I remember something about prohibited wood and Obama.
I remember it.
This is a disgrace.
It is time to tweet @realDonaldTrump #POTUS #GreatAwakening @jeffsessions and demand they investigate the obama feds that have dune this and why.
Yes, that raid was outrageous. I can’t recall the pretext used for the raid but it became evident afterward that Obama’s thugs wanted a pound of flesh out of the CEO.
What was the Obama pretext?
Also, the company should have been able to recover as their guitars are some of the finest ever crafted. Might be good to go through BK and emerge with a cleaner balance sheet.
The wood was ultimately returned, and Gibson made a run of Flying Vs using that fretboard wood, called the “government model”. Sold out in minutes. I recently did a blind test between some amazing vintage guitars and a new True Historic Les Paul. It won. Easily. Myth shattered.
I think Gibson is really facing bankruptcy because they are trying too hard to sell $500.00 guitars for $4,000.00. The quality they were known for in previous decades just isn’t there any more. Paul Reed Smith, Taylor, Kiesel, and other US manufacturers are offering much better instruments for comparable or lower prices.
Guitar forum liberals hate Henry Juszkiewicz just like they hate Donald Trump. It’s Henry derangement syndrome out the wazoo.
Henry swooped in and revived the company from its doldrums back in the late 1980s. He turned it around. I guess he couldn’t sustain it, though. Now it will probably be bought out by one of the big musical instrument corporations.
Gibson has always been in a precarious spot because their guitars are essentially hand made with lots of artisanal skill and labor involved. That’s been their main virtue to me but it puts them at a serious competitive disadvantage.
My prediction is that whoever takes over Gibson will radically modernize the production of the mid and low level guitars, and preserve the hand production only in a very expensive upper tier line.
Henry was sort of headed in that direction but I don’t think he had the heart to truly do it. He loved the company’s history and traditions too much. He was softhearted towards it. It’s going to take someone with more of a bottom line focus to do the radical overhauling.
That raid was abusive, and I can’t say there was something legitimate behind it.
However, the sums and damages cited are not of a scale that five years later would cause a default on a half billion dollars of debt that comes due within a 7 day period. That seems more like a company that spent too much money with too low a return over a long period of time.
The guitars will still be made, the company will survive out of BK, the debt holders will write down some of this money, and Henry J. may retire, I would guess.
Trump needs to step in and save Gibson Guitars, just another Obomba political attack.
Goddamn that bastard!
Yes, the feral grubbermint is a very real problem for Gibson but so is their CEO Henry Juszkiewicz.
Juszkiewicz mgmt philosphy has completely ignored their customer base gearing the company toward building ‘innovative’ new guitars.
Innovation is not what guitar players want or expect from Gibson.
What they want, and what Gibson can provide at the prices they’re charging, is Exact replicas of Gibson production from the 1950s.
They are not interested in Chinese made crap with innovative tuning gears on them that tune the guitar for you.
It’s so bad there’s actually a name for Gibson’s top dollar, phony, imported “made in the USA” copies from China.
Players are furious at being charged $4K or more for a “Chibson”.
Their Epiphone brand used to be the low end, low cost look alikes.
Today it’s considered a better made instrument than the real thing.
Why would you even consider any Gibson, when you could have a Strat?
Tweeted DT. Occasionally he looks at my tweets and Don, Jr. follows.
Gibson’s real problem is that their higher end guitars are made in the USA and involve a lot of hand labor. Fine guitars they are, but the ever increasing prices mean fewer and fewer people can afford them.
It’s not the federal attacks. It’s Henry Juszkiewicz. The quality sucks while prices are sky high. There are defective truss rods in their electric guitars and the company knows it, but won’t change them because it would open them up to a lot of warranty claims. The guy who does all my guitar work here in Nashville tells me they have a large warehouse of nothing but “returned” acoustic guitars at their Bozeman, Montana facility. The quality that used to be in Gibsons is now over in their Epiphone Division which is under different leadership. The “politics” of this problem are not the great factor people are being led to believe here.
I recall that they were actually raided twice.
If only Juszkiewicz would have paid the Obama Extortion ring, paid to some liberal cause
all this would have gone away,
until the next election cycle, or the next enviro-weenie colluded crisis. !"
Here’s my prediction - it will be taken over by some “hedge fund” armed with massive low interest debt. With its ruthless “efficiency” it will engage in massive job cutting and shipping out much of the work to India or China. The guitars will not be as good, but they’ll spend on a good media marketing campaign, and once they have fully destroyed the Gibson brand, they’ll shut it down.
Gibson Brands, Inc. troubles began with an illegal federal raid upon its factory in 2011 and now it faces bankruptcy; I strongly-urge all those who find offense at the government’s weaponizing a 100 year-old law (Lacey Act) against a corporation for political purposes to rally behind Gibson and fix this egregious injustice.
Pertinent quote regarding the Lacey Act amendment:
“That’s a blank check for bureaucratic abuse.”
The Lacey Act was amended as a component of the 2008 “Farm Bill” passed by the 100th Congress’ Dem supermajority on the Hill, followed with a Presidential veto by GW Bush henceforth overridden by the supermajority Dems.
The Obama administration then weaponized the Act against Gibson - for obvious political reasons; its head was a Republican supporter - in turn potentially-ensnaring every single Gibson guitar owner under the “due care” provisions of the 2008 Farm Bill amendment.
In essence, if your Gibson guitar contains wood which falls under the still-sealed warrant under which Gibson was wrongfully-persecuted, you have a problem.
All Gibson guitar owners & Gibson supporters (Conservatives in general) should put on their activist hats and seek to rescind the Lacey Act (a distinct possibility under Trump) and give consideration for the taxpayers (federal government) to bail out this fine company as recompense for the damage wrought by criminal acts ordered by the Obama administration.
Footnote: It is truly shameful that in this era we must rely upon bloggers to report facts.
Thugs beating up anyone they didn't like - from the IRS targeting Conservatives to the Environmental nutcase goons going after Gibson.
For the millionth time: Thank God Trump Won... and prayers for Gibson.
Yes. Having an ebony fret board on your Gibson causes global warming.