Emerald to offer in-home trial, sell direct only
 

Aloha,

Emerald Guitars has announced a new policy to be implemented soon:

"We are working on a brand new programme here at Emerald Guitars which will be launched in the coming months and will allow people to try one of our guitars in the comfort of your own home."

Along with this, they have confirmed that they will be selling direct-to-customer only. I'm not sure what, if any, dealers have been stocking Emeralds, at least since the closing of MacNichol Guitars, but now it's official: if you want an Emerald, contact the Emerald Isle.

http://www.emeraldguitars.com/mainbl...-new-barriers/

Pretty cool. I just bought a guitar from Emerald direct and it was a wonderful experience. In many ways, better than going through a dealer. And the follow up customer support has been outstanding.

Apparently, Alastair and his crew have realized how much fun it is for them to get to know the people who will be playing their guitars, rather than just shipping them off to a distributor or dealer and having no idea what happens to them afterwards.

I have been checking out the few dealer websites, and they never have more than two or three guitars, and what with all the configurations available, it makes sense to order the color, style and neck you want.


It allows for a larger profit margin for Emerald and a good deal for the customer.

I think he is learning from McNichol guitar that used to have road shows where they would let you have a guitar for a week for a small fee. That was so helpful cause these guitars are almost impossible to find to play in a store. Great marketing tool for them!

I am not surprised in that Alistair seems clearly more interested in innovation than factory work.

As a sideline I could see Tupper wear-like parties when people could invite a number of people for a viewing of their new Emerald. Referrals could be worth a few points that at some point could be turned in for a creation.

Carbon wear party A weave meet An Emerald Show ............

Cool development. In the last couple years, I think Alistair has found enough people coming direct to him to keep him plenty busy without dealers.

I've worked with him on several custom builds, and he's absolutely fantastic to work with.

I put an order in about a month ago. Only 3 more months to wait.

I haven't visited his site, I'm assuming that the following questions are not yet addressed there. Maybe not everything is even set in stone yet anyway?

It seems complicated to ship a guitar to other parts of the world without a middle man (dealer) to assume partial responsibility to get the guitars from manufacturing to owners. I would be interested in how the details are worked out because I can't think of a single time in history where this type of promotion has gone on involving guitars- and certainly no promotions extending across the Atlantic.

Will all guitars will be insured both ways should a prospective buyer decide a particular Emerald is not for him/ her- eliminating any responsibility to a potential customer?

If a prospective buyer does end up pulling the trigger on a trial Emerald, does the cost go slightly down for the buyer who, assuming, has payed the shipping and/or a refundable or non-refundable down payment?

Will the guitars shipped as loaners be "beater" guitars that will be shipped back and then a customer can order according to their new found hands on experience or will a guitar or will they all be new and sold "as is", thus leaving custom jobs to customers who are willing to wait for an instrument?

Just some thoughts that I'm having on this since I thought that Michael Stone over at MacNichol had an excellent program going on with "road trips", of which I was too late coming into the CF scene to ever really participate before MacNichol closed shop.

OK, you need to STOP this, right now!

That X5 gives me a serious case of GAS and, IMO, is the perfect travel guitar. The only reason I haven't been tempted by trying one out is because no one around me has one.

This news is not helping my GAS Abatement Program, at all. Now, I see I might have no excuse to try one. And I KNOW that if I try one, there is a significantly increased chance of me wanting one enough to give in.

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Sign me up NOW! I would like to get my hands on an OM size (12-fret), a nylon with slot headstock and maybe a Chimera doubleneck!

Sign me up NOW!

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LOL Fazool, I hear you man.

I would LOVE to spend a week with a Synergy but feel that just probably would never do. How am I gonna convince my wife that I need another guitar? Oh the AGONY!!

I'm so happy that I could be the bearer of good/bad news.

+1 for me... I am anxiously awaiting Evan's report.....

Faz? just order one, the X7 at least is way more than a travel guitar and, as such is my perfect travel guitar