Gibson Guitars files for Bankruptcy...

[unclebilly]

I imagine someone will pick them up and continue marketing the brand in some fashion. Even buying the trademark and selling hats and shirts (like Indian Motorcycles in the 90's)... and putting the brand name on Chinese guitars (like Bell helmets, Schrade knives, etc...).

[IROC]

People have been predicting this for a while. I think it was inevitable.

Maybe my SG and Les Paul will skyrocket in value.

[asphaltgambler]

Can someone break it down as to why? I love music, love the styling of classic guitars, but can't play. Even more odd ( for me is ) I'd like to have a few classic, not expensive guitars hanging on my garage wall......just cause they are cool

[Rick Lee]

They are a mess. They make guitars a lot faster than parents make guitar players. The market is totally saturated. And a new LP Custom is $4700 at GC. That's insane. Old ones, which are way better, go for half that. I can't see their lifestyle brand getting a lot of traction. If you don't play guitar, why would you bother with a Gibson shirt, hat, barstool, keychain, etc? And even if you do play, it's unlikely you're a Gibson-only kind of guy. I have a Les Paul and love it. But it's just one guitar and not my favorite. The folks with the real nice vintage stuff couldn't care less about the lifestyle brand or buying the new guitars.

If I were in charge and about to get all my debt wiped away, I'd refocus the company on making high quality guitars in much smaller numbers, make it more of a boutique thing, where it's kind of a big deal to see a new Gibson in a music store. When I was a kid, it was a big deal to see a new LP in the local music store. Now they grow on trees.

[Tobra]

Maybe Wolfe can take them over and do just that, Mr Lee.

[Rick Lee]

Originally Posted by Tobra

Maybe Wolfe can take them over and do just that, Mr Lee.

Yeah, that payout he got from his X5 getting trashed should cover it.

[yel911]

Personally, I've always loved Gibson's for their quality, but with so many Les Paul models, I don't have a clue anymore. I got a newer SG w/Maestro tail piece (2013) and I'm not letting go of it or my Les Paul.

[arcsine]

Gibson has pinned itself into the over-$2000 guitar sales ("We have over 40% of the market!") and made a bunch of questionable acquisitions that were aimed at diversifying and creating an entertainment powerhouse (Wurlitzer, Stanton, Cerwin-Vega, Phillips, Teac, Baldwin). They essentially overextended themselves with businesses that have a questionable return and cannot pay their loans. Throw in significant decline in quality of their flagship Gibson products and a significant drop in guitar sales overall and the results have just come in.

[sc_rufctr]

Sad news but the second hand shops are full of guitars and musical instruments.

A local leading music store went bust and then reopened a few weeks later with new owners. The new owners went broke about 18 months later. The store is now a chemist.
Camera shops are in trouble as well. Nikon and Canon are feeling the pinch and both manufacturers are in trouble.
Leica being one of the last boutique manufacturers are doing OK but even they are having issues.
Hasselblad almost went broke & were recently acquired and restructured. (lots of lay offs)

So much has changed. When I was a kid a lot of my friends were into music. I played the violin and still do but my children have shown no interest in learning.
Same goes for their friends and they have a lot of them.

I like living in this modern world but we have lost so much to technology.

[tabs]

Silly people you don't need to know how to play an instrument anymore to make music...all you need is a computer and a key board and you can be a symphony orchestra.

[Rick Lee]

I've read rumors that Gibson has a gigantic warehouse full of new guitars they haven't released yet. I don't know why they'd make so many more guitars than they can sell, since there are already too many on the used market that depress sales of new ones. And they were almost giving away the 2015 LPs with the Min-Etune and revamped Les Paul signature on the truss rod cover. Just seems like a cascade of very bad decisions, and they can no longer escape the consequences.

[tabs]

Incessant whining ...we live in a glorious age of digitalization where technology takes the work and effort out of learning. You don't have to know anything to be brilliant it is all at your finger tips now.

