My GMW experience,

[jgcable]

Re: My GMW experience,

Customer satisfaction is everything when you are in the custom guitar manufacturing business. Sometimes you have to take it on the chin to make your customer happy. By what I have read, this didn't happen. There are obvious flaws in the workmanship that should be corrected without question or arguement. I don't necessarily agree with you bringing your guitar to a local tech for a fret job though. I would have boxed it back up and sent it back to GMW and had them deal with it. Bringing a 3rd party into the situation just complicated things.

[peedenmark7]

Re: My GMW experience,

hey vic, I'm curious when all is said and done, what did you actually save $-wise in not buying this from jackson in the first place ????

I see lots of guys having c/j look alikes built by gmw and now more than ever cant understand why anyone would do so when you can have "anything you want" on a pointy charvel made by the folks that did them in the first place....
now that gmw cant do s-heads whats the point ?

for a few hundred bucks more I'll take the warranty , workmanship and integrity of a proven company that stands behind their work ,over nominal savings any day...
In thirty years there will still be charvels & jacksons being bought and sold.. will the same be said for lees copies of them ? I am thinking no at this time.

its unfortunate the only way to dan is through lee.

I have had my own share of mishaps with lee, but theres no sense in beating a dead horse...
I hope he makes things right "for you" .

[~K~]

Re: My GMW experience,

[ QUOTE ]
Hey Paddok...how close are your 12th fret dots? I've got some on a SD neck that was reworked at GMW that you can kick field goals through.

[/ QUOTE ]

This has been the problem with several SD Charvel restores I've heard about. I've seen the pictures too.. Someone who is revered as the top expert on restoration of old charvels should be more attentive to detail ..

As far as this problem it certainly seems like Lee could be taking atvantage of the distance between seller and buyer.

Vic as far as the ebay thing drop me an email direct and lets talk .

[charvelguy]

Re: My GMW experience,

[ QUOTE ]
Customer satisfaction is everything when you are in the custom guitar manufacturing business. Sometimes you have to take it on the chin to make your customer happy. By what I have read, this didn't happen. There are obvious flaws in the workmanship that should be corrected without question or arguement. I don't necessarily agree with you bringing your guitar to a local tech for a fret job though. I would have boxed it back up and sent it back to GMW and had them deal with it. Bringing a 3rd party into the situation just complicated things.

[/ QUOTE ]

yeah, that was kinda my feeling on it too. Having been alerted to the problem, I would have had Lee correct it...especially if it carried any type workmanship gaurantee. When you are dealing with a credibility or workmanship issue, you really do not want to start watering that down with another set of tools involved..but it also seems the problem became progressively worse as further issues presented themselves to be addressed.

I can also appreacite not wanting to constantly ship the guitar out over the ocean and not receive it back in an undertermined length of time either. It is a give n take.

[BigDaddyD]

Re: My GMW experience,

[ QUOTE ]
Guys don't discount GMW just because you hear a couple complaints. I'am willing to bet they have a 99% customer satisfaction record. Would you not buy something from an eBay seller who several thousand transactions and had 99% positive feedback?

[/ QUOTE ]

While I agree that an EBAY seller with 99% positive feedback record would certainly get my business. GMW thrives from forums such as this. This forum in particular is their exact target market and they get plenty of business from the free advertising that they have gotten here. That is why this situation is and SHOULD be so damaging to them. To literally F**K over someone from your target market in so many different ways is bullshit. I mean first, he won't accomodate the actual "custom" order, but won't admit to it so the client has to alter his dream guitar. Then he screws up pretty much every major aspect of the guitar. 3rd, it took 2 years to produce a piece of crap. 4th, he won't take responsibility for the actions, won't fix them, or refund the money..and finally BELITTLES THE COST OF A $1700 + instrument. That is absolutly disgusting. I have never had a GMW made, but I recently had plans to have 1 and possibly another that I wanted made. It will not happen now. GMW can kiss my ass for there attitude with regards to this guitar. I can understand mistakes. Shit happesn. No one is perfect. Customer service comes directly from HOW YOU HANDLE THOSE MISTAKES. If Lee doesn't want to be bothered with this guitar, then he should offer a full refund at the least. Then it would be out of his hair and he could then fix it and EBAY and make his money back.

I belong to many forums, many of which have "Forum Dealers". I know that exists here. On many of the other forums, these "Dealers" would have been banned from the forum for less than this. I for one will never use GMW for anything unless this is resolved properly. I am sickened by Lee's actions, regardless how much abnormal they are of him. He gets a lot of business both directly and indirectly because of the JCF and other forums like. This issue needs to be addressed pronto. [img]/images/graemlins/mad.gif[/img]

[Ozz666]

Re: My GMW experience,

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Guys don't discount GMW just because you hear a couple complaints. I'am willing to bet they have a 99% customer satisfaction record. Would you not buy something from an eBay seller who several thousand transactions and had 99% positive feedback?

