[The Dark Wolf]

Well said, Eric.

[Toshiro]

It's like Circuit City, only with dirty guitars and amps with the mids on zero.

[Toshiro]

Originally Posted by Stitch

I'm hearing all of this and I've been there but I think a big part of it is the fact that these 18/19 year old kids don't give a shit. They are just all hyped up to be working in a guitar shop. I'm 18, I've been working in our shop for two and a half years now, and I'd say that between me and my friend/colleague Ryan we are the only two left that have a clue about guitars. Its all about enthusiasm. I'm not a good guitar player by any stretch of the imagination, but I know enough about gear and have played enough different things to know what I am talking about. I learn about the stuff I need to know about. I have a near encyclopedic knowledge of Fender, Gibson and G&L even thought they hold little interest for me. If these kids would learn shit outside of there work hours they could be great, but they go off to drink beer and play System of A Down.

In the process they give all 18 year olds working in guitar shops a bad name. I get so much shit from customers looking down on me because of my age, but it's always nice to one up them with Ibanez knowledge and especially when they find out that I am the one who set up their guitar just they like it for slide in Open E. Thats right, the spotty kid over there in the camo shorts and long hair singing along to Necrophagist does know how to do something...prick.

Sorry for the rant.

I used to have punk 16 yr olds come up to my bench and ask if I could teach them everything I knew. For free, right then, so they could have my job. I was like .

Getting in good with the older generation means debating with them sometimes, and never being wrong. Ever. That's what gets you respect. Do not open your mouth to them unless you can back up what you say.

There really are a lot of stupid people in this business, on both sides of the counter. Ibanez reps who don't know what a properly set-up Edge should look like. Techs who think the angle of the headstock has more to do with string tension than the scale length(oh god, that was a flame war in person!). Customers who think their Musicyo $100 Kramer should play as well as the Fernandes Re-issue MIJ strat hanging on the wall for sale.

8 years I put up with this shit, and unless they wanna pay me $30/hr I'm never doing it again.

[Shannon]

I can't tell you how many times I've been offered a job at GC because I schooled-up some pimple-faced stoned-out-of-his-mind GC employee. Or better yet, for helping out a fellow customer because the GC guy didn't have a clue. I've got 4 great stories just from this week alone.

1) I technically sold a POD X3 to a customer and I DON'T EVEN WORK THERE! The GC guy was clueless (like 90% of them are) & the customer needed to know the differences between the PODxt Live (which he owned) & the new X3. I told him & then we BS'ed about all kinds of gear for 20 minutes. As I walked out of the store, the customer said, "By the way, you sold me on the X3. Thanks, man!"

2) I walked in to buy a set of strings for my 6-string bass. The GC accessories guy handed me a 5-string set not once, not twice....but THREE TIMES! And it gets better. He finally finds a 6-string set & the packaging is ripped all to hell & says "Here ya go!" I check it out and only 4 strings are in there. Ugh...

3) I was checking out their selection of 6-string basses. GC guy comes up & asked me what I was looking for. I said "6-string basses." By the time he came up, I already surveyed the situation & knew there was only one 6-string, a Peavey Grind model. He said "Check this one out! The 6-string kicks ass!" He's holding a 5-string OLP. I said "C'mon dude, that's a 5-string. The one you're looking for is over here." I pointed to it. He just says "Oh" and walks away.

4) I was looking for a Seymour Duncan Pickup Booster pedal because I needed a pedal that offered clean boost to equal out the varying volume outputs of my active and passive basses. 2 GC guys looked for one & couldn't find one. Both of them tried to convince me to be a distortion pedal because & I quote "did the same thing." WRONG. I got one through my GC hookup (the sales manager & only competant guy there).

