What do the gun business and the guitar business have in common? The answer is: Nearly everything.
Let’s make a list:
- The products appeal to a dwindling audience that is mostly white, male, and “cishet”, despite attempts to expand the customer base. The Venn diagram of gun owners and guitar owners has a lot of overlap, although there are certainly plenty of musicians who would never even think of using violence, even in self defense, and there are also plenty of gun owners who have never touched a musical instrument. The customer groups are so similar that at least two of the major guitar forums have firearm subforums.
- That audience is aging into irrelevance. Young people aren’t very interested in guns or guitars. The average Millennial thinks of music as something other people make and he thinks of self-defense as a deeply reactionary and possibly racist act that he associates with “stand your ground”, Oathkeeper types, and the entire state of Florida. It’s illegal to own a gun in many major cities and it’s difficult to play anything besides an acoustic guitar or a headphone amp. So the demographic for both is going South and Southwest. The majority of the “guitar music” on the radio nowadays comes from Nashville, not Liverpool or Laurel Canyon.
- The products are durable and rarely need replacement. You can’t “shoot out” a modern firearm in anything approaching normal use. A Glock can run 30,000 rounds between cleanings. Even something like a Smith and Wesson Model 629, the famous .44 Magnum revolver that is infamous for suffering “timing issues” after firing full-power Magnum rounds. can be cheaply fixed over and over again. Guitars are like that as well. If Willie Nelson can’t wear out his guitar, neither can you. And a solidbody guitar like a Les Paul will last a hundred years or more with the occasional refret. So people don’t have to replace their guns or their guitars the way they do clothes, cars, motorcycles, or computers.
- It’s difficult and expensive to make the products in the Western World. It doesn’t matter whether you’re talking about Bulgarian AKs or Chinese Epiphones; nowadays, if you’re going to make a guitar or a gun in the United States or Western Europe you’re going to face steep price competition from low-cost countries that will force you upmarket. Even the cheapest entry-level US-made guitars from Gibson, PRS, and Fender can run eight hundred dollars or more. That’s also what you will pay for a basic American-made 1911-pattern pistol, brand new. Put this together with the previous point — the used stuff is as good as the new — and you can easily see that used American-made products are the other major reason people don’t buy new American-made products in these categories.
- There are legislative barriers to making the product in the United States. American gun manufacturers actually have it pretty easy compared to importers — there are several kinds of guns that can only be made here thanks to import restrictions. But every year there’s a new Congress that tries to limit the product mix. Guitar makers don’t face any such problem, although I think some sort of reasonable restriction on double-neck “Assault Guitars” would make sense. They do, however, face constant persecution for CITES and Lacey Act violations real and imagined and that, along with OSHA and EPA regulations, cause a lot of makers to throw up their hands and send the work overseas.
- The buyers are highly resistant to change. We’ll get back to this point as far as guitars go, but with guns it’s absolutely true. Nobody wants to be the first person to defend themselves with a new kind of pistol or shotgun.
- A large percent of the buyer base purchases multiple products. Very few people collect KitchenAid mixers or sofas or hammers or hot water heaters — but most of the people who own a gun in fact own several guns, and the same is true for guitars. For that reason, it’s always more profitable to market to your existing customers than it would be to get new ones.
Keep all that in mind as we discuss the problem currently facing Gibson Guitars. Knowing that their customer base is literally dying out from under them, and also knowing that their best bet to find new customers and extract additional sales from current customers is to come up with something shocking and different, the company has spent the entire past decade trying to reinvent the guitar. Experienced Gibson watchers can name the ambitious failures: Robot Guitar. Dark Fire. Dusk Tiger. Reverse V. Firebird X. Virtually all of these products feature significant electronic integration into a product, the electric guitar, that has traditionally been a simple arrangement of wires, magnets, and potentiometers. None of these “innovations” have found much of an audience, although if you want a Dusk Tiger or Dark Fire for your collection today you should be prepared to spend real money for what many Gibson aficionados consider completely useless but historically significant instruments.
