GC only has to buy 1 dealership for the whole chain.Maybe that isn't true.Maybe they have some kind of agreement about sales,but my friend(owns a small shop) told me they don't have to.
GC should feel some kind of obligation to carry more Jackson USA's.Besides Gibson and Fender what guitars have been so influential?

[wilkinsi]

i'm going mail order from now on. i will be taking a trip to birmingham soon to check out a mail order co. that has it's own shop there, but i'm not walking out of there with a guitar because people on the trains are incredibly inconsiderate.

[darrellm]

Know what you mean about trains...and buses, bought my Les Paul from a dealer in one of the dodgier areas of London, it felt like a loooong bus journey back to the carpark knowing the value of what I was carrying.

Back to Jacksons (and Charvels), I've only ever seen a handful of USAs here in the UK in 20 years of looking. And these days all the shops round here seem to stock only Gibson and Fender, plus the odd Ibanez.

Ah, for the good ol' 80s when guitar shops were an Aladdin's Cave... Jackson/Charvel, Fender, Hamer, Kramer, Ibanez, Steinberger...not a Les Paul in sight....remember seeing my first Floyd Rose on a Kramer V circa 1984, and going in to pick up an SG only to come out with a white Charvel Model4A (still got it)

[Marcheville]

Sometimes you get lucky though...

Wifer picked up a month old RR-24 with the yellow bevels and the reversed inlays which was in perfect shape today about 5 minutes after it got traded in at the local Daddy's for...$900!!! This thing is essentially brand new. Plus they threw in a set of Ernie Balls and a leather guitar strap.

However, for new Jacksons they did not have a single American made or for that matter anything KV or RR series. All JS "strat bodied" stuff.



Beat that! I need to post a video clip of her working through this punked out version of Mott's "All The Young Dudes" - now if I can just get her off my Marshall and into her own "killer amp" peace and harmony will be restored into the world.

This thing (RR-24) plays every bit as good as my RR-1 except it's minus a neck pick up.

No way I could get a new/used RR-1 or RR-5 for her for $900. I could have gotten her an RR-3 but they of course, did not have any.

Schwing!!!




Right place - right time I guess!

March

[Nazgul]

What are you waiting for??? Start a thread about it and take atleast 20 pics!

[Robotechnology]

The 3 GC's around here never stocked USA Jackson until about 9 months ago they started to get them in. They're usually black though. They each recently received a black King V, black Randy, and trans blue SL2H. They've all sold the black SL2H's they had and whatever Charvels they had (about 4). Imports, they're well stocked. 2 to 3 DK2M's, an RR3, an a DK2 at each location usually.

Hmm... this is my 1,000th post... that's funny... I feel kind of... different...

[arjacobson]

80/20 guys- The stores stock 20% of the available stuff that will sell to 80% of the people who walk in the door- They could care less about a few guys wanting quality guitars when they have so many others buying all the imported junk. I'm sure the mark up is pretty good on the crap instruments. I'm getting so fed up with all the crap guitars out now that i have started building my own. Not gonna pay a bizillion dollars because some guy is endorsed/supposedly uses brand X. Not gonna do it...

[Marcheville]

80/20 guys- The stores stock 20% of the available stuff that will sell to 80% of the people who walk in the door- They could care less about a few guys wanting quality guitars when they have so many others buying all the imported junk. I'm sure the mark up is pretty good on the crap instruments. I'm getting so fed up with all the crap guitars out now that i have started building my own. Not gonna pay a bizillion dollars because some guy is endorsed/supposedly uses brand X. Not gonna do it...

I play a circa 80's RR-1 so I am a bit spoiled. When we went in to Daddy's today they had 5 Jackson's out of 100+ guitars. One was a putrid green SL-3 and the other 4 were JS series superstrats.

I know this might sound like heresy here but the JS series stuff is crap! Plain crap! I tried two of them into a Line 6 they had there and the necks are garbage. The frets were dead past the 15th fret and the E & A strings had some spots on the fret board that absolutely were a little flat. This was the same problem on two JS guitars I fiddled with.

