Guitar Center’s $1 billion in debt reveals this truth about musical tastes

[The Growler]

Guitar Center and Gibson (and Fender) have the same problem:

Borrowing money they are having problems paying back.

They might have spent it on different things (stores or other non-core businesses), but the problem is the same.

[fazool]

IMO this entire article is (yet another example of) garbage journalism.

The data does not back this up.

Guitar Center is a sinking ship because

1) they cannot compete with online sales like Amazon
2) they are over-leveraged (too much debt from "flipping" the company)
3) terrible management


The article (and the story they are spinning) is not their own failure but the market's failure. "We did nothing wrong, the customers left us". "We did nothing wrong, the marketplace changed away from us". "We did nothing wrong, people don't want our products".

The only thing this article did for me was make me significantly less empathetic about their inevitable demise.

[dcmey]

Originally Posted by Slothead56

B grade? Seriously?

Mayer and Bonamassa are great guitar players.

[JohnW63]

I really doubt AMAZON is the one taking a big bite out of Guitar Center's market. I suppose I need to read the article, but that is not where I would think to buy a nice guitar. Maybe a low end beginner guitar, but not stuff better than that.

[Steadfastly]

I like the idea of "School of Rock". Now we need a few more of these schools in different genres.

[Orfeas]

Millennials are spending money on technology including music technology. That's what matters to them. That's how they communicate. And yes, they do like playing guitars because it's cool. However, don't expect a millennial to spend money on Gruhn's vintage instruments. Plus the broad generalization that millennials are lazy had me lost respect for him. Sorry.

[JeffreyAK]

Originally Posted by rogthefrog

Guitar Center sells a ton of equipment and software used to make music not involving guitars.

I'm not sure what relevance the opinions of a vintage guitar expert in his early 70s can have on Guitar Center's business today. If I wrote an article about Tesla's debt, a local dealer in collectible model Ts wouldn't be the first person I'd call.

Agree. Guitar Center isn't even mostly about guitars, so a story about the lack of guitar heroes and the laziness of millennials totally misses the reality of why Guitar Center is in trouble.

[pagedr]

Originally Posted by JohnW63

I really doubt AMAZON is the one taking a big bite out of Guitar Center's market. I suppose I need to read the article, but that is not where I would think to buy a nice guitar. Maybe a low end beginner guitar, but not stuff better than that.

As others have mentioned, guitars are just a part of the GC business. Outside of guitars and drums, pretty much everything that GC sells can be bought on Amazon for, generally, cheaper prices, and can be on your doorstep in two days.

I'm also sure that plenty of beginner or even lower intermediate players have no problem buying their guitars off of Amazon. I consider myself a serious player, and I actually bought my Jim Dandy on Amazon. It was about $20 cheaper than anywhere else and I wasn't all that concerned about a perfect setup on a $140 guitar, so I figured why not. Had no issues and I got a great little knockaround guitar.

[BoneDigger]

My 16 year old plays fiddle, mandolin, and ukelele. She listen to pop, to Americana, and some strange things I don't get into. My 14 year old is taking piano lessons. I didn't start playing an instrument until I was 17 or 18, so they are way ahead of me!

I'm not so sure that I would say that electronic music creation requires no dedication or talent. I have a Maschine and I can tell you that thing is terribly hard to make great music with. I love it for the ability to simulate so many types of drums, but I have yet to actually record with it. I'm far from that point. Same for the midi keyboard. But, I'm not really a keyboard/piano player.

[AgentKooper]

Nels Kline, Aaron and Bryce Dessner, Ty Segall, Dave Rawlings, Jeff Tweedy, Peter Buck, J. Mascis, Jack White, Willie Watson, Mike Cooley, Jason Isbell, Kristian Mattson (aka The Tallest Man on Earth), and on and on and on.

I’m 46 and go to live rock shows of current bands regularly. I know a ton of young people who play guitar. There’s nothing more boring than old men b****ing about the kids these days.

[Wade Hampton]

Originally Posted by AgentKooper

I’m 46 and go to live rock shows of current bands regularly. I know a ton of young people who play guitar. There’s nothing more boring than old men b****ing about the kids these days.

Hey, Kooper, get off my lawn! Right now!!

Seriously, for what it's worth, Guitar Center has announced they're going to be opening a store up here in Anchorage for the first time.

For those of us up here who've been gigging in the region for decades, it's kind of puzzling: why a Guitar Center in Anchorage now? But as a whiskery old coot who already owns lots of guitars and most of gear I'll ever need, I'm not their prime demographic, anyway. So it isn't me they need to appeal to.


Wade Hampton Miller

[LoboR1]

Originally Posted by Orfeas

Plus the broad generalization that millennials are lazy had me lost respect for him. Sorry.

I would say millenials are more into the dopamine hit of instant gratification than they are lazy. They've been brought up in the social media world where everything is "look at me" and "right now." Maybe if we could send "likes" every time they learned a new chord, they'd be more interested in continuing to play.

[fazool]

Originally Posted by JeffreyAK

Agree. Guitar Center isn't even mostly about guitars, so a story about the lack of guitar heroes and the laziness of millennials totally misses the reality of why Guitar Center is in trouble.

Except that the significant majority of GC revenue comes from volume sales of low-priced instruments and merchandise.

The few high-end guitar sales don't make-or-break their numbers. The very many low-end guitar sales do.

[jazzguy]

Originally Posted by mmasters

I think George Gruhn hit the nail on the head, there are practically no guitar heros today to inspire people to buy guitars. Joe B and John Mayer are about it and they are like B grade guitar heros.

B grade? They are both widely recognized as guitar prodigies regardless of whether one likes their particular brand/style. No they are not in mega Rock bands like the days of old, but if they were both playing in the 60's and 70's, I'm convinced that we would consider both of the them our "guitar hero's" today.

[Goodallboy]

Originally Posted by rogthefrog

I fully respect his expertise, but he has nowhere near the perspective needed to opine on a huge chain that sells orders of magnitude more instruments than he does, catering to a completely different demographic, with completely different instruments.

I'd say his multiple decades in the guitar business would position him quite well to know what other players in the industry are doing. I'd imagine that knowledge would be something he'd be keen to be up to date on.

The model T analogy involving Gruhn was a poor one and completely off the mark in this discussion.