For 2015, Gibson decided to force its package of “innovations” on the entire line of USA-made guitars. The electronic features of robot tuning and printed-circuit-board tone wiring were accompanied by radical changes in the neck width and a “zero fret” intonation system. Everybody in the business outside Gibson understood how unpopular these new guitars would be, but that didn’t stop the company from announcing massive price increases across the board for 2015.
The result? Volume has fallen through the floor and guitars are becoming dusty on the hangers.
Under the leadership of “Henry J”, Gibson’s non-musician wonderboy CEO who bought the company along with a few other Harvard grads thirty years ago, the company rarely admits fault and rarely listens to customers outside their treasured “whales” who buy whole living rooms full of the $12,000 Murphy Aged Custom Shop Reissues. This year, however, the disaster situation at the dealers has been bad enough for the company to do a “Sprint Run” of midyear guitars for 2015.
The sales pitch for these guitars is, and I’m not kidding you here, that they aren’t quite as bad as the rest of the 2015 models. No robot tuners and standard-width necks! Woo hoo!” It’s like an alternate universe where Porsche admitted defeat and brought back the 993 in the year 2000. (That would have been a brilliant idea, by the way.)
Pretty much everybody in the guitar biz is applauding the Sprint Run, even if they are being a bit cynical about it. “Leave well enough alone,” they say. But the electric guitar can’t survive if all anybody does is build old-style guitars to sell to old people. Somebody needs to figure out a way to make the instrument relevant to young people. Maybe it isn’t robotic tuning or weird shapes or onboard processors — but it has to be something. Otherwise, the guitar will be the accordion of the twenty-first century. You do know that the accordion was once the best-selling instrument in America, don’t you?
Overgeneralized screed follows. Please take with grain of salt:
Guitars, guns, newspapers, network television, etc. all tied their wagons to the Boomers. The majority of Boomers are whiny, self-indulgent and spoiled, who constantly need their egos stroked. They never wanted to, and didn’t, attempt to pass on their interests. Rather, they selfishly kept everything to themselves and pulled it out only when it would make them cool at the expense of someone else. “Oh, you don’t have a ?” They created their own collector market, selling their own desired objects amongst each other at high dollar amounts, mistaking the inflated values for universal interest. “This guitar is worth $10,000 kid! Van Morrison grinded on it during ‘Moondance’ at the ’72 Monterey Pop Fest. Isn’t that awesome?” No, not really. It’s a fucking museum piece. Youngsters would rather just have the cash. Now that the Boomers are facing retirement home bills and costly surgeries, they have no compunction in selling off their treasured trinkets, at the same time putting the lie to their claims of strong attachment. It’s no surprise the kids haven’t followed their parents’ lead, because for the most part there wasn’t any leading.
Now they’re wondering why those darn kids don’t indulge in their expensive hobbies. You priced them out, Bobby Boomer!
Lots going on, here.
Interest in making music is, I think, higher than you intimate. The music itself, though - even the music with guitar in it - is mostly electronic. When all you’re going to do is plug it into an iPad or something, a $150 clearance special from Guitar Center is just as good as a vintage Jazzmaster.
The other, probably bigger, problem is that there just aren’t enough old-school nerds. Before the gamers stole the term, a nerd was somebody who would forego leisure activities, e.g. Talking to girls, for the sake of learning everything about a subject. Real guitar heroes, even the ones who eventually got the ladies, were often nerds who would hole themselves up and drill scales til they bleed.
But today’s role models, in my view, seem to be hacker types, not necessarily computer hackers, but just people who succeed by finding shortcuts to hard work. There’s also a weird undercurrent of, um, proletarian resignation? As if, unless you’re born special, and unless you’ll get wealthy and famous pursuing a craft, you’re wasting your time.
Guitars, marksmanship, precision driving - The past times which seem to be suffering are the ones in which we must constantly confront our own limitations. We are the 99%, and we would rather be playing video games, apparently.
I know nothing about Guitars but i do know that real gun control means mandatory Firearms training at a young age before the ‘ mystique ‘ bullshit gets embedded .
Firearms are just tools , no more no less . like all power tools they can be very dangerous , mostly in the hands of untrained folks and kids .
