Another Guitar Brand files Bankruptcy

The Know Your Gear podcast. The Know Your Gear podcast is brought to you by Patreon members, channel members, and viewers who like and subscribe. Thank you for making this possible. Everyone, welcome to the Know Your Gear podcast episode 445, the official, the last one of the year. This is the end of 2025 for the podcast. So this will be the last one. Seems, uh, seems surreal, right? I don't know. I don't know. I don't know why. First one was, pretend you still run your own shop. Can you walk through how you would find the trade-in value for a 1995 Epiphone Rivera Sunburst in great condition with Argel case? So different than when you would probably want to trade or buy a product in a store, it is much more than just whether or not what it's sold for on a reverb or eBay platform. It's how much do you want it and how much do you want to get rid of the thing they want to trade you? So, um, so that's a perfect best way to think about it. So let's just, before we go any further, let's just say this. Let's say you come in. This is the store. Hey everyone. Hi, my name's Phil. How are you doing? You know, welcome to my store and you're like, I want to get Now here's where it gets a little wacky. Let's say you want to grab something that's super valuable like not not Expensive that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about valuable. So what I mean by that is let's say you want something Do this a little bit. It's so weird how the shadowing is happening. Hold on a second. I just want to do that. Okay So let's say you want this GNL in orange flake The GNL is gone as we know the company's gone Whatever's gonna happen in the future of GNL will not be what we know it is And so the odds of you getting one like this again is not very common And as a dealer, I would think that if I just wait long enough, there's somebody's gonna come in and go Hey, finally, I want this and they're gonna pay the price. I would put on it. So You bringing me something. Let's say you're bringing me a 95 epiphone and maybe it's not something I've flipped in the past very well. Maybe it's something that's people aren't interested in very much or and So I'm not really interested in the trade So first of all, I'm gonna probably address your trade without even looking at the value of it with that attitude That I pretty much don't want your trade as much as I want to keep the thing I have I'll get the full price for what I have. So now it's more of a okay if you're willing to take a little pain I'm willing to make you, you know a customer. So I would then look it up You know probably off reverb sold listings or Going to guitar center's database. That's always a good resource. You can then also look up the gear exchange by Sweetwater or of course You can look at You know eBay so all of those things now in that case in a rare case Let's say I can't find an exact 95 by the way the year doesn't really matter to me to an epiphone So if I found a 94 or 93 or whatever year again, I'm not very versed in this guitar you're talking about So I would just be researching it like anyone else at that point. I'm not really Versing it that would affect how I would do how I'd want to do the trade Now another way this might flip is how desperate am I and pull some money in today and pay some bills this month That happens too in a real small business. So you're gonna be like, I don't know I'd rather you know, if there's a little cash coming with that guitar. So for instance, like, okay, I think your guitar is valued I'm just gonna make up numbers value to $500. I want, you know, 1500 for this I got a thousand coming in I'll make that, you know, I might make that happen because I'd rather have $1,000 coming in to pay the bills and Even though I kind of thought I can hold out for that to get the full mark Maybe I would just go ahead and and do that another trick that's real common in guitar small stores Especially you don't see this at guitar center, but you do see it in small stores is Sometimes you you massage the numbers to make the customer feel the best and it's not a trick It's not like the car dealerships where I'm not talking about playing a shell game of bullshit. I'm talking about like You know, maybe I'm willing to discount that guitar 10% so I said 1500 bucks maybe I'm willing to get anybody who walks in today that has you know The money to buy that guitar that guitar is getting a 10% discount Minimum that's what I'm willing to give without just you you sneeze and I'm like, hey You want 10% off that guitar or maybe just you know anything, right? You pick that guitar up and I'm like, hey, if you're interested that guitar 10% off I Might instead of tell you since it's a trade that I'm gonna give you 10% off that guitar I might tell you I might take the hundred and fifty dollar discount and add it to your trade value Right and I've done that a lot and then what happens is somebody will go you'll go Oh, let's say I'll go I'll go 650 on your trade remember. I was telling you earlier I was thinking it was worth five in this scenario. I go 650 you'll go. Oh, I was at another new store and they told me 550 and I'm like, yeah, this is a lot better. You're like, yeah now. Here's where it gets tricky When you play that game Sometimes when you do that One of the things that happens to you it's happened to me is the customer gets in bold and going well I didn't know my guitars were 650 actually, you know what? I'm gonna go ahead and go with that Nags and then you're like, oh crap. I gotta give this guy 650 for his guitar I don't want to try to sell the guitar is bad. So sometimes you have to kind of anchor him to okay I'll give you 650 but it's only you know, if you do it today for the guitar you're talking about sometimes like that Sometimes you may not want to play the game. I've I've eaten it before where I'm like, okay. Yeah I'll do the 650 for the thing you want so to answer your question That's sometimes what factors in to a store into a business guitar sitters a lot different Because an employee is invested like that You know, trust me an employee at the and it's not a dig against the employee Just saying an employee at the counter guitar centers doesn't know what the electric is this month the electric bill doesn't know What overtime they're paying out this month doesn't really think about this month's costs or this month's revenue and doesn't think like okay Well, it's me more susceptible to make any deal unless susceptible to making a deal And I'm not talking about market pressures. I'm just talking about the daily pressures of owning a business You know, just what it is. You're you're trying to do They don't you know, sometimes I've actually given it a really good trades or deals to customers Just because they don't know this but I have a large shipment coming in a couple days or a week and that shipments very expensive Right and it's kind of come in and I'm like, okay Look, I'd rather you know have some cash liquidity right now Then some of this product because I'm gonna have more product in a week So I might be more susceptible to make a deal so to answer your question That's how I would look it up and that's my factor it you said in a shop. That's how I would do it in my store Is try to figure out the best because keep in mind I'm balancing I'm balancing a very delicate blade of I need to make money and I need you to come back again and be a customer again I cannot take I cannot make a situation where every deal makes you never want to come back again I will never you'll never make it as a small business never never never never never never repeat buyers are a hundred and 110% of everything that matters to a small business if you you cultivate a Small store is like cultivating. It's like a small bar. It's like a hair salon Like I've said this before like when I was you know guitar tech the best advice which I used to say I would never give and now I give because I don't do guitar teching is that guitar techs are Are not like any other tech out there. They're not like a plumber. They're not like a you know Landscaping they're not like a mechanic. They're like a hairdresser. They're exactly like that. It's a totally different customer base It's a totally customer style the reason why guitar tech is like a hairdresser is because you're cultivating a client list In other words what you want is I always I just say Rhonda. I don't know why I like that name for a hairdresser I haven't been to a hair hair salon in a long time if you guys can imagine In fact, I don't think I've actually had anybody cut my hair since the army I'm laughing because I'm ashamed of this in a sad way But anyways, my point is Rhonda you what you want is when somebody says I don't let anybody cut my hair But Rhonda and Rhonda's on vacation next week So I don't get a haircut even though I need a haircut until the following week That's how you want people to talk about you if your guitar tech No one touches my guitar, but Rhonda only Rhonda touch, you know We'll work on my instruments and if Rhonda's not here I'm gonna wait and that's how you become a successful guitar tech and if you use that philosophy It's not as important as a store because the store you're gonna have a lot of customers that never come back they come in as I you know, they need strings one time and they're on the wrong side of town and You know and you'll never see them again. That's just that's just how it goes That doesn't mean you won't get word of mouth and other things but but literally, you know You need to run a small business more like a hair salon and less like, you know any other kind of you know like a mechanic or something like that because You know most people if their car keeps breaking down, they don't keep going in the mechanic They just get a new car most not all and so that's what I'm saying You only get so much repeat business for so long But a guitar tech is a very high repetitive be a repeat business not as much as a hair salon But you get the idea and sadly enough, you know when I started talking like that Just to give you a reference a hair salon even a high-end Woman's hair salon was more no was less money than guitar tech work and now it's more money think about that Man and just think about that If you trust me some of you women are watching right now not very many but some and a lot of you guys are watching with your wives Trust me your wife is paying more to have her hair done than you are to having your guitar done It's not even close anymore but Okay, so that's my spiel on what I would do on that trade and again other than just the basics of looking stuff it up and Now here's what a question you didn't ask Which is what would happen if I couldn't find that guitar? And that's something that happens and I find it really annoying at guitar center is you go in there and they can't find your product And then they're like I don't know what to give you and I'm like well, what do we do now, right? first of all before you would ever ever Look up anything and do start any negotiation the first thing I would ask you is what you want for it And I know that's a very salesmany thing and it's like hey I'll try to get you just because if you say 200 and I was willing to give you four I come out ahead That's not why I'm doing that first of all I'm doing it because most people are just they don't understand business No, no, should they it's not their responsibility. They may think like I paid 800 for this and People are selling all day long for six So I'm gonna want stores got to give me six and the stores never gonna give you six So if you come in and you say six, I'm gonna go. Oh man, I'm thinking more like four You know, we