Sweetwater facts:

[stratjacket]

Yes this is probably the best for folks who want to bury their head in the sand.........


It can be a real Jungle sometimes

It’s not about burying heads in the sand. There’s lots of venues to talk politics and other shit. On here I want to talk gear and music. I don’t care about any one’s views other than that in this site. But to each their own, I’m just making a recommendation.

 

[The~Kid]

It’s not about burying heads in the sand. There’s lots of venues to talk politics and other shit. On here I want to talk gear and music. I don’t care about any one’s views other than that in this site. But to each their own, I’m just making a recommendation.

This is true man and your are right and in a sense there is that but in another sense I see it as basic talk about economics but undoubtly within that conversation youre going to have politics.

 

[Rick Lee]

When I walk into the SW HQ, the last thing I think about is how much the employees are paid. It's just not my problem and there's nothing I can do about it. I'm polite to everyone 100% of the time and I try to be loyal to sales reps I know who work on commission. That's really the most I can do for them.

 

[311boogieman]

I've seen it many times, all over the country: Mom & Pops couldn't afford a Gibson, Fender, PRS dealership (minimum stock that's a massive investment) so they stock Aria, ESP, and the like. And with no online presence, they were doomed to failure.
Simply put, Sweetwater did it right and succeeded.
Almost every player mourns the loss of local shops but it was bound to happen.

Bro - I'm pulling this quote from that other thread that got moved to OTC if that is OK with you. The one I'm not posting in anymore. This one: That shit talking Sweetwater thread

I just wanted to say that like it or not, global online ordering/shipping is putting a lot of mom and pop shops out of business. Do I like that? No. Is it a reality of global commerce and business in general? Yes. There are disruptive business models in play all the times. If you can't adjust, you will fail.

PS: I don't love Walmart and Amazon but it is convenient and I think the plandemic showed a lot of people how easy it can be.

Too many haters people.

There are Sweetwater reps who are really good at what they do and make over 100 grand a year.

Very few at guitar center are making more money than the new guy at Sweetwater.

Maybe a handful of people doing OK at Mom and Pop shops but those numbers are getting smaller every day. Yes that does suck. I taught at multiple guitar stores and I would love to see them survive, that’s extremely difficult in today’s world.

ultimately people enjoy working at Sweetwater or they move on

My rep is awesome. His name is Jozy Franco. He was new when I started working with him. Today I’m one of his smallest clients. The guy is smart and he has a work ethic and he has a desire to please his customer base.

I would love to see the mom and pops survive too. My wife and I love shopping local and giving more than we take. Also, there is nothing better than going to a music store and playing some guitars through different amps etc., but those days are in the past.

 

[311boogieman]

You know those "Campuses" overseas next to the factory/buildings where a 10 year old makes shoes or Iphones.....

Yeah good stuff and more facts *_*

That doesn't make any sense.

You are full of it.

 

[311boogieman]

I think the bigger problem is $7.25 being minimum wage? Thats like 1996 wages tbh. How could anyone survive on that?

Their 55 point inspection is just as good as a Walmart door greeter. Some are quite enthusiastic and others not so much. Ive gotten at least 5 guitars from SW and at least 3 of them were sent right back.

I do appreciate their no hassle return policy however.

I don't disagree that $7.25 as a national minimum wage is far too low.

What I found online is that Sweetwater pays somewhere in the neighborhood of $12.50 to $15.00 per hour. That may not work well in California, but for Indiana, that is pretty good.

 

[BABMusic]

It may get to that point though. Maybe not in a year, but maybe in 10 years. You might call up Sweetwater someday and someone from India is talking to you on the other end.

 

[The~Kid]

Someone should stop them from forcing their employees to take and keep those jobs!

Someone should stop me from buying from them pretty much once a month!

Someone really needs to stop the manufacturers from getting so many sells through them!


Or ...and stay with me here...Someone should go back on his meds. @The~Kid We have already established your stunted intellect...but that someone is you. Go back on your meds, bud.