-Nate
The ownership math for both is n + 1, with n = the guitars or guns you have now, and 1 being the one you want next.
I shoot and play music with plenty of young adults my kid’s age (mid 20s). The kids, at least the ones I know, are alright.
PS: GIbson has lost its mind, and the plot. Equivalent to Harley Davidson dropping the V-Twin and going metric UJM.
Its much simpler then you lead people to believe .Generations after the Boomers did little with their hands . Work and hobbies for the whiner generation consist of politically correct,prepackaged theoretical don’t get dirty activity.In other words the spoiled brats cant do shit.So wheres the market???
I don’t think the children were responsible for their upbringing. May want to look a little upstream.
this. and the people you referred to above are in charge now.
In my experience, very high-end guitars have always been owned by either wealthy older collectors, or successful professional musicians who probably have a sponsorship.
Working musicians, those who tour and record for four or five-figure fanbases can’t afford to fetishize the object. Especially when the sound in their head may well be best realized by some $200 piece of whatever from the Asian continent that needs to be retuned every take. The most beloved instruments in studios I’ve been to were often saved from the trash pile and had no provenance, but simply created superior results in the right hands and after a little TLC.
In other words, plenty of younger people still play guitar, but no, they aren’t buying the types that collectors care about.
I can’t comment on the firearms industry as I have no experience other than buying them, but I would guess that people want cheap firearms that work more than US-made firearms. I don’t think interest has waned, though.
Not only that, I do know that Gustav Mahler’s first instrument was a little kid-sized accordion.
ATB,
johnny puddles
Closet Mahlerite
So I work for a large arms manufacturer. There is a certain irony to the fact that weapons import gun control bills have kept my industry from being washed away by a tidal wave of cheap firearms from southeast Asian countries. This unintentional protectionism has helped ensure that about 2,000 people at the company I work for are well payed, with full benefits and profit sharing. The same is true at other firearms manufacturers across the country. More stable, well paying jobs have also been created by foreign manufacturers either setting up shop here in the US or partnering with an American company. Business has been booming, I can’t begin to tell you how many pallets of AR-15s and handguns we move out the door each day. We would have to be idiots to not make money doing this. If the market for guns is drying up you could have fooled us. Especially subcompacts, can’t make em fast enough.
But all of that is thanks in part to protectionism. Which is why anyone telling me Free Trade Agreements are the solution to our economic woes can go to hell.
“If the market for guns is drying up you could have fooled us. Especially subcompacts, can’t make em fast enough.”
I think the market for guns is aging out. But as long as those people have money I’d imagine that they will continue to spend it. The problem is what happens ten or twenty years from now when your average middle-class potential customer has been thoroughly socialized to distrust the idea of owning a gun.
I can understand the perception, but I don’t think it holds true. I’m regularly involved in instruction for concealed carry and I see a pretty broad spectrum of new shooters. Every time something like the Furgeson riots hits the news half a dozen normal, well adjusted people contact me privately for help in acquiring a firearm (usually a pistol) and learning how to use it.
It’s certainly true that established owners buy more than one gun…I’m typical of that. New shooters tend to buy another firearm soon after their first purchase.
Shooting sports are growing in popularity, concealed carry permit applications have exploded in many areas…it’s remarkable. I never thought I would see the day when Illinois had shall-Issue concealed carry and yet here we are.
Since 2008 the aggregate demand for firearms and ammunition has increased dramatically and it shows little sign of slowing down anytime soon. The exact firearms in demand shifted slightly during ban worries, but prior to ObAma ban talk concealable handguns were on the rise and now that trend is back.
I don’t think self protection is going to become less popular in the future outside of a few urban areas dominated by elites who have ample public and private protection and the semi-permanent underclass who views the police more suspiciously than the violent criminal actors in their own community.
Also, the middle class in general has contracted quite drastically and the trend doesn’t seem to be abating, especially with regards to Gen Xers and Millennials. Doesn’t seem to as much ‘fun money’ circulating through the general economy, one reason for the desire to do everything through a computer program.