were we're $200 away Oh, you know, are we gonna be able to talk and then right there? I'll be able to know if you're like well You know if one you know cuz I gotta give the speech every store gives the speech, right? Well, I got to sell it for you know, I got to buy it from you and then I got to make money when I sell it Right, that's kind of the logic you got to give them that speech But I find to get your expectations is the best thing to do. That's not just a Businessy thing to say that's just my personal thing. It's just always good to see how inline and out of line You are your thinking is from my thinking So and if I can't find a price then I would just go with what you're you would say, you know Not in your value, but like hey, what are you thinking? And if you said hell, I think five and I'd look at it You know, I can generally could look at something and go I think I can move this for 500 bucks And if I get it and I'm wrong later That happens but most of time it happens in your favor But back in the day besides having the guitar blue book, which they still make by the way But back in the day guitar stores we we had guitar blue books I did not use a guitar blue book back in the day, you know, they had like just what prices are going for I never did that. I always shot off the hip. It was just crazy. It was like the Wild West I pull up eBay sometimes most of the time But no knowledge. I just look at something and I go Yeah, I'd pay that and then I'd go okay. I'd pay 800 So I'll give you four, you know Cuz I was always thinking like if I give them four and I get eight good If I give them four and I get five well, I screw up but I still come ahead It was like I always really looked at it like I can't imagine a world Somebody doesn't give me four and a bucks of this thing, you know, I'm buying it for four Somebody's got to give me that and that's not the goal to break even but you know, you're looking at worst-case scenarios in that so Okay next question subject is do you see guitar pedals I do they're right here they're right I got some here. I'm just kidding got a new volume pedal did some trading this week I went to Zimz and traded some stuff and got some new pedals. I don't know why but I got this cool little volume done Lot pedal. I've not plugged it in. I don't know why I got it. Pardon me. Thanks. I just got it cuz it looked cute It's impossible to keep me on track, okay Do I see guitar pedals and amps as consumer electronic devices when it comes to resale people? Seem less willing to take a hit on an amp and pedal than they are used computer devices Yeah, there's no there's not nowhere and close to the same thing is guitar pedals and amps are nowhere close to computers You know tablets phones television just because they're technology now. There's things in guitar land that are technology based We know like processors and things like that are more technology based obviously interfaces all that stuff all tech fully tech stuff But I argue that pedals and amps because of the fact that they don't Obsolete themselves. That's why they're not in that that that case a perfect example Sean to this would be if I did a video of any TV I mean any TV when I started my YouTube channel Let's say you know ten years ago is when I you know I start putting my first video But let's say eight years ago because that's when I started kind of like maybe I'll put some videos out on a regular basis Eight years ago if I put out a video of any TV any you said TVs, right TVs Yep, our computer any TV or computer if I made a video of that I would guess because I've seen it. There's almost no views on it today. No one's clicking on the Sony Vizio You know to what? 2017 TV model no one's looking at that, but they're still clicking on my review of the Ivan is Tube Screamer It's still getting a thousand clicks a month eight years later So proving that it's just not the same thing even though it is technology. It's just not in the same vein Why is that I don't know probably because it like said it doesn't obsolete itself That's a huge part, you know of that it's why it's really what hinders this industry is the fact that so much product lasts so long How do manufacturers keep creating a new? a New need for a product that doesn't have a need because you can just get them, you know How many times look if you go on I don't know for a fact We could try right now, but I just don't want to we go on reverb and type in Ivan is to screamer and see what comes up more used or new Somebody do that go on reverb right now and type in Ivan is Tube Screamer look at you Just look at the counts just be generic about it go into pedals and tell me put in the comments How many use ones versus new ones? I kind of feel like there's more use listed the new well, especially since reverb's Ghosting and blacking out most of the new listings so maybe that doesn't work, but you know, I didn't think about that I forgot reverb's hiding, you know listings now from us but But I think that's the like said this industry has the opposite problem It's not that that it has to it's it's it's it's technology doesn't obsolete so much Phil says I was wondering if you tried and liked the line six pod go I got one and I really like it Thanks for everything so the pod go I had one a long long time ago in a galaxy far away And I liked it a lot You know, it's one of those products that I would put in the tech the category of technology It was cool. I liked it. I'm gonna pull it up right now so we can all see it So you guys know because I think cuz it's called the pod go Some people are probably picturing that mini headphone little pod thing. So let's not get it You You Did I recommend it still to this day my my reasoning for moving on was Is was is hold on. I'm gonna go back to your screen was is the HX HX HX one sorry the HX one pedal so Specifically speaking I wasn't looking for a platform like that that has all my effects in one unit Which is really handy to run a couple at a time. I just wanted the HXM. So I our HX one I don't know why I keep calling it the HXM. It's the HX one So the HX one is what I switched to and that's what I have now and that's what I use Although you can only use one effect at a time for me It just works for what I'm doing because I kind of do not use a whole lot of effects I'm not a I'm far from someone who's using a ton of like, you know reverbs and delays and all that stuff I use like one reverb. I'm usually most the time in the amp very rarely not in the amp Delay but nothing special and then usually never any chorus That's more of a if I'm doing a cover of a song like think about this unless I'm covering a certain song I have no reason to use any effects other than the three that I like which is tremolo Which is a sometimes effect reverb and delay so and then overdrive. I kind of have my own overdrive pedals that I've just kind of love and stuck with So think about how how funny this is you could go back Which is something unique because it's not everybody can do this right has this ability You could go back to my earliest videos from years and years ago From the beginning of the channel and look at my pedal collection and see almost all the pedals I'm using today are almost all of those same pedals almost identically so In fact what I'm looking at right now is I'm trying to think of there's any pedals here The only pedals in my boards are using on any normal basis that was not in any videos Eight years ago is because they didn't exist eight years ago and they're new so I have pulled in a couple new pedals But there is no pedals that I've rotated. I just like the those ones I had Um um what let's go here Here we go Perfect time to get some water Okay, um Okay, so this question is what three-way pickup switch this came from Amanda Thank you Amanda for grabbing this uh, what three-way pickup switch did you use when you installed your illuminatone death Buckers in your tim millers uh, kiesel. I just used a three-way mechanical fender switch It's a basic basic switch. It's a blade switch nothing fancy because I didn't do anything Anything fancy with it. That does not have any fancening fancy wiring um Now the reason why I said fender is because um, I still have you got to understand I was a fender um You know guitar tech for a decade And because of that fender had some lofty buy-ins Right. Yeah Earlier was too too too dark now. It's too bright. Um, anyways, uh, I have a crap ton of fender parts That's right. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I don't know why I'm getting to the taking so long to get the point I have drawers and drawers and drawers of brand new parts that I bought. Uh, so think about this. I haven't physically Had the store since 2017 So do the math on that and I still am using fender parts all Still tons and tons of fender parts that I have and new and packaging just new and packaging Because I was like, well, okay. I'm not going to tech anymore. What am I going to do with all this stuff? and uh, I go I'll use it up and uh It's a slow burnout. I probably have about 20 or 30 brand new five-way switches in packaging and I know someone's going to say Hey, tell me what it's not worth it. It's not worth it to to put in bubble wrap and ship it to anyone so um, but yeah, so that's why I used it because that's what I have and it's a good switch and um, and uh That's what I used. Um, let's see. Uh, this one also Amanda grab. Thank you. Say, hey, Phil. How much do you think nam tech? Nam technology will impact the modeling market in 2026. So when you say nam, uh, That's not nam the nam show. That's the I've seen this term recently. Uh, It's You gotta say I'm not versed in what you're talking about. So let me look it up. So I only know because I saw it I saw it Software so you it's a software, right? I just want to make sure we're on the same page Uh, is that like the dsp's and all this stuff? Um Okay Uh, assuming we're on the same page and I apologize if I'm not because again, I only know I know I'm a guitar fanatic like you guys so I know a lot about, you know What's going on with the market when it comes to dsp's and stuff, but I'm not a I'm not an authority on that subject by far So, um, if we're talking about the technology and the idea, what do I feel like the ds? The yeah, the nam amp model. Okay neural. Sorry neural amp model. What do I think of neural amp modeling? Okay, so the the way I will explain it to you how I feel is from my perspective of it That's what everybody that you've probably watched and talk about it or you think about it is your perspective, right? So if you're an at-home bedroom player, what do you think about? plugins and and and uh neural amp modeling You're gonna have your perspective, you know a professional musician is going to have their perspective a studio Can have that an amp builder is going to have their perspective. Here's my perspective Uh, and so here's what it is It is extremely profitable to sell links to shit It's so profitable. It's just so profitable Um, that it's going to be an impossible thing to not have that become an avalanche of on upon us What I mean by that is this Let me give you an example that hopefully will hit home um I Built a business A physical business. I built, you know, not just the store. I'm not talking about that But I built the store and the repair uh, sorry the repair facility and I built a lesson academy. Of course my wife shawna Co built every every step of it probably even more so so really I co built it with her She did more majority of it. My point is is that it it was one of the largest lesson facilities in the state of arizona okay To build this facility we had to rent a building. Okay, which was $7,000 a month