I am glad that they are far away from me.Hey guys last week my brother and I went to Fort Wayne Indiana from Miami to do a real estate reconnaissance mission and of course we had to stop by Sweetwater.....First off we were super impressed by their classy setup and inventory.The new store is massive and every instrument has their own closed room......Oh it's not just a store but basically a campus.....Down here in Miami all the stores Guitar Center and Sam Ash have limited inventory with basically no high end guitars.....example I have never seen a ESP (Japan) before.....Sweetwater has taken the Apple store approach to where they have all their instruments,amps,pedals,etc out on display for all to play....If you don't see it on the wall because there are to many to keep there and if they have it in stock they will unbox it and bring it down to you so you can play it.....I did this with a $4,500 ESP Horizon.They have over 1,000 pedals on display with guitars stations so you can try any pedal.....oh the staff was super friendly.....well here are some pictures of our visit....enjoy
This monster Music Man Luke III felt the most comfortable to play by far to me
This is the ESP Horizon....This had the best build quality (QC) with no defects that my brother and I could find and the color was insane
Sweetwater Visit
- Thread starter Evil Z06
- Start date
Rick Lee
Well-known member
While the parking lot photo looks very cold, and I don't do cold, I would serious consider flying out there in nicer weather to check it out and visit some friends. When I was in high school, I used to take the train into NYC and go to all the stores on 48th St. Looks like SW is the closest thing to that anymore.
Evil Z06
Active member
It was very cold as cold as -7 with wind chill.........We planned the trip to be in the winter to experience very cold and snowy weather which we got our wish and we went on a friday and the day before Sweetwater was closed due to the big snow storm.
midnightlaundry
Well-known member
Wow huge..
It's a ghost town..
It's a ghost town..
MadAsAHatter
Well-known member
Seeing all that gear at once I probably would have just jizzed myself to death walking in.
Sneerim
Member
Well, it is in Fort Wayne, Indiana in the middle of winter...
Basementcat
Member
Oh man. I’d be in heaven. All I have out here is a crappy barely stocked guitar center. That place looks amazing!
Gibsonchild
Active member
Me too. There are no music stores in the town I live in or the next town over. It’s 45-60 minutes to the two closest stores, and on a good day they might have 3-5 no-name guitars. GC/Sam Ash is almost 2 hours away, depending on traffic.
Basementcat
Member
Closest to me is an hour and sadly it’s a barely stocked GuitarTuna center with staff that doesn’t care about sales at all.
Basementcat
Member
lol! GuitarTuna kind of aptly named but I meant guitar center lol.
When I worked at Sam Ash on 48th in 2011 it was only them, Rudy's and an orchestral instrument store. Now Sam Ash is on 34th St and Rudy's is in Soho. Don't know if that other store is still there.
At least there's still the smaller stores scattered about.
stratjacket
Well-known member
Very nice. I’ve been telling myself I’m going to make a trip since I took a job in Louisville 2 1/2 years ago. Will need to head up one Saturday when it warms up and I have some dough to spend.