The two stores with ranges where I usually go to shoot are having banner years, and yes, they’re selling the shit out of ARs and subcompacts. And this is in the Chicago suburbs. In Florida, where I often visit and go shooting with my daughter and friends, the store/range where we have a membership is having the best year in their history.
I’m seeing a lot of first-timers as well as repeat customers. Salespeople are working with young married couples getting their first piece. Classes are booked up for basic pistol defense. And then in IL there are the experienced owners who now (finally) have the right to CCW and are getting certified and picking out their subcompact carry pieces.
ARs are super hot as even political moderates are sensing another run may be coming by the feds to institute another weapons ban, and scary black rifles are always first on the list. Heck, in IL there have been attempts in the legislature to ban semi-autos — all semi-autos, not just pistols. That would include your waterfowl shotgun, pistols, rifles, including the venerable 10/22. The Springfield/Chicago crowd gets beaten back by the downstaters, but the writing is clearly on the wall.
At a big box retailer near me, there are guys who pay off a few salespeople to get a call when the truck has ammo on board. When the doors open, these guys show up with dollies and roll out cases of the good stuff.
Maybe we have reached Peak Gun in America, but I’m thinking the only thing that slows down gun sales will be federal restrictions. And everyone else must be thinking the same thing.
There’s the real risk that all Obama has done is pull future gun sales forward. Many people (some of my family members among them) are buying NOW because they fear they won’t be able to 5 years down the road. For guns they may or may not have bought five years from now. And five years from now, the guns they bought are still going to be in good shape (possibly never fired) and not in need of replacement. Or worse, put back on the market as used guns, potentially depressing new gun sales even more. There’s a real possibility of a drought on the horizon.
In my case, the n+1 math is competing with the motorcycle n+1 math, the fishing gear n+1 math, the boat n+1 math, etc. Guns kinda lose out cause the guns I bought back in the 1980’s are still good. Why buy more?
The good thing with kids is that most of them will want to, someday, buy the same guns they use on call of duty. So there’s that market. Eventually.
You could be right Jack, all of our numbers for demand and future projections argue otherwise but only time will really tell. I only have anecdotal evidence that firearms ownership is increasing. I do believe that there is a growing Gun Culture 2.0 as your former boss at TTAG likes to say, but who can say if that will pan out.
Also, it would be very sad to see guitars relegated to the same place in society as the accordion.
Not two hours ago, I was walking down woodward avenue with 3 fellow millenials, discussing our shared passions for firearms and cars. I think the excesses of the american gun market of the last few years are unlikely to be seen again, but there are a sizeable number of younger folks getting into guns and finding out how enjoyable sport shooting can be/self defense enthusiasts.
” If the market for guns is drying up you could have fooled us. Especially subcompacts, can’t make em fast enough.”
panic buying. Any time there’s an incident which puts focus back on gun control (especially if there’s a (D) in the White House) sales skyrocket. “Get one now before you can’t get one at all;” and such. It’s one reason I seriously considered buying an AR-15 earlier this year, until I remembered I don’t like the things.
Interesting.
I’m a GenX-er (specifically a “Bust Generation” GenXer). My partner is a Millennial.
I own a (cheap, crappy) guitar someone bought me off of woot.com as a gift. I learned to play it with GarageBand because, well, I had a guitar! My partner also plays, having spent her youth as perhaps the only tween/teen band groupie who wasn’t promiscuous through some crazy paradox of events.
Neither of us have ever used a gun because we are 1) Canadian, and 2) not anywhere where the far more common Long Gun ownership in Canada would do us any good, not even for target shooting. I’m a tech geek and generally like the idea of weapons as entertainment but, like roller coasters, I’d rather the professionals (or, at least, the trained!) keep them than I. This is probably near universal sentiment from folks where I live.
Plus, honestly, I’d rather play with (or see someone playing with) an RPG or minigun than a pistol or rifle, probably sniper rifles excepted (again, training!). I *do* own a bow that I actually rather enjoy shooting off, but we have public outdoor archery ranges here, and it just feels appropriately “quaint”, maybe like owning a baby cannon or a flintlock.