Then now it would be more Okay, $7,000 a month Um, somebody says nam is free. Hold on. I I'll get there. Just get just hear me out hear me out My point is is that the amount of time it took to build a a lesson academy at the level that we did Okay The amount of students And i'm pulling us up right now To see that amount of students Which was And i'm gonna pull it up right now Approximately They were paying 120 a month as a student you were gonna have about 180 students Okay now You do that math Okay um, it's $21,000 20 will roughly we'll round it up for $22,000 a month, but of course You have teachers as you're paying. It's a huge part of that Now I want to talk to you and not about as a lesson academy I want to talk to you about one of my teachers I just want you to understand something that is in play right now and it happens to do with all this and all this stuff If one of my teachers was able to build up 60 students 60 students times 120 a month They made $7,200 a month And then they would have to pay essentially $20 of that to to us. That's how you're covering your room your You know the the amp in the room the cables obviously us booking and and doing all stuff, you know, just it's how you do the expenses so Have a teacher physically Got 60 students as a 30 not not including gaps in in students. That's 30 hours a week We're going to call it 40 hours a week 40 hours a week Times $100 a $6,000 a month. Okay $6,000 a month I had teachers doing that You know and they were making a living I don't have a friend that does online lessons now that doesn't make twice that a month and they don't have to do anything I want to say that I don't mean nothing. I mean obviously they build a lesson course Okay, but if a friend of mine came to me a teacher came to me and said hey phil I'm making five to six grand a month teaching one-on-one with students And you know, I'm just whatever reason I need to try something different I would say well, you could start a lesson course and you could do digital downloads and they go Why don't I have a huge following and I go well? Here's the thing at $100 a course How many courses does it take to make what you make in a month? So that's what you need a new sign-ins You know, you're talking about 60 sign-ins a month. I know people can pull 9,000 sign-ins You know not in a month, but they could do it. I mean, it's it's always going to be the size of your channel stuff Now, I know you think I'm off topic because I'm talking about lessons, but what I'm trying to explain to you is is that Just like how boss wants to make a stomp pedal where you might have to buy, you know extra effects Everybody has different opinions about this, but I'm trying to tell you as someone on these platforms You understand this is the dumbest thing I can be talking to you about because literally this is how Everyone makes their money and more importantly how I could even make a lot lot more money the more I push A digital thing, right digital things are extremely profitable. They're easy for you to convert a customer to Um, you guys will immediately as us years go. Oh, yeah, I think I'll get that ir pack or oh, I'll get that lesson or I will buy that you know that plugin um And even if the platforms to do those plugins are free It doesn't matter because again you'll eventually start buying some kind of digital product and digital products have a much lower lower cost No tariffs by the way, so tariff free and so they don't even have to factor that in Um, the obviously there's a lot of starp cars. Look, there's some people right now And they're probably making this stuff and they're probably watching me go fill, but you don't understand No, I totally understand there's a lot of starp costs and I understand there's maintenance costs There's the website there's there's I'm not trying to say it's just like they're laughing to the bank But I'm saying what it is is this is going to be um And see here's what's funny. I keep saying somebody says nam is free as in beer and an open source That's not how everything ends though So a perfect example is since I've been since I was talking about this since doing youtube I used to buy all of I used to pay for a software. We used to do all the Like editing all kinds of uh, we do the photoshop We did all that stuff and we bought it now. We pay subscription rates for it This month because I have to pay for next year stuff was $4,000 in apps and software to run this channel That's what we paid out And if you're wondering what that's for I actually itemized it all till my I was talking to my patron about it patrons about it What it was that we break down what all these costs are to maintain these things send out rss feeds Um, you know, we have to pay for that. We have to pay for to host the website This is where everything is going to go Because it's so easy to convert us this way And if you guys I always get pushed back when I talk about this and I really don't give a shit because the reality is Um, this is how most of the people I know in this industry are making lots of money. So I'm just telling you how they're doing it This is how they're doing it. It's uh, it's essentially anything that you can download if they can give it to you for free they can eventually convert you into some kind of repetitive payer and It's a very easy system. So I think that's so the question you ask is what do I think about it? Well, I think it's going to win because the money is there. That's where the money's at Things are going to go to where the monies are so, um Never mind, I'm not going to go down that road. So it's like you need write-offs. I don't think you know how businesses work so anyways, uh, the point is is That I think that's why it's going to win. That's why all of that stuff would win and it doesn't again It doesn't matter if it's a free service at first. It's kind of like when everybody talked about the the boss thing Again, uh, like they said, hey, yeah, but phil they're not charging you for that monthly service Again, if they're not established, why would they charge you for the service now? And again, I use a kipper and you can get free kipper stuff and you can pay for kipper stuff and it works the same way And I buy plugins too by the way, I blow all the stuff you guys are buying too. I buy online lessons I buy all the things but i'm trying to tell you as someone who sits in Way too many meetings with way too many of these companies that you guys think, you know that we all love I told you guys a lot of them are like It never it never it's almost to the point now where if somebody says hey phil you got an hour to talk real quick Sure, we get on a call. I know it's going to go. Hey, we're gonna come out with this pedal and we're going to come to this amp And hey, what do you think about us selling a? You know a a plugin. Hey phil. What do you think about us selling a digital product? so um And you'll see it more and more more digital products I don't think we're even at the beginning of what the wave of digital products are coming from they're definitely coming so It's just how it goes and like I said, I can't I say I can't I'm not going to say that I don't run my channel without buying all that stuff. So I have to buy it too and it's just and like I said it boils up over time So that's my answer now back to the nam thing being free. I'm happy. It's free I don't use that whatever that service is or whatever it is. That's why I said I'm not aware of it I'm just telling you about those type of products. That's where it's all going to go The the last thing I'll end on is is uh Not one not two not three not four and maybe not five but so four four companies next year I talked to Basically, we're talking about physical products coming out, but then a digital product version of it coming right out in the tail of it so um Yeah, and also I actually have a uh a weird interview video that will be out in about Month to two months that you'll see talking about a company talking about a very large predominant company talking about The hardships of the market right now in the physical amp market and how wide digital is Whether it's digital plugins or digital, you know, like software or just digital style amps Are so important to them for the future that they're banking on it. This is what they're banking on switching So that's just my thoughts on it. Um And that's I'm just giving you a parting of what I understand from what you guys are talking about But on that other note, I want to also point out. I also like modeling technology That's another reason why it's easy too for me to It's hard for me to kind of I don't uh, I'm not bagging on modeling technology. I'm just saying I can see where everyone's gonna focus on it so And by the way Here's my question Because I can tell you who's done a really good job at selling digital products online is a retailer in its sweet water by far You can buy a ton of digital products on sweet waters website. You can go and buy download software all kinds of stuff plugins and My question is how many mom and pops are going to be able to sell any kind of digital products All that stuff as everything goes a little bit more digital Um, and I don't know how it ends. Uh, basically what I'm trying to say is I'm kind of just paying attention to it right now It's possible in a year or two. We all get sick of it and it pulls back. But right now when I see, you know um John mayor pushing a plugin when he could have think about this, you know I would argue 10 years ago john mayor and prs. What it came out with a $1,000 size You know, uh mark tramani size prs amp, you know a little dumble in a box, you know 15 watts and and it was sold for like a thousand dollars and and john mayor would have probably saw about 60 Maybe of that thousand dollars maybe As a royalty and now he's doing a plugin and the plugins 150 bucks And then you go well, how much did they give john mayor that and what if it was the same and look at the difference? You know and again, that's all speculation. But my point is is uh, Yeah, I can see digital Is going to keep growing and it's very profitable comparatively speaking So, um Yeah, everything's going to subscription based uh drug dealers taught us well Yeah, I mean, it's just how it works. I mean think about this. I have a patron thing and it's essentially like a subscription base I mean, it's essentially what funds the channel. I get it. I'm dry like said, I'm just being upfront about everything Okay, let's go to something funner Uh Let's see Okay, go to the next one. Uh next one is Uh, hey, Phil anybody make a programmable pitch hermon harmonizer like the old rack mount digitec and I have no idea Uh, you know who would be a good channel to resource that maybe michael nilson's channel because he's into stuff like that I don't use like I said, I'm not into the harmonizers and pitch effects I use the uh the poly You know the pitch effects that down tune your guitar or down tune your bass. That's interesting to me But I don't play enough lead work to worry about harmonies and stuff Um This one's hey, Phil I have a question. I run a small repair shop at out of my house What my model has been is I buy the parts And tack it on at the end of the of the bill should I be taking deposits for parts? Um, I mean No, I mean the rule has always been You know you you you bill at the end the this is because you have essentially you have their property So you gotta understand you don't want in my opinion I would not want to imply someone I I don't trust somebody like hey, I need to deposit on the work or deposit for the parts And you know because to me that makes me that makes it feel like well They should be also doubting me going well