Ooh, the new PRS Private Stock "Signature" guitars are hitting the shelves!

[AndyR]

Yeah it seems I am saying that, doesn't it! :lol:

Not quite what I meant to get across, though it does follow from what I wrote. (I got a bit distracted and kept coming back to it... there was a "devil's advocate" approach in there somewhere, but I'm buggered if I can figure out what I was doing now...)

All I'm really trying to say is that as a consumer I don't personally feel I have any input on it other than my "yes I'll pay that, no I won't pay that". And I'm more than happy with that state of affairs. I don't want to be able to impose anything on the folks that make or distribute stuff - what they want to charge is up to them as far as I'm concerned. They get my business or they don't.

I also never quite see it when folks talk about "firms talking people into buying stuff even if it's overpriced" - yes, the marketing, same as the media, same as what we're doing right now posting on the web, yes all this helps form buyers opinions... but no firm can talk someone into buying something that's overpriced, the consumers that buy the things do it to themselves. No-one's forcing me to buy a Rolex, or PRS, or whatever.... And, indeed, I'm very unlikely to. I personally don't believe that these items are overpriced, they just cost more than they're worth to me personally.

Yes, I do feel sorry for companies that go under because they can't compete. But that is the way of the world, if you've not got a viable business, then you've not got one, sorry... (and I've worked for one or two... I strongly suspect that I'm working for one now and have been the past 11 years, but my job is safe for at least another year or two, and has been all that time)

What I was actually trying to hint at in that bit was that if we were to force everyone to sell at "cost" we guarantee that those people will go out of business and that we would lose a lot of talented people and products. In guitar terms, a PRS or Gibson limited to cost will be way cheaper than one built by the talented luthier in the next village. The quality of the finished products will still vary by only a small margin, and it turns out the cheaper one, half the price, a third even, is the famous and fashionable one! I wonder what the masses will buy? How is a newcomer ever going to break into that market? We'll be stuck with the big businesses that already exist and we'll all have to sell our souls to them if we want a job or products.

I was also trying to hint that if, say, Gibson (I'm guessing, I know nothing about their finances and business models) turned round and sold at cost, they'd be telling you that they were doing it because you asked them to. But that isn't why they'd be doing it at all, they'd be trying to talk you into buying their products for that reason, but they'd be doing it to steal market share at the expense of their competitors.

Nah... I'm happy that what controls all this at the moment is "what is the market prepared to pay for an item" - we the consumers set the prices. We do it by comparing like with like, following fashions, deciding whether we could do it ourselves instead, etc, etc... We have a measure of freedom because of this. Yes, it's constrained by our personal buying power, but I haven't yet heard of an alternative that I actually like the sound of. So I personally don't want to see it changed - I believe that we mess with it at our peril.

And that's the reason why I personally have to say "good luck to them", even if I wish that certain products could be priced in a way that I might personally consider more affordable :lol:

Like Dave (TF) said earlier, we ain't going to agree on this one... but it is fun debating it :D

(Except I've now used most of my day off on the internet!!)

[Philly Q]

well if i were in business i'd like to think i'd charge what it cost to produce the item- including things like wages, r&d, stuff like that (including any other inherent costs you can think of).

I'm not saying i'd mandate it or anything like that. I'm just saying that's what i'd do, and what I think other businesses should ideally do.

I just don't agree with charging what you think you can get away with. I just disagree with the principle of it.

Suppose, for the sake of argument, you have a guitar-making business.  You work hard, get a good reputation, and after a while customers are coming and saying "I can't believe you're so cheap, Dave, your guitars are just as good as that Wez V and Feline but they charge loads more (rip-off bar-stewards!  )".

Wouldn't you be tempted to increase those prices a bit, if the customers were happy to pay it? Just to give yourself a better standard of living and maybe a bit of a nest-egg?  Or to protect the business itself against future hard times.  It doesn't turn you into a robber baron.  :P

Nothing wrong with idealism, but it seems to be cutting off your nose to spite your face.

[Twinfan]

Yep Phil, I'm with you.

Also, dave_mc thinks a £2000 PRS is overpriced.  Do you know PRS' labour cost?  Factory running costs?  CNC investments?  Advertising costs?