[flipper35]

They are trying to sell a Chevy at master coach builder prices. For those not playing for real money you can buy an Epiphone and spend a few dollars at a luthier and have a really decent guitar for 1/10th the price of a Gibson. If you want a top end hand build Gibson, talk to SLO-Dave.

[WolfeMacleod]

Originally Posted by Tobra

Maybe Wolfe can take them over and do just that, Mr Lee.

Originally Posted by Rick Lee

Yeah, that payout he got from his X5 getting trashed should cover it.

Plenty in savings waiting for a fire-sale, Rick. Not enough to take over, though! I'll be there for coil winders, wire inventory, magnet inventory, and anything else to do with pickup production. Including the tooling and dies they own that are used by one of my own suppliers.

[stuartj]

Like Harley, Gibson is one of a few brands that people tattoo on their body, like Harley, it will rise again. This Ch11 episode will mean absolutely nothing to guitar players. Some really bad decisions involving extending the brand into electronics and "Lifestyle" products. Failure to successfully innovate, just about every "innovation" has been met with outright derision by their faithful base (guitars with circuit board electronics, robot tuning). Bad relations with the retailers. Outright inconsistent quality, good ones are great, bad ones...geez.

I love Gibsons, own several, but I'd never buy one sight unseen. I would, have, buy Gibson Custom Shop guitars sight unseen.

I don't understand the company's thinking about many things. For example, inside an expensive Gibson Les Paul Custom Shop reissue is a pair of old fashioned "paper in oil" capacitors, known as bumble bee caps, as the original 1950's guitars had. Similar caps can be purchased as after market parts for, say $10-15 pair (or you can pay IIRC about $80 for the Gibson part). I imagine Gibson could buy these for cents. But the "bumble bee" caps inside expensive Custom Shop guitars are fakes. They are no old fashioned "vintage spec" PIO caps. Cut them open and inside is a little green run of the mill silicon capacitor. I don't get it.

[ZAMIRZ]

Originally Posted by arcsine

Gibson has pinned itself into the over-$2000 guitar sales ("We have over 40% of the market!") and made a bunch of questionable acquisitions that were aimed at diversifying and creating an entertainment powerhouse (Wurlitzer, Stanton, Cerwin-Vega, Phillips, Teac, Baldwin). They essentially overextended themselves with businesses that have a questionable return and cannot pay their loans. Throw in significant decline in quality of their flagship Gibson products and a significant drop in guitar sales overall and the results have just come in.

Yup, exactly.

My boss is the former CFO of Monster (the headphone company that invented "beats") and he brought this up with me today. He said Gibson was being run way too much like an old company with new company ambitions and zero clue about the marketplace. When they started straying into consumer electronics, he knew it was the beginning of the end. In that business, if you don't have margin and volume, you're ****ed. Everything goes out on consignment and then the consumer and retailers rake you over the coals. It's the polar opposite of specialty guitars where the value comes from customers who are looking for quality, reputation and service.

[Bill Douglas]

Me too. I find it sad when something really nice like a guitar, film camera, that sort of thing where you bite the bullet and make a last a lifetime type purchase, then some consumer type product comes along and takes over. I think that's why I keep the 911SC because it's one of those nice things, whereas a Honda Civic is actually a better car.

[AFC-911]

Real working musicians are not paying those absurd prices that they're charging.

The LP is too heavy anyway, so I highly doubt I'll be buying another one again. The last electric guitar I bought was an Ibanez Joe Satriani model in gold...And that still cost me less than $1,200 iirc!!! That was a super nice guitar to play.

[sc_rufctr]

Originally Posted by Bill Douglas

Me too. I find it sad when something really nice like a guitar, film camera, that sort of thing where you bite the bullet and make a last a lifetime type purchase, then some consumer type product comes along and takes over. I think that's why I keep the 911SC because it's one of those nice things, whereas a Honda Civic is actually a better car.

IMO Cars peaked with OBD1.

[DanielDudley]

I see the former CEO of Sears is buying up as much of the real estate and holdings as he can. He made himself rich running the company into the ground. I can't say how it went for Gibson, but I doubt anyone at the top missed a bonus.