I am leaving my expensive guitar with you or my guitar with you and and maybe there's a situation I can you know where they leave a you know $200 guitar and you're buying $300 for the parts and maybe you're a little nervous about that I understand that um but You know you have to decide I know I say you're doing at your house But you have to set it decide at one point if you're doing this as a hobby if you're going to try to do this Is as a job and if you're doing this is a job you got to provide provide stellar service I can tell you that you can do 10 jobs Perfectly in the 11th one is crap and you've lost the customer forever. There's almost no Uh grace when it comes to customers Um, you know customers are your friends, but sometimes that friendship is tied to how well you do work So the first time you don't do work, they're not really your friend anymore. You'll be like, hey, I messed up a little bit I'm really sorry and they'll be like this is unacceptable and you'll be like wait a minute. I thought we were buds Remember we always talk every week, you know, you're gonna find that essentially um, you have to think of your customers like a work life Work life friendship where essentially there's another element going on besides the friendship You know you have you're a business and you need to provide perfect and good surface every time And anything that's not that is going to damage everything your reputation your friendship So I would say no Um, if it's an issue if that's a deeper end of the question if the issue is that you're just having trouble Like that's a lot to put up front for parts. Um, you know, then you're gonna have to evaluate your your rates Maybe your rates aren't enough, you know, uh, my concern would be if You're concerned about parts and I'm not saying this is the issue with you I'm just saying if this is one of my would be my concern with myself If I'm concerned about advancing money from parts, I'm probably running the business too delicate Okay, um, I've talked about this in the past, you know, people ask me like what did you make when you're guitar tech? And I've said it and a lot of people didn't think that was enough money And I'm like, well the business pulled in all kinds of money But I don't can only pay myself a reasonable salary to that but more importantly you need holdings You need cash capital to for expenses, but more importantly for the oh crap moment You know, um the not only if you're going to work on people's personal property Not only do you need to be prepared to have to pay for it if you damage it you need to pay for it very quickly um, the the fix of a situation that you've caused has to be Very precise and very fast in fact It has to be Almost one in the same at the same moment like if you ever have to call somebody and say hey I had your guitar, you know a screwdriver dropped and it hit the front of the top of the guitar And then literally you got to give you know a minimum of two maybe three Um solutions to that problem We can fix the top. You'll never notice it. We won't charge you for anything. We're really sorry We can get you a brand new replacement or a replacement that's like in condition exactly like that And let you AB them and choose, you know, right you want to kind of you kind of want to over go This is where When you screw up, this is where you're going to win the best because this is where Even if they have a bad experience Um They you can turn it around. It's a very hard thing to do You know, for instance, uh, you know, I just made an expensive purchase for us at the house I had some stuff done to the house. It was a decision. I was I was more prone to do it than my wife Um, they told us, uh, you know the price which was very expensive and they told us the the timeline the timeline was six to eight weeks Shawna called them at nine weeks. She called literally I heard the whole conversation. I was in my office I heard her say she's like hi. My name is shawna mcknight. I'm calling about um our you know our our product that we ordered Um, they said it was going to be about six to eight weeks. It's nine weeks. It's getting them to the holidays You know scheduling is going to get a little weird for us Uh, I just want to see how it's looking and they told her. Oh, it's it's here And she's like, oh, okay And then long story very long story short The lady was horrible on the phone Um, she was laughing at shawna and it was really weird. It's a hard thing to talk about because it was like a weird really weird bad experience So shawna called the person the tech salesperson and they called us out and and um I told shawna when they came because they came, you know, they got all worked out and they made nice They said hey, we're sorry for treating you so bad I told shawna before they got here. I said, you know, uh and a friend who was here They said, oh, they're coming to install it and I said, yeah, and he goes and I said, here's the suck part for them If they do everything right and they install it perfectly today and they go perfectly on their timeline and it looks beautiful They got a c at best Because they were so horrible to us on the phone The customer service was horrible. They got to do they got a a plus this thing today to get a b and they came in and no no, uh I'm not trying to throw any issues towards the the techs and the workers, but they were a c at best So you can imagine their c was really a d And so a d and f factor that together. It's not a great grade My point is is that that was their opportunity after a mistake to make to really you got to really level up so that's the same thing with parts, uh, and I I preach this so much because Because especially in our industry, it's the opposite. It's like everybody's just doesn't think like this But here's the problem. Everything's getting really expensive and the more expensive it gets the more people are going to scrutinize what they give you They're gonna they're scrutinize how they feel about what they've given you. It's just how people are You know, it's 60 dollars is a lot, but 160 dollars. You're just like, this is crazy. I used to be 60 now I'm paying 160 and then when you get less service than you got at 60 it's going to make everything tougher and This is where and this is why I'm telling you this and I'm telling you this because you said you're you know You're starting a small business a small shop and I just want to tell you guys this When we have a market like we have right now, this is where we're weeding out all the week This is where all the week businesses go. You're not going to be here. We're losing tons of businesses Um, that's a good segue. Let's talk about a business is going away. If you guys haven't heard hoffner file bankruptcy So hoffner guitars and basses in in in germany has filed for bankruptcy now Officially the bankruptcy is they're trying to re-consolidate. So in other words, this is like guitar centers bankruptcy where they're not really they're not gonna You know sell off and close forever. This is a reorganization essentially they're going to try to settle with creditors and kind of settle some debt and figure some stuff up and stick around and You know you hate hearing this stuff but also it's kind of like the g&l story this year and it kind of like here's the thing that's A little sad to say when we talk about the businesses of 2025 that have either closed or doing poorly None of them were a shocker Not to me Hoffner, I think is a great look. It's paul mccartney played that bass It's an amazing bass because paul mccartney played it. I said this once I'll say it again if hardly pv Could have if I could have gone back in time and given hardly pv advice. I hoped I could I would I would just like back to the future I go in like Like mcfly and be like hard go up to hardly going give eddie vane. Heyland half your company. Give them half Whatever it takes to give eddie vane. Heyland as much as your company as you can tolerate He cannot lose him because here's the thing now you think about pv and where it's at EVH is bigger as a company than pv It's more it's more exciting It's doing more Think how horrible that is, you know the same thing with steve. I steve. I made ibanez You know ibanez. I think should give steve. I have their company They probably do financially because they give them a lot i'm sure but you know paul mccartney made hoffner You know the fact that hoffner every year should have called paul mccartney and begged him like hey We'll give you half the company just You know help us, you know keep it keep it going beetles. Whatever whatever. This is all we got. We were the beetles and um Brian says give him 51 50 that's good eddie vane. Heyland joke and uh And uh my point is is that this is the I don't want to call it the reckoning But this is the time I told you when the market slows Okay, and it and it just and we're not spinning as much and we're scrutinizing every dollar and that's really what's really happening It's that's where the not spinning as much comes from you're like, ah You know what maybe I won't buy every new pedal release for those of you guys that get crazy buying pedal releases Maybe i'm only gonna buy the two or three top ones now. You got to be those two or two three top ones You don't have to slash your prices down to nothing. That's not the only thing that's out there is an opportunity The best opportunity is to make something that we want something that people this is a luxury business the guitar business And because it's a luxury business It's done for joy and if you can get people to think hey if I get this I'm gonna feel better playing this doing this Listening this this is how you you you this is what you do and the sad thing is um Yeah, somebody says remember carvin and vi same thing. Could you imagine if carvin had the the uh gave steve i half the company and said Hey, you know keep playing carvin amps and you know, you know, I don't know make it make carvin land I don't know something but um That this is my point is why I think everybody should be paying attention I was uh, I was not shocked to hear you know during the holidays this holiday I talked to a lot of friends in the industry and a lot in fact. I was a little nervous That's why today's show started posting a little late When I do so much talking like I did over the last week with so many people in the business So many of the things that I have in my head come out of my mouth to you guys and some of this stuff really can't come out of my mouth But what I will tell you that I can say is it was not shocking to me the That a large portion of my friends were like we're up 20 percent. We're up 5 percent. We're up 10 percent. We're up 12 percent We're up 20 percent when was up 30 percent And then some other friends that I have and they're like down 20 percent this year down 10 percent We're gonna be you know, I have a I have a friend this this week I wish I could tell you that has a high end Guitar slash amp or pedal business one of the three maybe all Who told me not only was a great year. They're gonna lower prices next year They're like, yeah, we're gonna lower the prices a little bit We're like oh really? Yeah I go oh I go, you know, and I thought oh because the market's a little tough and a little price like no no some of the some of the feedback was Prices a little high so we're gonna rate and we're gonna lower them a little bit We kind of did really well this year. We overshot a little bit. We did well, but we're gonna kind of do it I was like It's exciting not all everything but a couple you know a couple things that people complained about that were a little pricey I was like, okay So what i'm saying is is that it's it's gonna be