For all my major purchases, I go through my sales manager friend & have been for years now. He hooks me up & he actually knows what he's talking about. I had him order me a couple of other items so I could check them out in the store. I didn't have to pre-pay for them in order for GC to get it there to check it out, like most stores require on special items. I spend thousands per year there, so I guess I'm a "preferred customer." After the string incident, he said that the accessories guy is kind of an idiot. I said "Kind of?! Dude, he's a fucking knob! Why the hell does he even work here?" He just sighed and said "I dont know, but I don't get to make that decision, unfortunately."

If anything, you can look at that place in 2 ways...
1) Go there to see if you can catch the salesperson feeding you a line of bullshit, then call them on it! It's fun!
2) Establish a relationship with a GC dude who is knowledgable & stick with him for any major purchases. Hook up city, brother & less hassles. I have my guy paged over the intercom for any big purchase I make. He'll always get my commission.

[Blexican]

Originally Posted by technomancer

Yeah I don't think she's there anymore, I haven't seen her recently. She was really cool too

Are you guys talking about the GC near Robinson Towne Center?

[Rick]

Originally Posted by Leon

the Toledo GC seems pretty tame by comparison. shit, sometimes i have to FIND a salesman to pull down a guitar for me

Same with the one by my place.

[skinhead]

Wow, I thought they had a great atention there, Shawn.

Here we have shitty atention, and if you're a teenager they won't let you try anything. Only if you are really convinced that you're going to buy it

[whatthe17]

Originally Posted by Shannon

2) Establish a relationship with a GC dude who is knowledgable & stick with him for any major purchases. Hook up city, brother & less hassles. I have my guy paged over the intercom for any big purchase I make. He'll always get my commission.

I agree with you on this one Shannon. Believe it or not I've actually had some good luck with some Guitar Center salespeople. I've had more bad experiences in the past at smaller local stores.

1. The first one being with someone who I eventually was in a band with. I bought a small 30watt Marshall amp and he was helpful and actually very cool to talk to. He made sure I got exactly what I was looking for and let me check it out to my satisfaction without pestering me constantly. Then about a week later called me up! Quote - "Hey man, I'm just checking in to see how that new amp is working out for you." I've never had that happen at any other music store before so I was floored. Usually once I walked out the door they never wanted to see me again if there was any problems. About 3 months later he had left GC and started working for the courier company I was working for. He asked me to run sound for his band at a gig and later to join them when their bass player left.

2. I was in an Auto Accident and received a settlement. After my expenses I had enough cash left over to be able to walk into Guitar Center and buy a 5 String Bass, Bass Head, Bass Effects, A Whammy pedal, Digital Delay, several other pedals and lots of instructional DVD's and books on both Bass and Guitar. The salesman asked me what I was looking for and grabbed about 5 basses to check out. He hooked me up with exactly what I was looking for. I walked out happy and he made an excellent commission for making sure that happened.

My last purchases were online from Musician's Friend and I've had pretty good luck there too.

[Shawn]

Originally Posted by Shannon

If anything, you can look at that place in 2 ways...
1) Go there to see if you can catch the salesperson feeding you a line of bullshit, then call them on it! It's fun!
2) Establish a relationship with a GC dude who is knowledgable & stick with him for any major purchases. Hook up city, brother & less hassles. I have my guy paged over the intercom for any big purchase I make. He'll always get my commission.

[Stitch]

Originally Posted by Shannon

I can't tell you how many times I've been offered a job at GC because I schooled-up some pimple-faced stoned-out-of-his-mind GC employee. Or better yet, for helping out a fellow customer because the GC guy didn't have a clue. I've got 4 great stories just from this week alone.

1) I technically sold a POD X3 to a customer and I DON'T EVEN WORK THERE! The GC guy was clueless (like 90% of them are) & the customer needed to know the differences between the PODxt Live (which he owned) & the new X3. I told him & then we BS'ed about all kinds of gear for 20 minutes. As I walked out of the store, the customer said, "By the way, you sold me on the X3. Thanks, man!"