Another insightful post, you're wisdom and depths of knowledge truly know no bounds.


Very, very, very insightful *_*

 

[311boogieman]

I go to the SW campus about 4-5x per year, as I pass through Fort Wayne on my way to work in South Bend. I don't know what they make, but cost of living in Fort Wayne is way below what we pay here in the Phoenix area. The SW campus is pretty nice. It would be an excellent work environment if you were looking for a W2 job/career. I've worked in way worse looking facilities. I've also been to some of those factory campuses in China. There is no comparison. Factory workers in China migrated from the countryside because the factory work is far easier and more lucrative than subsistence farming, and they can save enough to send back home to their families in the countryside. If you've never been to the countryside in China, you just have no idea what real poverty is. It's like going back in time 500 yrs. I was just there six weeks ago, so I know it hasn't changed much since my first trip there 20 yrs ago. I'd take working at SW any day. People who make that comparison really have zero credibility.

Thank you for a dose of reality.

 

[MadAsAHatter]

just wanted to say that like it or not, global online ordering/shipping is putting a lot of mom and pop shops out of business. Do I like that? No. Is it a reality of global commerce and business in general? Yes. There are disruptive business models in play all the times. If you can't adjust, you will fail.

If we're talking music gear mom & pop shops... In my area Guitar Center came in with a physical store and killed most of them before online shopping was the big thing. At that point I hadn't even heard of Sweetwater, Musicians Friend, Music 123, etc.

The ones that did survive; and are still around, adapted by focusing more on school band instruments, gear repair, and other areas that didn't involve direct competition with GC.

 

[rsm]

Bro - I'm pulling this quote from that other thread that got moved to OTC if that is OK with you. The one I'm not posting in anymore. This one: That shit talking Sweetwater thread

I just wanted to say that like it or not, global online ordering/shipping is putting a lot of mom and pop shops out of business. Do I like that? No. Is it a reality of global commerce and business in general? Yes. There are disruptive business models in play all the times. If you can't adjust, you will fail.

PS: I don't love Walmart and Amazon but it is convenient and I think the plandemic showed a lot of people how easy it can be.



I would love to see the mom and pops survive too. My wife and I love shopping local and giving more than we take. Also, there is nothing better than going to a music store and playing some guitars through different amps etc., but those days are in the past.

word on Wall St is that Amazon is planning to layoff 16,000 workers. Not only are mom & pops, brick and mortars, being squeezed out, so are workers thanks to AI and H1-B and other work visas that ensure cheaper labor vs American citizen workers (not politics, reality).

I was also one of those computer guys, working on/off in AI since the 1980s; most of my projects involved automating, optimizing, positive cost/benefit models, and improving security/speed/throughput, etc., In many cases, human jobs, job tasks, job skills were eliminated or reduced, and there were 100s of thousands like me in information technology doing similar work, and probably in the millions now...but their jobs, tasks, skills are also at risk from AI, quantum computing and robotics.

 

[84superchamp]

Bro - I'm pulling this quote from that other thread that got moved to OTC if that is OK with you. The one I'm not posting in anymore. This one: That shit talking Sweetwater thread

I just wanted to say that like it or not, global online ordering/shipping is putting a lot of mom and pop shops out of business. Do I like that? No. Is it a reality of global commerce and business in general? Yes. There are disruptive business models in play all the times. If you can't adjust, you will fail.

PS: I don't love Walmart and Amazon but it is convenient and I think the plandemic showed a lot of people how easy it can be.



I would love to see the mom and pops survive too. My wife and I love shopping local and giving more than we take. Also, there is nothing better than going to a music store and playing some guitars through different amps etc., but those days are in the past.

Re: playing guitars through different amps; no help if Sweetwater is too far away but if you're close enough, they have an amp selection that you're free to try out. Not much high-dollar, no Mesas or AC30s but a good selection.