interesting market 2026 will probably be the end We'll see the end results of what happened in 2025 in other words everything that's happened in 2025 that's closures is why is um Is uh, we'll see more of it unfortunately of what really happened this year next year somebody asked this I thought it was interesting somebody says um Will heritage guitars go the way of g&l and then I thought oh that's a that's a good question because heritage is like To gibson is what g&l was defender? um The reason why heritage won't go the way of g&l is the people who currently own heritage and mono gig bags and harmony are not Nowhere in the situation that g&l was financially much less in any other way, but more importantly I guess I could say is um if g&l or not Sorry if heritage was would not close if it was to be sold off It was just because maybe they're done with it as the owners They maybe they don't want anymore. I I don't think that would be the case at all But that would be the only scenario I could think of because they're financially very Set so they came in with money. They have money So that they have it they have they're good Um Okay, this is a tough question because I don't know the answer The question is that uh that um, integrapped was can you comment on the warranty for pickups my 490 t is not working. So the 490 t is a Gibson pickup. Here's what I I don't for first of all We got to talk about two things one You mean in the guitar like if you bought a brand new guitar and the pickup in the guitar The pickup would be attached to the guitar's warranty. So when you buy a new guitar, it's going to be parts and workmanship So those are the warranties and how they kind of they kind of overlay them So under the pickup in the guitar would be would be covered if it is covered under parts and workmanship of that part Um, so that it's covered now if you're talking about you bought a new pickup a new Gibson pickup that pickups I would assume has a warranty. I have not looked at them. Have you called Gibson? That's what I'd like to know is like the the problem though is that I would you know what I didn't think about it aftermarket parts usually no warranties Because they don't know how what you did to it. That's right. I forget I always forget that parts are kind of that one thing that you literally kind of so in the guitar you would be safe But yeah, if you bought an aftermarket pickup, it doesn't work So if you got the pickup and it was not working when you got it You can usually get some kind of an exchange on it Um, what I would imagine is if you had it for any period of time and maybe the warranties expired or the warranty is You know avoided because the fact that it's like, you know, it's a part. So therefore if you can sell it I would call Gibson and just try to get an exchange And just get them to just get send them the pickup say hey, I'll send you the pickup. Can you you know and and they might Not do it bigger companies are a little bit more difficult that way Fender was always so much easier to deal with for that stuff Fender would most likely displace your pickups I've had Many cases where Fender has warrantied a pickup or a part where no problems, but Gibson I I gotta be honest as a dealer a Gibson was horrible. I sold a Gibson up That's main reason I stopped being Gibson dealer. I sold a guitar at Christmas to a guy and it was defective and Gibson Was really difficult to deal with and to the point where we had to eat it as the store and take care of the customer And then I was like, I just don't I can't go this way anymore, man Um, so they're a little on the crappier side, but I'm saying that out of you know off that experience I don't know what the current experience is. I would say contact Gibson The one thing I can tell you is is if the pickup is not working Something's usually the wire some wire like maybe the wire in the coil has been broken or damaged that can happen It's not very common. Especially if it's like a Uh a um if it's not exposed bobbin pickup, maybe if you have a cover on it, it's gonna be really hard to get damaged in there. Um So, uh Some people are saying the 490t is a cheap pickup upgrade it. Yeah, I mean the 490t's it's not that it's cheap I mean, it's a good pickup. I mean pickups are kind of a weird thing because they're really they're they're like said They're they're to everyone's ear. Everybody has a different thing. They're trying to get out of it. Um I It's not I can tell you this is not worth fixing if it can't be diagnosed quickly, you know, put it on a multimeter The questions I would ask is have you put it on a multimeter? Have you tested it? Have you tested it correctly? Do you feel confident that? um That it is not working and if it's not working then one of two things have happened the wire that's making it coming out of the pickup The wire there has been damaged Or the wire in the coil has been damaged. That's essentially your two big culprits Um, if it's an exposed bob and pickup It's possible the wire in there got cut and damaged and it's kind of a pain and you can watch lindy frail in videos where lindy Takes pickups and unwinds them. I've owned a couple pickups and found where they broke and rewind. I will never do that again That's you know, I'm not I don't have uh lindy's reputation. I'm sure I'm either he's doing it for fun in those videos Because he just wants to do it or people are paying him through, you know, a good amount, you know to do it But I didn't have a customer base like that to make it make sense. But um uh But uh, yeah, that's what I would say just try to get uh Try to talk to him about exchanging it. So It's possible. Other thing too is also where you bought it You know, if it's uh, if you bought it from a credible dealer also try to give the dealer an opportunity to try to fix the situation so And um, and you could always find other things I've done everything Every way that's kind of worked in the past that's kind of worked in other words So like I'll you know, if it's a dealer I'll say hey, I have this issue and they're like, oh, there's another way to do for you I'm like, okay Well, look because you're always using the market for them. I'm like, look, I'll buy this other thing from you right now too Could you take care of that and I'll buy this thing? You know and you know, it just makes their life a little easier, you know It's like they don't really need to do a lot of free work or they don't want to want to do a free work for you Maybe that will tie some It's uh, it's tough but Yeah, but like I said, make sure you test it correctly and make sure RJ wants to know is it worth refreading a budget guitar with stainless steel frets? Well worth it is tough. I've refreaded a glary with stainless steel frets and it's still playing and great today Now paying somebody to do it hell no don't pay somebody to do it That's just crazy, you know, because you can take the money that are going to charge you and and take the guitar and just buy something better But you doing it. Oh, it's uh, is it worth it? Again, it's an education. The education is the the payout So it's not a financial. Will you get your money back? That's okay. So let's break that question down. Is it worth it? No, it's not that i'm saying no to that. I'm saying let's not the question. The question is will you get your money back? No Right. No, no, no, no if you refread an expensive guitar with really nice frets If anything you've devalued the guitar you haven't even helped it. Not only when you're not getting any money back out of it You'll lose money. So don't do that Is it worth it in the case of uh, well remember why did that video? I refreaded a glary because like a lot of people that reviewed a glary like I reviewed a glary because Somebody goes, hey, I've seen the 65 dollar glary and I was like, no And I got one I presented to you guys because I'm like, how do you make a guitar for 65 dollars? It's really crazy, right? Like that's really nuts That's that's about as cheap as you think it gets hard and get and it would make sense if it played, you know It was unplayable, but it was somewhat playable and uh, I gave it an honest assessment I said that, you know, you shouldn't buy this guitar unless You just want to work on guitars like you couldn't buy you couldn't walk into most pawn shops or guitar stores and buy Cheap junky guitars to work on for 65 bucks. That's the that was the whole point You know, hey, what a great way to cut some of the costs Maybe buy two glaries and work on them because they're gonna need work um And then somebody said just go ahead and take that right to the landfill and I don't know why that drove me nuts It just did in the comment section So I refried it in mine and turned it into a super strat and then we gave it to somebody So um, and it's still playing this day because I think you can turn You know unless you could turn most any guitar into something playable I mean, obviously I think our rock idols our guitar idols have proven that taking parts guitars and putting them together um But like I said, it's a it's not a good thing to do with your money But it's I think it's a great thing to do with your time is to learn how to refread a guitar Just even if you do it once and never do it again. I told you guys I basically built two kit amps You know and and everybody's like and I tell everybody I don't want to build amps But I feel Not that I can build an amp now that I put the kit together But I feel like I have a better understanding of what Goes into it and what amp builders and amp repair guys are pointing at where And and I don't know if you guys remember the story. It's kind of funny when I built my amp kit. I did something horribly wrong in it And I was in a class uh and the class the the teacher came up to me and pointed like wow no no no no stop doing what you're doing I'm like what he's like no look do you read here? It says do this and I was doing something because I thought I knew something better than what they knew and um what I was doing was I was putting the amp together in a way that I could service it later later easy Which is something I do as a guitar tech when I'm working on guitars I want to be able to get in there and fix it again or or you know Modify and he's like no you need to make these wires shorter and twist them and I'm like He's like I'll access no wires noise. I'm like oh See in the guitar. That's really not something we worry about. I don't really worry about an extra inch or two inches of wire as A problem that's not going to create 60 second hum or anything or create a problem So again, it made me understand like oh the two guys are going or the amp guys are going through a different process than the guitar guys And that was kind of insightful. It was nice so Okay, let's uh Let's grab this Ah, okay, um I have no idea right here Okay, so this question came in Um Uh Frugal wants to know frugal fixer spike says hey, do you have any experience with vester guitars? I do Vester guitars I'm looking at one and was owned by a guitar player from marshal Tucker band in the early 90s Has a nice quality and feel. I think made in japan So vester would probably be made in japan or korea That would be real common at the time vester was another brand that's owned by Uh, a company one of these Uh, so you got to think like people don't realize like the krait amps actually had a guitar brand essentially when you think of series 10 And uh west tone there essentially is attached to the st. Louis music distribution, which was at the time was like krait alvarez krait alvarez uh west tone series 10 audio sentron and then amp ag And then eventually mackey and then it all falls apart. But so that's how we're vester. I