I've actually been in the same situation. I'm being courted by a local shop (part of the second biggest chain in the UK, and definitely the one that will take over I feel) because I've been in on three seperate occasions and helped sell things for them. Not out of a "I know more than you" arseholeishness, but because I cringed when I saw what the guys were pulling. The local one has a fair bit of metal gear besides their G&L's and Gibsons, and this guy was trying to tell a customer an RG2610 was a better instrument than a Caparison Horus. I quickly set him right, told the customer why it was a great guitar (I played a few in Japan and was the one that got Caparison into the UK) and the guy took it in the end. I can't remember how much he got it for, but the salesguy still got the sale so he wasn't going to complain, he actually said thanks - Caparisons go for a fortune over here, so it was best for him. I've had exactly the same story with a guy trying to say VHT Pitbull's were only good for 'Nu-metal and that industrial Manson stuff".

Originally Posted by Shannon

4) I was looking for a Seymour Duncan Pickup Booster pedal because I needed a pedal that offered clean boost to equal out the varying volume outputs of my active and passive basses. 2 GC guys looked for one & couldn't find one. Both of them tried to convince me to be a distortion pedal because & I quote "did the same thing." WRONG. I got one through my GC hookup (the sales manager & only competant guy there).

I'm not sure if thats what yo umean, but I must say I hate it when two guys try and hustle in on the sale at the same time. I'd just walk out. Its rude, its overbearing, and they always contradict each other

Originally Posted by Shannon

For all my major purchases, I go through my sales manager friend & have been for years now. He hooks me up & he actually knows what he's talking about. I had him order me a couple of other items so I could check them out in the store. I didn't have to pre-pay for them in order for GC to get it there to check it out, like most stores require on special items. I spend thousands per year there, so I guess I'm a "preferred customer." After the string incident, he said that the accessories guy is kind of an idiot. I said "Kind of?! Dude, he's a fucking knob! Why the hell does he even work here?" He just sighed and said "I dont know, but I don't get to make that decision, unfortunately."

From this I'm assuimg GC are a national chain rather than a series of franchises? Its interesting there is such a difference in quality of stores and staff if they are all technically owned by th eone company. I'd be surprised if they were franchises given how well(haha?) the stores seem to communicate with each other and share stock.

Originally Posted by Shannon

If anything, you can look at that place in 2 ways...
1) Go there to see if you can catch the salesperson feeding you a line of bullshit, then call them on it! It's fun!
2) Establish a relationship with a GC dude who is knowledgable & stick with him for any major purchases. Hook up city, brother & less hassles. I have my guy paged over the intercom for any big purchase I make. He'll always get my commission.

I totally agree with 2) - if you find a guy that you know, like, trust and is generally just not a fuckwit then stick with him, especially if its a commission based business. Its just polite, and guarantees he'll look out for you next time. I've refused to buy something from my local Sound Control before because my preferred dude wasn't available and the guy that wanted to take the sale was a slimy, snivelling little weaselly tosspot. I hate him.

I'm not saying yo do this, but 1) isn't cool if you're just going into assert yourself. I hate people like that - I get them a lot, especially because of my age. Middle aged bedroom shredder fuckwits trying to prove their superiority over me and take my job. I've watched a guy talk to me about the innards of the 5150 and the Triple Rectifier, argue with me, get proved wrong, try and talk to me about Ibanez RG's from the turn of the Millennium, get proven wrong again, then go and talk to my manager and say that I was misinforming customers, and wouldn't the manager rather have him as an employee, someone who knew how to treat customers and knew their stuff?

I was apoplectic with rage. Fortunately, my manager came and talked to me about it and I told him what had really unfolded, and the guy got banned from the shop for stirring it up. My boss knows me fairly well (and trusts me - I'm the only guy with a set of keys and the alarm code to our shop besides the store manager, who needs them since he is full time staff, and I'm only weekend staff/a technician) and also knows that I know the innards of Triple Rectifers and the history of Ibanez's models like no one else.

Cool if you're buying something and you want some decent service, but not cool if you're just going in to be a dick.