BadComrade wrote:If you find something they sell cheaper elsewhere, they match the price. I was buying a friend of mine an Electro Harmonix Micro Synth for Christmas a few years ago, and they wanted like.... $270 for it or something, and I found it online for like $200. I printed out the webpage, brought it in, and they sold it to me at the same price. Kinda cool if you don't want to wait for something to be shipped to you...


In the summer of 2005, I bought a bass for $2000 at the Arlington Heights store that's worth about $5500 - $6500. They actually sold it to me for $1999.99, a penny less than what they paid for it. So, they kinda rule sometimes

You can get decent but uncool used shit for pretty cheap there sometimes.

Surest path to a splitting headache is Guitar Ctr on a weekend.

scott wrote:I don't have so much trouble with Guitar Center. First of all, you can work them down on the prices a lot of the time, so it's not as overpriced as people seem to think.

I used to know a guy who worked at the one on Clark. He showed us a trick that they use to make you think that they are cutting you a deal (I'm sure they can't do this on all sales...you'd have to be buying more than one thing). I was there with our drummer who was buying drum heads and sticks. Lets say the total for everything came to $100. If we said "hey those drum heads are $30, but I'm used to paying $25." The sales guy could say..."oh okay, I can give them to you for $25", but then the $5 that we "saved" would be moved over and hidden in the price of another item like the sticks, with the total always remaining the same. I'm not sure if I'm explaining it well...but basically the bottom line was always the same, and you could change the price of individual items and the cash register would shuffle the prices of other items to make you think you were getting a deal on one particular item. Kinda like when you buy a car and they give you a great deal on the price, but then screw you on the trade in.

This sounds totally crazy now that I think about it...but he actually turned the cash register montior towards us and showed it happening in real time. Then again this was a long time ago...I could have selective memory...

Eben...Eben from Del Rey, are you out there? Did I just make this up?

Yeah I know places that try to do that. You have to make sure you check the prices and add everything up before you go to the till. This place has over inflated prices to start with.

This is the best Guitar Center related thing I've heard in a while; my 17 year old cousin who has never played a guitar, bass, drums, set up a p.a., recorded a band, changed a guitar string, turned on a guitar amp, seen a condenser mic, tuned a guitar, or plugged in an effect pedal in her entire life has an interview to start working there.

I hate to say this, because it is my cousin, but I'd like to think that when the store manager meets with her and then finds out that she has no practical musical experience that she won't be hired. However, seeing the road that the chain has gone down since the early 90's when I first started going there, I don't think this will be the case.

She sent me 2 text messages a few minutes ago:

1. What does a footswitch do?

2. Why are there so many different sizes of guitar strings?


I think she got the job.

Minotaur029 wrote:Scott: Does the guy in the great band work at the Arl. Hts. store?

He does not!

I present to you a FIRST in Electrical Audio forum history:

The DOUBLE SELF-KERBLE!

http://www.electrical.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=9299

http://www.electrical.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=1985

I got 75 bucks knocked off of a used ampeg reverberocket I didn't even want, they were asking like 500 (still overpriced though)

What did it for me was walking into G.C. in Seattle about 5 years ago and seeing a beat to shit 60's Strat hanging up about 50 feet above me (out of reach of us little peoples).Price? 22 grand. I dont think even the best years of Strat were worth this much at that time.I then asked a very youthful looking guitar dept. dude if they ever got Beans or aluminum Kramers in the store. He hadn't heard of either guitar and I swear there was fear in his eyes. Later that day, after inhaling copious amounts of mini donuts, I checked out Trading Musician and Evan's in Everett . Much better . Evan claimed that a TB artist with serial number 666 was potentially available through an ex- Bean employee's widow , now living near Seattle. He knew a way to contact her and promised to make an attempt on my behalf . Lamentably waiting on that one still , but I must say excitement ran high for weeks afterward. I guess the above is a good example of the kind of contrast between a quality establishment and ... well, Guitar Centre.

Actually, I'm not waiting on that one. Anyone in pacific northwest heard this story? Again ,the guitar was built and owned by a ex-Bean employee.

m.koren wrote:What did it for me was walking into G.C. in Seattle about 5 years ago and seeing a beat to shit 60's Strat hanging up about 50 feet above me (out of reach of us little peoples).Price? 22 grand. I dont think even the best years of Strat were worth this much at that time.I then asked a very youthful looking guitar dept. dude if they ever got Beans or aluminum Kramers in the store. He hadn't heard of either guitar and I swear there was fear in his eyes. Later that day, after inhaling copious amounts of mini donuts, I checked out Trading Musician and Evan's in Everett . Much better . Evan claimed that a TB artist with serial number 666 was potentially available through an ex- Bean employee's widow , now living near Seattle. He knew a way to contact her and promised to make an attempt on my behalf . Lamentably waiting on that one still , but I must say excitement ran high for weeks afterward. I guess the above is a good example of the kind of contrast between a quality establishment and ... well, Guitar Centre.

Nothing about your story, but there was a Travis Bean TB1000 at Trading Musician a while back...about 2 grand. You could probably have talked them down a bit, as it was originally priced at 1,800.