They may be more than you're wiling to pay, like Andy says, but that doesn't necessarily mean they're overpriced.

[nfe]

Well, those running costs are low enough that they can sell them to their domestic market much, much cheaper ;)

They might not be overpriced in the states, but it's difficult to argue they aren't here. The same would go for lots of products in lots of industries, of course.

[AndyR]

I just spotted this in the bit Philly quoted:

I just don't agree with charging what you think you can get away with. I just disagree with the principle of it.

I didn't notice it before, Dave (mc).

You turned "how much you think people will pay" into "what you think you can get away with".

Which is fine, it almost means the same thing... But it does put a different slant on it... it implies a nefarious motive, and it loses some of the meaning.

Motive
The motive is actually making a profit. There's nothing nefarious about doing this! It's what we all have to do to survive on this planet. If we make less than we spent we're in trouble, if we only make as much as we spent then we might as well have sat on our hands that day and watched the clouds going by, waiting for something or someone to come along and take advantage of our inactivity. How am going to buy a guitar if I don't make a profit? How am I gonna buy my wife a nice dinner? How am I going to pay my ISP so's I can sit on here and waffle? How am I going to save for my old age when I can no longer work? If we're going to regard making a profit as a bad thing then we might as well call a halt now, we're wearing ourselves out for no reason at all.

Missing Meaning
I wrote "how much you think people will pay" because there's no point in asking for an amount that no-one's prepared to pay, it means people won't buy your thing. That meaning gets kind of lost if you convert it to a "what you think you can get away with" statement.

Granted, there must be folk that set their prices using the "what you can get away with" method. But it's kinda dangerous, it's a quick win strategy, it implies you don't believe the product itself will survive the market's scrutiny for more than a few months, so let's make a buck while we can. As an organisation, you're not going to have long term success if you consistently market products of this nature.

And to be honest, I still say "good luck to them"... the customers will find them out and depart in droves :lol:


Dave (TF), I'd say it stronger than that, I'd go as far as to say PRSs are not overpriced at all. There are dudes happily buying them and waving them about. If they were overpriced, people would not be buying them and they'd be going down the tubes.

Now, if you could do exactly the same job, get the same buzz as you do with your Modern Eagle using my Dano (£165 new it was) - then I'd wonder if you might have paid over the odds slightly. But you can't. In fact, I haven't got a guitar that does that job as far as I'm aware. Instead I might have paid almost as much for all my guitars. I have relatives who still can't get why I need more than one - so I've paid over the odds as well, from their perspective... :lol:

This price thing, on any goods or services, is all about personal perspective.

EDIT: nfe slips another one in while I'm typing! :lol:

Yeah, global markets... I don't really think this place was meant to be "one world, one vision" :lol:

But isn't it perspective here as well? They're only overpriced here when compared with over there. I don't even think about over there - so I'm just looking at the prices here. When I do think about it, it's "oh life's too short"!

[Twinfan]

Well, those running costs are low enough that they can sell them to their domestic market much, much cheaper ;)

They might not be overpriced in the states, but it's difficult to argue they aren't here.

It's very easy to argue they aren't here nfe!

See the example in my earlier post - we're paying pretty much the same as the US for the new Studio model if you add in a bit extra for UK transport costs, customs paperwork etc

http://bareknucklepickups.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=24492.msg323751#msg323751

[AndyR]

^ I was thinking that - but I don't know enough about PRS prices let alone comparing them overseas.

And btw Philly - just cos I'm siding with the PRS-owning stock brokers, estate agents, and minor landed-gentry here ()... it doesn't mean I'm giving in to any GAS for a PRS - don't expect any NGDs from me in the near future :lol:

[nfe]

Well, those running costs are low enough that they can sell them to their domestic market much, much cheaper ;)

They might not be overpriced in the states, but it's difficult to argue they aren't here.

It's very easy to argue they aren't here nfe!

See the example in my earlier post - we're paying pretty much the same as the US for the new Studio model if you add in a bit extra for UK transport costs, customs paperwork etc

http://bareknucklepickups.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=24492.msg323751#msg323751

You're looking at the cost of an individual consumer buying an individual guitar. Not a distributor buying 500. Those transport costs start go down a little bit per item, y'know?