don't remember who they were attached to I want to say Hamer, maybe that was through cayman. So vester might be a cayman thing. You'd have to you know, maybe you can Look it up and do some research from that knowing that Um, but what what vester guitars is is there was good There was a company gtx was definitely from from that. So I always associate gtx and vester guitars But you understand I could be I'm doing off memory Um, but a lot of those brands like aria pro was you know, different than what I'm talking about But a lot of those brands popped up in the in the time as You know the alternatives to the brands that people couldn't get or afford in stores So, you know, they were just the offshoot brands So I think of vester like I think of aria pro like I think of west tone like I think of Uh, maybe for nanda's, you know, just the brands that were known but not really known. They weren't kramer. They weren't jackson They weren't char bell. They weren't, you know Um, ivanus at the time So, uh, I've picked up a bunch of vesters and played them They all played great because again, they were all either made in japan most of them the ones I played were made in korea So if there's no markings that say it's made in japan, you might want to assume it's made in korea Because I'm sure early ones were but that's how it worked b-search was the same way a lot of them You know, they would go to japan and then immediately go to korea So a lot of companies did because because, uh, you know, japan came became very expensive very quickly and so a lot of companies went to korea Uh, just says hey, does jackson start their 16 inch radius at the 12th fret? When leveling or somewhere else on the fretboard asking so I can fix someone's high fret overall I'd have to know so first of all, that's just not something I can answer here. Um, because jackson First of all is not the same company. It's like three different companies with multiple different production Uh points, so it's just too hard. I'd have to look at it to know and I mean look at physically look at it I wouldn't you know, the model number would be nothing to me. Um, because you gotta stand not only is there china jackson india jackson indonesia jackson korea jackson Japanese jackson us jackson and mexico jackson. So the thing is jackson's made been made in at least six countries that I can think of Then you have multiple ownerships of jackson throughout those times So, you know, there's very few brands That's what I said We brands are funny to us and you know now that you think of brands you think of brands like jackson and charvel and bc rich and They've changed hands so many times and changed production points so many times and who's made them so um, when it comes to compound radius uh You don't have to It depends on what you're doing to the fretboard. You don't have it and if you're using radius blocks That's one thing you're gonna have to deal with but a lot of times you do if you're leveling the frets You don't have to use a rating block a radius block. They wouldn't use a radius block. They would use a sanding beam Uh, so that's what I would recommend you use is just a sanding beam if you're using a sanding beam a straight sanding beam with some sandpaper on it um Which is what they would use It's going to follow the contour of the frets and level the frets that are high if you're trying to do that Now if you're trying to re-radius the fret frets I mean, maybe you can use sanding beams, but I wouldn't just follow the user's sanding beam call it a day That'd be my suggestion Um Oh, let's see All right I'm just going screw it scroll scrolling through the comments Uh, this one's came from or elliworth elliworth worth. I think it's elliworth elliworth I hope I said it right so he's looking for a small puddle platform tube amp under 15 watts For bedroom an occasional live playing looking at the princeton or the blues junior right now So those are two different animals, right? The blues junior likes pedals. So does the the princeton to me They're different and what I mean by different is the blue the blues junior is going to have a really great clean It's going to be a bigger sound especially at lower volumes You know, you can get to overdrive if you turn it up, but if you're using a pedal platform, which is most people are Me I like the blues junior. I prefer the hot rod deluxe a little bit more and you can usually find them used for The same price or if not better right now hot rod deluxe is they're silly cheap, you know, so, you know, you know I'm just blown away how cheap some of those amps are right now um I mean just ridiculously cheap So the hot rod deluxe is are right now And I know you're like well, that's a big amp louder than I need but you can turn it down If you're using it as a clean platform, it's just really great But the blues junior works great. I've used that as well for pedals clean likes pedals The prinsten is more compressed It's you run pedals through it But I will tell you a 10 inch speaker versus a 12 inch speaker First thing you're going to notice is your distortions have more of a fizz to them, which I like at lower volumes I like the prinsten because it quiet volumes It feels big but not bassy because it can't get bass because it can't crank it up And that's where sometimes when you have an amp that sounds great with bass as you turn it down the bass Thins out and then now your amp doesn't have any like fullness to it Um, I prefer the prinsten over the blues junior. That's just my personal taste For whatever it's worth some other Suggestions, I mean obviously going fender amps is almost a no-brainer You can never really lose when it comes to that But obviously don't forget the supra guys are out there which make really good amps for the price point too And you can pick up some of those right now is a good time to go out there looking for a good little amp on a deal man I I'm just just I can't even sell some I have about 10 amps Maybe eight. I don't know 10 10 amps that I'd like to get rid of they're not worther than anything No one wants to pay anything for them. I took some amps down the zims guitars in mesa So you guys know my jord's been sent I took it down there to sell it and it's like It's worth nothing. It's like laughing. I was like, oh and it's not and it's not selling worth nothing and it's Amazing amp. I would I'm almost like maybe I should go back and grab it Because I'm like it's such a great amp. I'm only doing it for space purposes. I go there's only so much space So you guys know I just got a ton of amps and I'm getting some more next month for next year There's a lot of amps coming out and some companies sent some amps to bring me to check out and I was like, why don't we do all these amps? I only have so much room But uh, yeah, okay, so Um, let's see Okay, let's go back Let's see hold on a second I'm just scrolling real quick to see what you guys are. Let's go back over to here Um This one Uh, is there any advantage to using an FR FR cab versus plugging into a pa currently I have a 15 inch mackey pa wondering if it's worth the upgrade to it he put you put fs fs fr but I don't know if that's a mistype. I'm just gonna go with fr fr cabinet uh any anyways, uh uh Is there is there a downside? I don't know if there's a downside to a pa. I don't really don't play through the pa I play through either studio monitors or I've tried the fr fr cabinets I'm not a big fan of fr fr cabinets if I don't need them So I could see an alive performance or an alive situation running my, you know, sat You know modelers through it. I could see the the point of that Um, because it's just to me. It's a flat response monitor and it's gonna sound good, I guess But I I necessarily don't worry about that I use my studio monitors and I was using studio monitors and I wasn't loving them and then I switched to fr frs And then that I think I did a video somewhere in there. I bought all the fr fr monitors again I say not all but too too many of them the lion 6 one was probably one of my favorites freedman's was okay The mark based one I had that one that was okay. It was good. Um, like I said, I just went through them all and uh Head rush about the head rush ones. I just kept buying them hoping like, you know, when is this gonna click for me? And nothing really clicked for me And it's just okay because everybody's got different ears for different things But right now I'll just run it through my my monitors. If you have a pa. I don't see why not so I mean think of this larry mitchell plays an axe effects and he plays everywhere and he will run through an fr like the fender one fr fr or he'll just plug into whatever you have that's clean when he performed here at my house He ran through my phil jones bass amp So he just uh plugged into the phil jones. We went straight Ran the amp flat and he went through right through the amp and it sounded fantastic in the room so I don't know if I overly worry about that kind of stuff I think the big thing is you just don't want something that colors your sound too much And when I say colors it makes your sound may too basic or too bright because usually with a modeling tech You've kind of made a correct the sound that you you have that you love you don't want it to add bass or low end too much You know, right? So but yeah, I uh And uh, I like said, I absolutely just go live going through studio studio monitors and then if I at this point I really don't like I use the kimber, but I won't take it. I don't take the kimber to play with other musicians Even though it's powered and I can run it through a monitor. I I just have easier solutions than that. I really don't want Technology for that. It's not what I'm looking for technology to me So different players have different goals to me if you're bringing technology to a gig You're trying to bring multiple multiple sounds. I'm usually playing in two to three sounds I'm not playing, you know, I'm not playing us an album of music where I'm like I got to capture the song where we use this delay and then the song where I use this and then is not what I'm up to I'm just I I have a sound and it works and I can play through the music, you know I think I told you guys this story. It's kind of funny when I played at the uh, the german I played a german soccer arena for this uh for this well Guinness well Guinness book of world records thing uh, and hues and kittner supplied the amps and they gave us all these modeling amps and They took the time And I want to thank them for that to go through the set list and create All of the profiles or whatever all the sounds for each one of the songs and they go here's the songs and I go okay and um and uh What happened was I plugged into the amp and I got a clean tone and I set it I just hit store whatever and I and I found an overdrive sound with a good amount of gain And I found a sought spots and I go I like this and I saved that and I took the ibanez az I used and whenever I needed low gain Like when we played because we were playing a lot of covers we played um two german covers and I think everything else was you know american cover like nirvana or um cold play or whatever, you know, we were doing acdc uh Jack white right white stripes so um Roll the volume down for that roll the volume up. I was it's how I was the whole show roll I was like and I I I thought it sounded I thought I sounded some a little better than some of the Profiles and stuff. They were using our settings. So I could just do that no problem and uh, that's how I kind of think It's like I just need two tones. I need a I need a just to overdrive and a clean I just make that kind of work and I'll use the volume on the guitar to kind of figure out