Originally Posted by: martintaylor2002One of the biggest problems with GC is they sell guitar a full price. When I was shopping for a Martin D-42 last year, I went to GC and they charged me full price for a D-42. I went online and found both Maury music and Wilcut and got the exact same brand new Martin D-42 for 33% off the price that I would have paid at GC. When I was looking for Elixir strings at GC store, they are about 40% higher than I would have gotten from Sweetwater.
GC is pretty much like Borders and Barnes and Nobles. It will die from thousands cut. The business model is not sustainable, IMHO.
The new business model is to have a very small showroom where customers can go there and try out new products and purchase them online or through the store kios. Do it the same way like an Apple store. Apple is making a killing....
Agreed. Covid may have been the final nail, but they've been in the coffin for awhile now. I do think local music stores of the kind described above will stay, for the community of it, like indie bookstores (which are actually making a comeback).
It's possible Guitar Center could use the Best Buy model, which seems to have saved them. I'm not sure what that is, though -- I recall reading that Best Buy did some things differently than the other big box electronics stores that allowed them to survive/thrive, but I don't recall what they were specifically.
"I got this guitar and I learned how to make it talk."