Quite aside from not considering bulk discounts, quick payment discounts, sell or return deals...

[AndyR]

OK, I'm confused now, guys.

Obviously, I think, we're saying that if I could buy a PRS from a shop in the US, with my money, ruling out delivery for the moment, what we're saying is that I could get a lot more geetar for my money?

Is that what folks is saying?

What about salaries? How do they compare. If I moved to the US, am I taking a pay cut if I do a comparable job? I don't actually know, so I can't safely argue what I want to argue.

I'd like to know:
How many months wages does it take a UK person on average UK wage to buy a PRS at UK price.
How many months wages does it take a US person on average US wage to buy a PRS at US price.

Surely that's a better comparison?

I'd mebbe like to know this as well:
How many months wages does it take a UK person on average UK wage to buy a PRS at US price.
How many months wages does it take a US person on average US wage to buy a PRS at UK price.

I've got a nasty feeling I won't like the answer!

Anyway, this global village sh1t won't work until we sort that side of things out across the whole world - and I somehow don't think we will in my life time :lol:

[Twinfan]

You're looking at the cost of an individual consumer buying an individual guitar. Not a distributor buying 500. Those transport costs start go down a little bit per item, y'know?

Quite aside from not considering bulk discounts, quick payment discounts, sell or return deals...

Yeah I know matey, but most of those things apply to each dealer on each side of the pond  :)

Me as a consumer can buy from an authorised dealer in the US, or a dealer in the UK, within a few hundred quid.  More dealers and consumers in the US overall will mean keener pricing and more competition - classic market forces at work.  My example uses a very large US dealer with high turnover, versus a small dealer in the UK.

Taking that into account, if the UK price is only a few hundred quid more with the increased transport and custom costs, plus the larger margin required by the UK dealer due to fewer overall sales, I don't think that the UK prices right now are in any way out of line.

[nfe]

That would be a good comparison. And I've no idea how it'd compare.

Then you've things like the cost of living in both nations and so on...

What kind of prices are gear in high tax/high cost of living nations like those in Scandinavia?

[Twinfan]

Andy - you can't really use your comparison example as wages are generally higher in the US because they have to pay for medical care, have fewer holiday entitlements etc.  It's not an apples with apples comparison.

[Philly Q]

And btw Philly - just cos I'm siding with the PRS-owning stock brokers, estate agents, and minor landed-gentry here ()... it doesn't mean I'm giving in to any GAS for a PRS - don't expect any NGDs from me in the near future :lol:

Ah go on Andy, you know you want to!

I'm not expecting any maple 10 tops, just a nice Starla or Mira?

[AndyR]

I'd forgotten the medical care bit - and didn't know the others.

But it do kind of feed into my "perspective" thing anyway.

I'd actually be very surprised if I had the same spending power on a specific item X if I walked into a US or a UK shop. There's all sorts of factors involved, not the least being someone (me or the seller/distributor) has got to shift item X from one country to another.

Even for something like MacDonalds where I assume the stuff is resourced in the country that the shop is in, I'd expect the price of a Big Mac to reflect the spending power of Joe Average in that country. And I'd be looking at it through an exchange rate thinking "jeez have you seen the price of that compared to what it is in Tooting..."

I still think the only sensible way of pricing your stuff is to establish what the punters will pay and charge that. If you move into other territories you'll have to make sure the extra costs are covered, but set a price based on the territory's spending power - you'd be daft to do anything else. Now we're getting all global, I guess that's kinda upsetting it a bit.

(Disclaimer: I have not been in MacDonalds for many many years, I've not even been in the one in Tooting, and I've been living here 10 years... I just felt I needed to get that out...)
(MMmmmm Big Mac, do they still taste the same? I could just do one now :lol:)

No Philly, I looked at Mira/Starla whatever it was the other week - didn't grab me at all. Actually Dave's ME is the sexiest looking PRS model I've come across... still no stirrings in the loins though :lol: (I'd rather have a Big Mac!)