Anyway, back on topic: My partner and I are the only people I know *our age* who own a guitar. As for gun ownership, two of our Jewish friends who believe the world is out to get them own handguns for protection (seriously, that’s their justifcation), and only take it out to target shoot about once a year. Otherwise we don’t even know anyone who has ever 1) used a guitar or 2) fired a wespon.
Now, our respective parents, and extended family immediately before us (think aunts, uncles, etc.) i.e. Baby Boomers, had nothing to do with guns, either. But several of them did, and in some cases still do regularly play guitar. In both our cases, guitar was offered to us as something to learn, but wasn’t especially exiting to either of us in adolescence - my partner learned guitar as a side effect of band fever in her late teens, and I instead gravitated to the piano, then keyboard, then electronic music.
So Jack, I think you are pretty much dead-on about both gun ownership and guitar interests. While I doubt the owner venn-diagrams would line up the same up here in the Great White North, all of the factors in play exist in both scenarios, as you say.
Now, all this being said, my Baby Boomer guitar playing group, as far as I know, have never purchased another guitar, being quite happy with what they have now. They then either passed those guitars on to their offspring or, their offspring weren’t interested and they are either gathering dust or still in use by their original owners.
Here’s the thing: After reading this article, I decided to ping two of my uncles and ask them why they never grabbed a new guitar (yay smartphones). “It’ll be worth something someday!” was one answer, and “This is what my idol used to play!” was the other.
And that led me to wonder - how much does collectability affect guitar value? Are great swaths of guitars scooped up by collectors today? What percentage is the market?
And, while I know there have been a great many iconic guitar players over the years, what about now? For modern rock bands and their followers, *is* there any longer a focus on “owning your idol’s guitar” as there was in the past? Or have they become utilitarian?
Guns and guitars for most are hobby tools used to pass the time, be challenged and entertained.
The endless and easily digestible entertainment options of the digital age are at the stand by to satisfy our needs for entertainment - who wants to practice scales and memorize songs when we Guitar Hero is competing to fullfill those creative desires with minimized challenges.
I’ve got a sweet Korean-made DeArmond by Guild from 2001, set neck, goldtone humbuckers running through a Crate Vintage Club Class A tube amp made in St. Louis
Jack Said :” I think the market for guns is aging out. But as long as those people have money I’d imagine that they will continue to spend it. The problem is what happens ten or twenty years from now when your average middle-class potential customer has been thoroughly socialized to distrust the idea of owning a gun.” .
I don’t know Jack ;
I taught my Son Fire arms use and safety when he was in his late teens (he wasn’t interested before then) , he’s now 36 and recently built his own custom Bushmaster , his Wife knows how to shoot , both of them hit the target better than I .
He has multiple side arms too and enjoys shooting and maintaining his weapons .
Me , I got bored after 50 years of firearms and gave most of mine to him .
BTW : don’t think we don’t see how you cleverly set this whole thread up ~ Guitars indeed .
-Nate
At the rate firearms and ammunition are selling these days, I have to wonder how many more guys like this are out there: http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-family-id-s-dead-man-with-cache-of-1-200-guns-20150722-story.html
I don’t own a firearm or a guitar, but I can only recommend that those who do have them should actually use them. Play your guitar. Shoot some firearms. Enjoy yourself.
I’d play my cheap Tele more if i could actually turn the amp up loud enough to cover the sound of the picking.. Headphones are pretty much the only option as even my acoustic is too loud.
I’m not qualified to comment on guns in the states but since visiting the Sako factory and spending a day at their range shooting various rifles and shotguns I’ve been meaning to join a club and get a bolt-action rifle for shooting on the range. Probably a .308. For some reason I find open-sight long range shooting fascinating.
Apart from shotguns, a hunting rifle is the only gun you can acquire a permit for relatively easily. Finland is full of hunting rifles and shotguns, but handguns are pretty rare. Unless you count old war-time handguns without permits that are just stuck in gun-cabinets because you can’t buy ammo for them unless you have a permit for that particular calibre..
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