 

[311boogieman]

If we're talking music gear mom & pop shops... In my area Guitar Center came in with a physical store and killed most of them before online shopping was the big thing. At that point I hadn't even heard of Sweetwater, Musicians Friend, Music 123, etc.

The ones that did survive; and are still around, adapted by focusing more on school band instruments, gear repair, and other areas that didn't involve direct competition with GC.

Excellent point. Some of the local shops I go to are doing just this.

 

[84superchamp]

It’s not about burying heads in the sand. There’s lots of venues to talk politics and other shit. On here I want to talk gear and music. I don’t care about any one’s views other than that in this site. But to each their own, I’m just making a recommendation.

Heh, we DO get some politics and other shit discussed here.

 

[The~Kid]

I don't disagree that $7.25 as a national minimum wage is far too low.

What I found online is that Sweetwater pays somewhere in the neighborhood of $12.50 to $15.00 per hour. That may not work well in California, but for Indiana, that is pretty good.

Nvm everything else..... As said before the lower than average cost to live there, lower than average living wage/working wage, lower than average taxes, lower than average cost to operate there.


No one else in the industry can compete with that essentially and be on an equal playing field or any sort of real competitive playing field..... NVM the "Campus"..... Or whatever the fuck goes on there to operate how they do......


Imagine if Fender, Gibson, Martin or anyone else say MF or GC or whatever has a "Campus" where they kept, housed and fed employees like human cattle to work for them..... How the fuck would that go


With conditions like that you get a modern day Amazon/SweetWater..... And from that perspective SweetWater is worse in how they abuse these things and other loopholes to be Amazon on steroids as Amazons cost varies as they operate throughout the country.....


SweetWater has no such problems as said practically operating like the Dominican Republic, Venezuela or China within America in one main location, well two now as they have a warehouse on the West Coast for logistics purposes....... relative to the rest of the "competition", if you can call anyone else competition relative to them no one can really compete against them given the Monopoly like market they have been allowed to create



Anyways that's a separate matter that has nothing to do with their actual market share and more to do with their practices and how they are able to get that market share without any other company able to actually compete with them.

 

[BeZo]

This thread isn't about Sweetwater is it?

 

[rsm]

Before the internet, I used to get great deals from Daddy's Junky Music. They had a great used / consignment model, and would move items to various stores, ship items from other stores to the closest store so you could try before buying; as well as selling new items. It was like Music-Go-Round + GC; I was surprised they didn't / couldn't adapt to online sales effectively, it should have been easy for them unless they waited too long before selling online? I never heard the story of their demise, or wehn.

 

[rsm]

This thread isn't about Sweetwater is it?

SW is just a metaphor.

 

[BABMusic]

Before the internet, I used to get great deals from Daddy's Junky Music. They had a great used / consignment model, and would move items to various stores, ship items from other stores to the closest store so you could try before buying; as well as selling new items. It was like Music-Go-Round + GC; I was surprised they didn't / couldn't adapt to online sales effectively, it should have been easy for them unless they waited too long before selling online? I never heard the story of their demise, or wehn.

I remember their mail catalogs! I was most surprised by Mars music. They came into our city and I figured they would erase all competition. Well, a few years later, they went bankrupt.

This problem of low wages isn't going to be fixed until the entire system collapses. The Cantillon effect of inflation money being injected into our system is intended to make assets (apartments, homes) rise faster than wages can keep up.

 

[84superchamp]

Re: playing guitars through different amps; no help if Sweetwater is too far away but if you're close enough, they have an amp selection that you're free to try out. Not much high-dollar, no Mesas or AC30s but a good selection.

Re: Re: you just hope there isn't an amp hog in the electric room. On one visit I spent well over an hour in the store, including lunch in the cafeteria and from the time I walked in until I walked out there was the same dickhead plugged into the same amp with the same guitar all that time. And he was NOT impressive.....not sure what options, if any, the staff had to shut it down.