That is not to say some of the other low end stuff is any better. I found it laughable that they had something like 50 Gibson/Epiphone guitars in the shop and I'm not really keen on those either. They had the usual Ibanez low end stuff (no RG550's or JEMs) and a ton of Schecter stuff (some was OK). They are really pushing the low end fender junk with the HH set up out of Mexico.

Oddly enough, Gibson has gone way down hill IMHO. They had a "silverburst" color SG in the shop. The toadie tried like mad to get my wife into this (because he did not have the RR-24 when we first walked in). It was funny, he was babbling on how these are selling for $2500 on Ebay but he could let me have this one for $1600 with the case. He rambled on how it was "collectible" and then my wife shut him right up with, "I want to play the guitar, not collect it and put it on my wall!" Go crazy lady!



Anyhow, this "$2500" SG was not half the beat up old 74 SG I learned on (with the old Bigsby tailpiece) - I do not know if the wood they use is different or maybe I am just a geezer and I remember this stuff all wrong but my old SG seemed heavier, had a better neck and MUCH longer sustain. And I paid $450 for it (used) back in 1982ish when I started to learn. It seems Gibbies prices went sky high and their quality dropped.

Hey, not all the import guitars are junk (after all we did get the RR-24) but the low end stuff? Maybe we just hit on a few lemons but I would find these to be unplayable and if I were a rank beginner I think I would have a hard time learning on one of these despite the "way cool" colors.

The best part of our run in with the toadie - he was trying so hard to sell us this "special SG" he totally blasted Jackson guitars. He said they were "skateboard" guitars for one dimensional players - the SG was soooo much more versatile, we should buy that instead.

I guess I'm a bit of a snob for higher end guitars but for my money, Jackson is THE BEST deal on any made guitar made in America. For $1600 (what this SG would have cost) I could have bought a USA made RR-1 (or come close to it) or a DK-1. I might have even found a PC series guitar if I hunted around long enough.

IMHO...any of these SMOKES an SG when compared dollar to dollar.

Seems everyone is cashing in on cheap labor in Asia. PRS has these Korean SE guitars which aren't exactly "cheap" but they are not anything like the American made PRS stuff.

I'm gonna try to track down an older Charvel Model 6 to play around with.

My wife hasn't put this RR-24 down for more than 20 minutes since she got it today.

Anyone know anything about their USA made basses? Daddy's has a used USA made bass (looked to have one P and one J pick up in it) for $600 with the case (used) but it's got a nice coat of dust on it and I bet I can take it out of there for a lot less!

March

[Marcheville]

80/20 guys- The stores stock 20% of the available stuff that will sell to 80% of the people who walk in the door- They could care less about a few guys wanting quality guitars when they have so many others buying all the imported junk. I'm sure the mark up is pretty good on the crap instruments. I'm getting so fed up with all the crap guitars out now that i have started building my own. Not gonna pay a bizillion dollars because some guy is endorsed/supposedly uses brand X. Not gonna do it...

The only problem with the 80/20 rule is the 20% of us who know what we want and are willing to pay for it are totally turned off by the chain stores. GC or Daddy's needs to sell a lot more JS series Jacksons to make the same bank they would on a single PC-1. I'm not going to order a guitar that takes 8-12 weeks to arrive that I haven't played yet (even a CS order, forget it!) and I am not going to pay or even put 50% down on something they do not have that I can get shipped from the net tomorrow either.

I guess the "sell the cheapest stuff to the masses" approach must be the better business model because if selling high end axes was the way to go then for sure GC and Daddy's would be doing it.

Still, if I owned a shop...for sure I would rather have a "boutique" place that catered to people who knew what they were after and were willing to pay for quality and service. Daddy's had crap in there. Not a single Marshall tube driven head - all solid state. Who thinks they can buy a "real" half stack for $600?!? If you have to have the Marshall name that bad...

I gotta get the wifer a new amp. She is trying to commandeer my old Marshall and I would like my Roland back eventually too.

And at Daddy's...for $599 I can get her a bright red "Marshall" half stack

March