MARTIN FACTORY tour pictorial: 350+ photos

[Neal Pert]

Still working on captions, but I wanted to share these with you.

https://picasaweb.google.com/1038210...eat=directlink


This is for those of you who said, "Take pictures of EVERYTHING." Well, I did. I have more photos of this than I do of my week in Italy last summer.

EDIT: I deleted a bunch of redundant or slightly blurred photos, with the end result that we're now UNDER 350 photos.

[ZekeM]

Thanks for sharing!! Lots of pics I like it! I'll have to really look at them on the computer tomorrow. I got through about 50 on my phone but it's too slow.

[The Growler]

Originally Posted by Neal Pert

Still working on captions, but I wanted to share these with you.

https://picasaweb.google.com/1038210...eat=directlink


This is for those of you who said, "Take pictures of EVERYTHING." Well, I did. I have more photos of this than I do of my week in Italy last summer.

Thanks for the pictures. When I travel, I shoot gigs every day, so I understand.

[Neal Pert]

I'll pull this into something more accessible and orderly later, but for now, what the heck. Never know what someone will want to see.

[jersey]

that was great, thanks

[madhat]

very cool- thanks!

madhat.

[rmyAddison]

Awesome! Like taking the tour all over again, thanks!!

Two comments: it was nice seeing the candling table, wood grading is not just visual inspection or opinion, candling catches imperfections and occlusions and defects in the wood the eye might miss unassisted, grading isn't just about "beauty". And.....

Because of Claptons's comment that if he came back as a guitar it would be an OM-45! OM-45's are very rare, unlike D-45's which are made every year (albeit in pretty small numbers), OM-45's are not built every year, the last run was in 2005 and only 29 were made. All time only a few hundred have been made, to me the perfect Martin model. Thanks again for the pix !!!!

[rkl245]

Wow...just wow

Thanks

[rolleiguy54]

Thanks! Now I have to go sometime.

[Dru Edwards]

Wow - now that's what I call Factory Tour pics!!!!

[000-18GE]

Call me weird but surfing through all those photos and trying to soak in the enormity of the operation somehow left me feeling a deeper appreciation for small shop- and individual luthier-made guitars. There was almost an impersonal character about the operation with so many staff "touching" the guitar along the way. Now with that said, I have the utmost respect and admiration for Martin's operations, quality, history, market influence, branding, and customer service but it left me feeling like I'd prefer my next guitars to come from smaller operations. I love my 000-18GE but somehow the "artisan" quality seemed to get lost while viewing those photos. I didn't expect to feel that way despite having viewed Martin factory shots before. I guess my frame of mind is different these days. Thanks to OP for posting.

[Neal Pert]

Originally Posted by 000-18GE

Call me weird but surfing through all those photos and trying to soak in the enormity of the operation somehow left me feeling a deeper appreciation for small shop- and individual luthier-made guitars. There was almost an impersonal character about the operation with so many staff "touching" the guitar along the way. Now with that said, I have the utmost respect and admiration for Martin's operations, quality, history, market influence, branding, and customer service but it left me feeling like I'd prefer my next guitars to come from smaller operations. I love my 000-18GE but somehow the "artisan" quality seemed to get lost while viewing those photos. I didn't expect to feel that way despite having viewed Martin factory shots before. I guess my frame of mind is different these days. Thanks to OP for posting.

I can sorta see that, but I will say-- go and visit. There's something simultaneously very big and very small about the operation. When you're there, you discover that it doesn't feel like an assembly line-- it feels like a whole bunch of craftspeople doing these intricate things. It's way more like a guild than like a normal factory. And believe me-- I've been in a lot of factories.

With all those people and all that space they only produce something like 230 guitars a day.

I think I left with an appreciation for both the small luthier and for Martin. There's a guy here in town who makes amazing guitars and who's posted pictorials of his work here. I love it. But the truth is, every build is, in a sense, a factory build, and a community effort. Someone chops down the trees, makes the strings, ships the wood, etc.

[rmyAddison]

Originally Posted by 000-18GE

Call me weird but surfing through all those photos and trying to soak in the enormity of the operation somehow left me feeling a deeper appreciation for small shop- and individual luthier-made guitars. There was almost an impersonal character about the operation with so many staff "touching" the guitar along the way. Now with that said, I have the utmost respect and admiration for Martin's operations, quality, history, market influence, branding, and customer service but it left me feeling like I'd prefer my next guitars to come from smaller operations. I love my 000-18GE but somehow the "artisan" quality seemed to get lost while viewing those photos. I didn't expect to feel that way despite having viewed Martin factory shots before. I guess my frame of mind is different these days. Thanks to OP for posting.

You need to go in person, it is far more intimate and hands on than most folks think. Smaller doesn't necessarilly equate to better, somewtimes yes, sometimes no. And Martin treats it's employees very well, that counts a lot to me......

[StringMeUp]

Sweet! Thank you for posting the photographs!

[Glennwillow]

Neal,

That was an awesome photo tour. Now I don't need to go! Wow, that was great! And how nice that your 11-year-old daughter went with you on the tour!

- Glenn