the sweet spot um Never had anybody go. Wow. What was that? This you know, that's horrible. They just it's I'm just looking to keep things easy in my life. So I Make sense I guess for me um And I was in front of 60,000 people Not one of them complained. I thought maybe one of them stopped me in the parking lot and be like man What's with that tone? We didn't feel like it changed every song Um Okay, uh Okay, hold on a second. Let's go to the next one. How are we doing time? We're doing good. We're gonna wrap this thing up. Uh Uh Okay, so phil, uh, he says hey is the sire factory near the one where you visited I bought a sire v5 base and it's incredible So sire, I don't know is sire I don't know where sire's uh indonesian factory is so, you know, uh sire's another company like court They're technically a korean company and then they build everything in indonesia. This is my take It's kind of gonna probably whatever it's worth to me. I look at indonesia now being there and looking at how it was all structured It's like korea's mexico Please understand what I mean by that. I've been to mexico Into the factories in mexico like insinata and that's the way I looked at it. That's the way it kind of comes across It's like It's it's and I've been to germany and check republic is essentially in my opinion kind of like germany's mexico What I mean by that is it's their source for a uh more Lower cost production. That's where they can produce stuff even for less So that's the way it was kind of like I see it and it just ironically same thing when you go and look at like the martin Our taylor and the fender facilities, you know that are in uh in mexico It's like, okay We have this amercan company and then they they build in mexico because it's lower cost You have the same thing where you saw I saw german companies building in check republic same thing And doing the same thing and this is what I mean now. This is where the korea indonesia thing is different What's different is in mexico and in united states You see them actually start a product or send the product to mexico for finishing or vice versa They'll do some products in mexico and bring them back to the united states and there's a little bit of a crossover I noticed the same thing in germany some products were going to check republic to be finished or They were you know started in germany and then go there I didn't really see anything go the other way, but i'm sure it could Where I you didn't see anything like that with korea like korean product going to indonesia So that's where the analogy would then stop but um, you know, I would imagine that's why almost all the korean manufacturers went to indonesia It's just again. It's just a lower cost a point to make an instrument at this point. That's what everybody's shooting for It's like how can they compete in this market of ever ending? How can we do it for less money kind of thing? um, and that's just the reality of it, you know, it's uh I don't know um I don't know how to I don't know how to I know how to explain it. I don't know how to justify it all if that makes any sense um, okay I Okay Brian says where does mexico outsell or out sort stuff to be cheaper china? I don't know I don't maybe everybody does china think about this Uh, every everybody uses china at some point, you know, we were talking about this on a on a personal private business Call behind the scenes kind of thing and one of the comments that I thought I could take away from that share with you guys is Somebody was saying that it's so impossible to make anything anywhere now Even if you get something made in china, it's not all made in china Like that's the irony even something that says main china isn't 100% main china That's how impossible it's getting to make anything anywhere now in one place. It's a very very tough thing to to do But uh, we all we all know the game the game is, you know, they're all trying to figure out how to make a guitar price point That's something you'll buy but also very profitable for them and the future for them is definitely overseas Which is why I've been saying this for years that every time, you know, you guys talk about gibson Or fender or prs in the vein of like american made product I'm like, yes, they make a product in the united states and yes, I think that's great and but also they they all equally Do a equal amount or more overseas and that's really where things are, you know, that's where the growth is I I don't know. I can't look in their books. I'm just guessing I'm gonna say I'm gonna guess that gibson fender and prs's growth is really rooted in overseas market That's not only building overseas, but they're they're opening up new new markets overseas prs is opening up india and they're how to good They had a bunch of clinics in india for guitars and they said it went really well really really well so they say it fast Now brian says we're just trying to outsource things to be made cheaper There's cheaper than china for sure. So, you know, like vietnam's I don't know, but there's that they they outsource as well everybody outsources a little bit so um Robert says moon pie is the best in the world it is moon pie is outsourced nowhere It's why, you know, I said this to to the patrons and I don't know if I ever tell you guys this I have no problem talking about any product or anything again. I don't like politics. So we don't talk about politics I say that in the vein not that that I don't want to Take a side in politics. I just like sports. I just don't have the attention span for it It's not something i'm interested in so to talk about it would just be a waste everybody's time that being said Products and on the channel, I've told you guys I will review whatever I think is either interesting or more importantly what I think you guys might find interesting And we'll just discuss it on the channel and a lot of the stuff, of course It's most interesting you guys based on the analytics Is affordable guitars? um, I I think I told you this into a year. Let's just tell you this year. I did way too many We're going to readjust that for 2026. I did too many High end usa make guitars on the channel whether or not When I say that people go really and I go, that's because you didn't watch them. That's the videos that didn't get watched Yes, all the guitars I did that were main china main indonesia were Essentially like 70 percent of the views total views for the year of this channel But they were the minority of the videos I made they I actually I think actually indonesia and china combined were still a little less than main usa product. Why because I mean look at my wall here. I'm I'm I you know, I like main usa product Like I said, I don't know if it's a pride thing because I served in the military or because I am you know an american I don't know if it's because it's more they're more collectible I don't know if it's because it's what I desired when I was a kid But that's what I lean into but it's not what I just value only does it make sense? I don't look like I don't look at any one of the guitars on this wall and go Oh, this one's better because it's made so and so made so somewhere However, I I've said before and I'll say it again and um, I think main usa stuff is a luxury to buy And if you can afford to do it, you know good for you I try to do it myself Because again, it's a luxury but it's also I think naive to not understand that You know, there are great guitars for a quarter of the price And you can't ignore them as a channel that's supposed to be a dissection of guitars across the platform um So that's my whole point with all this is what i'm trying to say um But when it comes to that what I when I told the patrons which I apparently have never told you guys So I thought maybe maybe now it's worth mentioning. Um, I made a deal where as you guys know, I have a signature guitar with Kiesel I don't get paid for that guitar because that's the deal I wanted to make it be made but that essentially is a guitar I'm endorsing that's what that means. I'm endorsing Kiesel because I said hey put my name next to that guitar I've also as you guys know, I've had uh, zither stands and I've put my logo on them and I've sold them to you This is a zither stand with the know your your logo Zither stands with a string swing cradle And soon probably next month you'll be hearing what's happening to black stock pickups And you'll know I've also again partnered with another company And the one thing you'll notice just like when I helped launch the badlands guitars um, the cons there's a consistency in that and I again, I don't mean to be political about it I just need you to understand my logic because I think that's what's fair Um, all those companies have something in common. I just mentioned which is they solely make products in the usa They do not make any of the products outside the usa zither does not make any products outside the usa They only make stuff in texas kiesel only makes products in in in california. He does not have a import line of products The new partnership you'll see or endorsement you'll see next month is a 100 u.s. A manufacturer again Obviously badlands was a 100. That's why I lent my help to them Um, this is for one reason one reason only I think that's who needs the most help So if I'm going to give my wholehearted full force endorsement of something which I rarely do Um, that's why I do it. I'll do it because I that's I think they need to help I don't as you I just told you a second ago I can do a video of a 300-dollar main china guitar and I can get a half a million views and they'll sell a quarter of a million guitars and good for them and I'm glad they did it. I don't really get anything for it. So it's not really a good for us. It's more good for them, but I'll when I put my full energy behind something I always put it behind something I I feel a little bit more passionate about personally. So it's more of a personal thing to me, which is something You know, that's just my own personal thing and then also Also someone who needs it Brandon says badlands and past tense. Well, I'm no longer a partner with badlands. So I partner with them Because the fact that like I said, that was the only way to make it financially feasible for them. They were they didn't have any way to You know compensate me in any way. So we did it as a partnership agreement So Okay, so anyways, I just thought I'd share that with you us Okay, so Hold on Hold on a question. There's a question. I don't understand the question. Somebody says why would someone are you talking about earlier? When I was talking about company lowering prices somebody said why 60 second Steve said, why would they lower prices? I don't know if you're talking because it's where it gets talk Troublesome in the comment sections. I don't know what you guys are going on about um Why would a company lower prices? Um in the reference and the point of the company I'm talking about their sales went up this year when they were projecting flat or down So they were very excited about that but Um, what happened in their case one, they didn't uh, you you was mentioned. I'm just again You credit mentioned tariffs. They didn't have any tariffs. So I'm just being just telling you what happened. They didn't really have any tariff pressure they're um They are I mean nobody can say like I said, nothing's made 100% anywhere But they are made, you know in the high 90% in usa Um, and in fact, I've talked to four companies who are in that percentage and they all said the same thing They just didn't see a whole lot of price increasing this year on them. Um, just telling you what they said don't kill the messenger Um, I just thought it was