[/ QUOTE ]

That 1% 'bad feedback' has a lot more weight when it's someone you know. Plus stunts like offering to sell the guitar and give him the proceeds minus 10% goes beyond bad feedback imho.

In the grand scheme of things, we can all vote with our wallets. Personally, I'd avoid GMW, but they obviously have more work than they can handle.

Pete

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree...I had 2 projects that were going to be sent to Lee, but especially now...this incident...as well as a few other *bad* stories I've heard first hand from honest people...my projects will be sent off to someone who I have confidence in...

- Joel

[brett8388]

Re: My GMW experience,

Joel, who are you going to use? I also need someone if Lee doesn't correct this situation.

Brett

[slo100]

Re: My GMW experience,

In my experience, Lee has been more "gruff" to deal with as the years have rolled by. In the beginning he was open to work and would fix issues and work with folks a lot more than he appears to now.

I have had Lee work on eight guitars of mine. The best experience I had was when he shipped a newly refinned Charvel back to me that developed a bad neck pocket stress crack in the clearcoat. He was not happy but had me ship it back and redid it. I was very impressed and very happy with that service.

Of those eight guitars only one was I unhappy with and that was with an original Charvel that I had him replace the fretboard because it had been poorly scalloped. He put these cheesy milky white looking dots on the neck that I was very unhappy with. He basically told me to buy dots I wanted, ship it back, and pay him to put other dots on.

My opinion is that all the work he has done for people that inhabit this board and all the resulting referral business really gave him a jump start...perhaps even enough to launch the Empire line. I am not saying all the credit goes to us but what other close-knit group of guitar players who want Jake E. Lee and Warren DeMartini Charvels besides us are out there? We're the guys that pay for brass hardware, Charvel bodies, necks, and high-dollar finishes!

I dunno, I can only think that he has a decent run rate of business from other ventures and product lines that the whole retro-Charvel thing is not really necessary. Otherwise you would not see this kind of situation.

The first thing is I hope this situation gets resolved amicably.

The second thing is I hope this is an exception not a new rule of how Lee is treating our market segment. The question is if there is anyone else out there who can provide the products and services we get from him now? If he feels he has us as a captive customer base...he can do as he pleases.

Good luck Gene!
Bret

[kmanick]

Re: My GMW experience,

Bret you may be right, he may feel like he's got us by the balls, but a couple of more stories like this and I think he may see a significant drop in orders.
I for one am now waiting to see how he resolves this
before I place an order with him, and that just sucks because the GMW I already have is a piece of art.

[shredmonster]

Re: My GMW experience,

Maybe some people here should call GMW to let them know word gets around when they do stuff like this.

I had in the back of my mind some day to order a custom GMW.

No way now.

[BigDaddyD]

Re: My GMW experience,

[ QUOTE ]
Maybe some people here should call GMW to let them know word gets around when they do stuff like this.

I had in the back of my mind some day to order a custom GMW.

No way now.

[/ QUOTE ]

That shouldn't be necessary. Good customer service and quality work are paramount to a successful business. If he wants to start putting out subpar work AND have a miserable attitude about it, he will suffer when his business drops off. We as a group shouldn't have to beg for him to fix someone's order.

[Dreamland_Rebel]

Re: My GMW experience,

just more reason to go to Sully instead.

[brett8388]

Re: My GMW experience,

Who else is knowledgable, trustworthy, and capable of restorations? I'm not talking a scuff and paint job - I'm talking frets, binding, neck straightening, etc. Real luthier work. I have a valuable guitar that needs to go somewhere immediately, and if not Lee, then who???

PM me if you want.

Brett

[neilli]

Re: My GMW experience,

I agree that we shouldn't beg as it's Lee's business, but if it would help a JCF brother out....mind you, I'm a little wary to get involved as I'm expecting a guitar from Lee within the next couple of weeks or so (cowardly I know!)

[BigDaddyD]

Re: My GMW experience,

there are tons of guys out there. Here are a few of the more high profile ones.

Dan Erlwine
I don't think he has a web page, but he works with Stew Mac and I think has a shop in Athens, Ohio

Sadowsky
http://www.sadowsky.com/pages/framesets/fs_repairs.html

Mike Lull
http://www.mikelull.com/welcome%20frames.htm