[dave_mc]

(a) Yeah it seems I am saying that, doesn't it! :lol:

Not quite what I meant to get across, though it does follow from what I wrote. (I got a bit distracted and kept coming back to it... there was a "devil's advocate" approach in there somewhere, but I'm buggered if I can figure out what I was doing now...)

All I'm really trying to say is that as a consumer I don't personally feel I have any input on it other than my "yes I'll pay that, no I won't pay that". And I'm more than happy with that state of affairs. I don't want to be able to impose anything on the folks that make or distribute stuff - what they want to charge is up to them as far as I'm concerned. They get my business or they don't.

(b) I also never quite see it when folks talk about "firms talking people into buying stuff even if it's overpriced" - yes, the marketing, same as the media, same as what we're doing right now posting on the web, yes all this helps form buyers opinions... but no firm can talk someone into buying something that's overpriced, the consumers that buy the things do it to themselves. No-one's forcing me to buy a Rolex, or PRS, or whatever.... And, indeed, I'm very unlikely to. I personally don't believe that these items are overpriced, they just cost more than they're worth to me personally.

Yes, I do feel sorry for companies that go under because they can't compete. But that is the way of the world, if you've not got a viable business, then you've not got one, sorry... (and I've worked for one or two... I strongly suspect that I'm working for one now and have been the past 11 years, but my job is safe for at least another year or two, and has been all that time)

What I was actually trying to hint at in that bit was that if we were to force everyone to sell at "cost" we guarantee that those people will go out of business and that we would lose a lot of talented people and products. In guitar terms, a PRS or Gibson limited to cost will be way cheaper than one built by the talented luthier in the next village. The quality of the finished products will still vary by only a small margin, and it turns out the cheaper one, half the price, a third even, is the famous and fashionable one! I wonder what the masses will buy? How is a newcomer ever going to break into that market? We'll be stuck with the big businesses that already exist and we'll all have to sell our souls to them if we want a job or products.

I was also trying to hint that if, say, Gibson (I'm guessing, I know nothing about their finances and business models) turned round and sold at cost, they'd be telling you that they were doing it because you asked them to. But that isn't why they'd be doing it at all, they'd be trying to talk you into buying their products for that reason, but they'd be doing it to steal market share at the expense of their competitors.

Nah... I'm happy that what controls all this at the moment is "what is the market prepared to pay for an item" - we the consumers set the prices. We do it by comparing like with like, following fashions, deciding whether we could do it ourselves instead, etc, etc... We have a measure of freedom because of this. Yes, it's constrained by our personal buying power, but I haven't yet heard of an alternative that I actually like the sound of. So I personally don't want to see it changed - I believe that we mess with it at our peril.

And that's the reason why I personally have to say "good luck to them", even if I wish that certain products could be priced in a way that I might personally consider more affordable :lol:

Like Dave (TF) said earlier, we ain't going to agree on this one... but it is fun debating it :D

(Except I've now used most of my day off on the internet!!)

(a) :lol: yeah I mean I didn't want to put words in your mouth (as it annoys me when people do that to me), and was scared that i'd just skimmed your post and got the wrong end of the stick, but that's just what taking your post to its logical conclusion seemed to suggest.

No worries on the devil's advocate thing, I do it all the time. I should also point out that a lot of what I'm saying is "in principle", rather than necessarily "in practice". While I have many problems with capitalism, I certainly don't want to live under soviet style communism/state capitalism either.

(b) I dunno. I agree that no-one is holding a gun to anyone's head, but there certainly is a lot of psychology at play in advertising. Yes, it's a "free" choice, but it depends on how you define "freedom" and it gets very complicated very quickly.

Funnily enough, what you're saying about the big guns versus the smaller guys actually does affect me, since I'm willing to look outside the more established names... if anything I'm getting a good deal out of the current system because I can get a lot of stuff cheaper because not as many people want it. :lol:

I just don't agree with charging what you think you can get away with. I just disagree with the principle of it.

Suppose, for the sake of argument, you have a guitar-making business.  You work hard, get a good reputation, and after a while customers are coming and saying "I can't believe you're so cheap, Dave, your guitars are just as good as that Wez V and Feline but they charge loads more (rip-off bar-stewards!  )".