interesting. They all had said this. They don't know each other They just all know me and we were just talking because it's the holidays and um, and also we they were asking me to do content for next month This was something that was in discussion And what was in discussion was they didn't see a huge they didn't see cost increases in 2025 And they didn't see sales losses, which they were anticipating So in the particular case of the company who says they're going to lower some prices What they noticed was a couple of their skews Were not selling as strong as the other skews and They felt the prices were a little high and that they said the feedback from the customers where the prices were a little high And they actually have room to bring them down Because the fact that they just had they haven't felt any pressures that have to live. They don't have to raise that price So that's how it works. But so, you know, that's the minority The majority of the company talks talk to or talk about that, you know, prices are up and some of the profits were down So that's how it works so But I think they were all in agreement with iwas2 was some of them were saying they were up 5% this year and they said that 5% was great Because flat would have been good for them and I agree So Let's see Um Um the rift the return The return of tc says the whole selling point of badlands was the final check by phil well That was what people grabbed onto as the selling point. That was not supposed to be the selling point of the guitars I wasn't even supposed to do the quality assurance on those guitars That wasn't anything I was going to do the quality assurance of me doing the guitars The original idea was There was issues with the builder So I was going there to make sure everything was fine is what the the plan was the main selling point of the badlands guitars besides trying to offer something unique was the Disclosure of every component and where it came from. That was the needle. I was trying to move They were very aware of this by way of badlands, uh, which is I saw this as an opportunity. Look everything I do with a company I I try to try to figure how to make that as an opportunity for what I do here That makes perfect sense. I think Not financially notice. I'm not saying financial. I'm saying opportunity So for instance, you know, if I can work with a company and go to their factory That's going to benefit us here because I can share that with you guys You know, uh, now that I've had a signature guitar for many years I could tell you all about signature guitars. No one's asked But if you want to know how people are compensated how it works What decisions are made what you can and cannot do what I can say and not say what a company can say and not say I'm more versed into it than the people who pull up from their ass constantly on youtube constantly I've heard now in the last month. I've heard three different people explain a signature deal I have never I have no idea how it works Because they have a negotiated one. I've negotiated not only to have one. I've negotiated For companies for somebody to have one with a company. I've been on both sides of that fence So I know what they get paid out and I know generally speaking I can't know everybody's business, but I can know you what I can tell you what somebody agreed to and what I agreed to So that's insightful. Maybe we'll discuss that one day. Um, the point is is uh, back with badlands When they came to me with the idea that they k want to make this usa me guitar And they want to do something really fun and different and colors, you know in paint jobs one of the things I'll show you This is what I did Is and uh, you know it did it move the needle? No Because there was uh, there's a reason why So let me go here Go to it Um Okay, give me a second guys takes me a second to fail And remember I'm looking on right now. They could have took away what I did Um And they might have they might have ditched it Um Yeah, because I don't see it Let me try something hold on one last try Yeah, I don't see it so maybe they took it away. Um, let me try one more thing Huh Oh, here it is. I found it or at least I think I found it right here. Let's try this Okay, so I First Honda, you know, uh, I think I I'm doing off memory guys. Don't kill me. Okay, when I bought my first Honda I pretty sure it said like body made in like Arkansas and then it was like engine made in Japan transmission made in like somewhere else in the u.s And I was like, oh, that's cool. And then like my current Honda It's pretty much mostly made in the u.s. And oh, you know, think of this Uh, I had I've owned a bunch of Hondas one Honda was made partly in Canada and partly u.s. And partly japan this one is the most main usa Honda I've ever owned the current one I have. Um, and I thought it was cool Truth so I thought oh, let's do that and Uh, I thought maybe that would put pressure on the industry to kind of do that what I learned. Okay um is Most of the most the companies don't have they they have suppliers and the suppliers don't know It became this this badlands when they were doing this they can tell you this if you want to talk to them, uh, they will tell you that um the uh It's really difficult to Get anyone to disclose where they're getting it from so yeah, if you bought it and you Okay, uh, when you when you buy something Uh you You can't I'm basically what I'm trying to say is like I built a guitar in the usa and I buy a bridge from godo and it says made in japan You're like, okay, so I can that part's made in japan Then I want to get fret wire the fret wire is usually made in usa or made japan But maybe I go to the fret wire company go where do you get your wire from and they're like they don't know It's just like said it's really tricky and when you make pickups like I've made pickups for years Sometimes just asking common questions about raw materials and pickups is almost impossible The the manufacturer that's making the part when you contact them. They just don't know the they just don't know so so Yeah, it's tricky It's all it's all you know, but like said, I think uh better informed consumers are as always a better situation All right, let's wrap this show up. Let's uh, we probably got stuff to do this weekend What are we gonna do? Let's uh Let me refresh to make sure I haven't missed anything. I'm gonna see what Amanda grabbed for me. Let's try to do one more Interesting Okay Um Beer the the sign on is beer that's their name beer Like ber Anyways, it says thoughts on guild. I have a I have an s200 and I love it Um, I owned a bunch of guilds and I love them especially guilds 12 strings I still till this day. I think it's one of the best 12 string guitars ever um You know guild was a a thing because I was a dealer when fender had guild and that's not even necessarily known as the best guild By far, you know, obviously, you know fender acquired guild Um, and then now a guild is owned by another company Uh, but when fender uh off shot guild, I lost it as a dealer So we lost the guild line and that was where I lost like connection with the brand doesn't make sense I didn't I didn't have a way But so that's why I said guild is another brand where it's like kind of like what I talk about jackson Like which guild are we talking about? There's three different guilds and I don't know which one but uh, there another one I would like to see on the channel the um The uh, well since this is the end of the show, I'll give you the end of the show announcements were cool for 2026 There's a lot of new changes coming in 2026 um This year for 2025 we spent uh, the majority of our time focus and money on improving the content By the you know the scorecards the new cameras the new cameras, uh, you know editing process The increasing amount of information per video that you get, you know, uh while compressing the video So the videos are technically shorter, but have more information they've ever had before That was where we focused, you know, kind of how can we refine the process to make something better for you guys? That's ultimately the goal. Um So I want to thank the patrons the channel members all of you guys subscribe all that stuff for that um The other thing we did was we also consciously brought down the amount of Sponsored videos that we had this year and the type of sponsorship, you know Because there's obviously multiple times sponsorship the two biggest being they supply product Either they give it to you or loan it to or they pay you Um, and essentially all of it is a form of payment But we're talking about there's cold hard cash payment And then there's free product payment and then there's loaning your product and you know And uh, we were able to to push that down a little bit but also refined to the most raw type, which is just product And 2026 will be even less sponsored content than before Um, because again, we only do I only do so many videos a year whether you guys realize it or not Doesn't really matter to me or does it probably doesn't matter to you, but that's how many I do So when I decide to take less Uh, uh, when not take less monsters, basically when I only do so many videos It's not like if a company reached out tomorrow and said hey, we'll pay you to do a video I'll do another video on top of what I'm going to do just make sense And what I'm basically trying to say is we've calit we're calendaring out the videos I want to do for the year So that's how we know we're going to have less sponsorship videos in 2026 because a lot of the videos are just videos I think you guys want to see again. I'm just trying to focus the other thing that I want to tell you That's really interesting about 2026 and because I want to end on a positive note when I can is the average view video of a know your gear video went from in 2024 From 38,000 views per video that was the average because we had some 10,000 view videos and to uh, 98,000 views per video for the year that's not total for the channel for lifetime That's just for this year. So we doubled our average view durations views um this year and Coincidentally that was from non-sponsored content. So obviously the more stuff we did that wasn't heavily sponsored the more people engaged with it um, and I just want to thank you for that and um, I I want to think uh, you know who I'd like to think I'd like to thank my wife a lot for that because not only did she help me do that but she was supportive in the idea because uh, you know, that's I can tell you right now. You could triple you could quadruple your views You're not going to make on youtube what a company would have gave you to sponsor video. So But ultimately better content, dude I'm not going to complain. Hi. So I want to thank you guys all for that. I hope you guys have a fantastic weekend Something fun. I should have mentioned at the beginning of the video because I'm an idiot and I didn't do it I'm doing a you know how we did a live pedal board build I'm doing a live 1980s rack mount build on the other channel. I'll put a link to that I think I'm going to try and do it tomorrow. If not sunday Definitely by sunday. So I'm going to do a live rack mount build and then demo it live and everything And I'm really excited about that. So I want to so just look for that on the second channel If you haven't subscribed to second channel, you could you could check it out if you want Um, and on that note, I want to thank you all for your time to the next time Know your gear If you're learning something or having a good time, don't forget you can subscribe for free and help this channel Or for ten dollars a month, you can join me on patreon for live clinics where you can ask questions every single week