Wouldn't you be tempted to increase those prices a bit, if the customers were happy to pay it? Just to give yourself a better standard of living and maybe a bit of a nest-egg?  Or to protect the business itself against future hard times.  It doesn't turn you into a robber baron.  :P

Nothing wrong with idealism, but it seems to be cutting off your nose to spite your face.

I'm pretty sure if anyone ever saw me using tools they wouldn't be saying that :lol:

But yeah, I mean I dunno. Look at paul C who makes the timmy. His waiting list is out the wazoo, and (as far as i'm aware) he hasn't really raised his prices much. Certainly some people do it. I know what you mean about buffering yourself against harder times, but if you are that cheap you're probably gonna have a pretty decent waiting list, so you're gonna know how well you're doing for the next while.

Obviously all that's in theory, lol.

Well, those running costs are low enough that they can sell them to their domestic market much, much cheaper ;)

They might not be overpriced in the states, but it's difficult to argue they aren't here. The same would go for lots of products in lots of industries, of course.

+1

I'm not saying PRS are overpriced everywhere. I'm saying they're overpriced in the UK.

I just spotted this in the bit Philly quoted:

I just don't agree with charging what you think you can get away with. I just disagree with the principle of it.

I didn't notice it before, Dave (mc).

You turned "how much you think people will pay" into "what you think you can get away with".

Which is fine, it almost means the same thing... But it does put a different slant on it... it implies a nefarious motive, and it loses some of the meaning.

Motive
The motive is actually making a profit. There's nothing nefarious about doing this! It's what we all have to do to survive on this planet. If we make less than we spent we're in trouble, if we only make as much as we spent then we might as well have sat on our hands that day and watched the clouds going by, waiting for something or someone to come along and take advantage of our inactivity. How am going to buy a guitar if I don't make a profit? How am I gonna buy my wife a nice dinner? How am I going to pay my ISP so's I can sit on here and waffle? How am I going to save for my old age when I can no longer work? If we're going to regard making a profit as a bad thing then we might as well call a halt now, we're wearing ourselves out for no reason at all.

Missing Meaning
I wrote "how much you think people will pay" because there's no point in asking for an amount that no-one's prepared to pay, it means people won't buy your thing. That meaning gets kind of lost if you convert it to a "what you think you can get away with" statement.

Granted, there must be folk that set their prices using the "what you can get away with" method. But it's kinda dangerous, it's a quick win strategy, it implies you don't believe the product itself will survive the market's scrutiny for more than a few months, so let's make a buck while we can. As an organisation, you're not going to have long term success if you consistently market products of this nature.

And to be honest, I still say "good luck to them"... the customers will find them out and depart in droves :lol:


Dave (TF), I'd say it stronger than that, I'd go as far as to say PRSs are not overpriced at all. There are dudes happily buying them and waving them about. If they were overpriced, people would not be buying them and they'd be going down the tubes.

Now, if you could do exactly the same job, get the same buzz as you do with your Modern Eagle using my Dano (£165 new it was) - then I'd wonder if you might have paid over the odds slightly. But you can't. In fact, I haven't got a guitar that does that job as far as I'm aware. Instead I might have paid almost as much for all my guitars. I have relatives who still can't get why I need more than one - so I've paid over the odds as well, from their perspective... :lol:

This price thing, on any goods or services, is all about personal perspective.

EDIT: nfe slips another one in while I'm typing! :lol:

Yeah, global markets... I don't really think this place was meant to be "one world, one vision" :lol:

But isn't it perspective here as well? They're only overpriced here when compared with over there. I don't even think about over there - so I'm just looking at the prices here. When I do think about it, it's "oh life's too short"!

i think that depends on your definition of "profit". I don't really count your wage/salary as profit- if you do, then that changes things a bit.

I'm certainly not expecting people to work for nothing.

I don't want to quote any more or to make this any longer (LOL) but dave/twinfan is right when he says it's very, very hard to compare wages and living conditions in the US and UK since the conditions are very different.

Oh and is this a bad time to say that I should maybe check what prs prices actually are in the US? :lol:

gotta go for dinner now but will check that later. :D