RAN guitars offline. Did they close? Update: Trouble Relocating

[Isurez]

We are guessing how all the people who have left a deposit feel so we are able to offer better prices for them.

If the funds are liquid enough to be transferred from one business to another, why not just provide a refund?

Unfortunately it is not as easy as it may seem. We have a way to do it. I do not want to delve into details, the only thing I can say is that we want to help these people. We know the details of part of Ran Guitars orders and we are sure that our offer will not meet the requirements of some of these people. For example "V" shape guitar made by Skervesen Guitars. We assume that some people are not interested in our guitars at all. So I would like to emphasize once again that this is only an option that people can use. This is not a solution to the problem on the part of Ran Guitars, only the proposal with which his clients came out.

 

[Kleks]

So you're not able to build a V-shape guitar?

 

[Isurez]

We do not have such a model in plans. We have not even received one inquiry for this type of guitar in the last 3 years. Also we do not plan to use Ran Guitars projects, so please do not think about ghost-building. There is not the slightest possibility for such a thing.

 

[LeviathanKiller]

This offer is what I was hinting at earlier in this thread. Nice to see them come to SS.org and offer it to even more of you guys.

 

[BlacKat Guitars]

I assume that they build their own models, not RAN copies and probably discontinued their V long time ago like everyone else.

We are also working with some RAN customers who ordered in run organized by Troi - in this case we just offer spec that is closest to original order.

This situation is very unfortunate and we keep our fingers crossed that RAN will manage to deal with their problems and will get back to business.

 

[MSS]

I have a Ran 7 and a Skervesen Raptor 7. They are both outstanding guitars. I would jump on this opportunity. I do think the money should be refunded but maybe it was already invested in wood etc.

 

[Xaios]

The only thing I can come up with is that they may be writing off part of it between the two of them.
IE I put a $500 deposit on a RAN and RAN sends $250 to Skervesen who agreed to just eat the other $250. Only thing I can think of that makes sense.

This sounds pretty sensible to me. RAN can save some measure of face with their customers and Skervesen gets a wave of new builds that don't have to come in piecemeal, and also generates a boatload of goodwill, all without having to do any extra marketing of their own. That sounds well worth taking a $250 (or whatever such a split would dictate) hit per instrument.

Granted, I'm no luthier. Perhaps someone that is can chime in. @canuck brian , penny for your thoughts?

 

[Wolfhorsky]

As an owner of few Skervs and a friend of guys from Skerv team and also as a Pole, I want to share my thoughts on this. Both Skerv team and Tomek from Blackat guitars are cool people that only want to help Ran customers. They want also make things better in order to keep the positive image of Polish guitar manufactures. They all have their companys, but they respect and like each other - that is worth mentioning imho. So, guys from Blackat and Skerv - thumbs up.

 

[Ordacleaphobia]

This sounds pretty sensible to me. RAN can save some measure of face with their customers and Skervesen gets a wave of new builds that don't have to come in piecemeal, and also generates a boatload of goodwill, all without having to do any extra marketing of their own. That sounds well worth taking a $250 (or whatever such a split would dictate) hit per instrument.

Granted, I'm no luthier. Perhaps someone that is can chime in. @canuck brian , penny for your thoughts?

Something else that occurred to me later is that some of the capital may be in the form of raw material- timber, pickups, tuners, etc. that could be used for the build still.
If my $500 deposit is gone in terms of liquid cash, but RAN can send Skervesen the pickups, bridge, tuners, and wood that RAN bought for my build, that's effectively an equivalent transfer of value in this situation.

Just thinking out loud. This is pretty much the first time I've seen something like this happen with a company that had their ducks in a row, and also didn't almost immediately point toward things going terribly wrong- so it's fun to be able to just be curious rather than upset for once

 

[soldierkahn]

Maybe some won't agree, but I want to at least post that while I don't dig these brands, the simple fact they are banding together like a family is not only super shocking to see happen, it's amazingly refreshing that there are still business folks who care. They didn't even start out saying they're trying to help RAN out specifically, they're focused on the customers. I'm gobsmacked in such a positive way. I just wanted say that

 

[narad]

I am also working with some of the RAN customers who ordered in run organized by Troi. I will be providing vials of essential oils, closest in smell to the woods of the original RAN order, or also I can draw the guitar on a custom moleskine. This may not be suitable for all orders, but those interested please contact me via email.

 

[Sogradde]

This is probably the best they could have done in the situation. Kudos to RAN and Skervesen for working together like that.

 

[BlacKat Guitars]

I am also working with some of the RAN customers who ordered in run organized by Troi. I will be providing vials of essential oils, closest in smell to the woods of the original RAN order, or also I can draw the guitar on a custom moleskine. This may not be suitable for all orders, but those interested please contact me via email.

I wasn't going to write anything here but it's annoying to see suggestions that no actions are being taken to remedy this situation. RAN going down would be terrible news for custom guitars community and other builders from Poland. They are not invictus or brj, they've been around for long and are known to deliver awesome quality builds. We don't really know what happened and I can't see the point in speculation and gossip. I hope they manage to work out their problems but all customers trying to cancel and get deposits back at the same time is a nightmare scenario for all parties involved. In this case customers have option to get guitar from another custom shop instead of fighting to get their deposit back, RAN has a chance to work out their issues without long queue of angry customers and those other shops get some extra orders so in this bitter situation it's a win-win (as much as it can be).

But essential oil jokes can help too, just as essential oils do.

 

[BrutalRob]

As good as it is that Ran is trying to find some solution for their customers, I would probably be totally pissed.
Been a Ran customer for about 12 years and got 5 Ran Invader during that time. So basically, during those years i had a guitar being build all the time. Always a V.
So right now, I am extremely lucky I have no other guitar in the pipeline, which would have been , tadaaa, another V.
So my only option right now would have been to take anything else Skervesen has to offer. Which would be no option for me since I can not stand most of those superstrats which seem trendy nowadays. Or to live with the fact my desposit would be gone.

But since everyone seems to be all over the Crusher models nowadays, I think getting stuff from skervesen seems like a good alternative.

 

[Isurez]

It is worth mentioning that one of the main goals of whole action is to get rid of fears about ordering guitars from Polish manufactures. We never treated Tomek from Blackat Guitars or Darek from Ran Guitars as our competition. We could always count on the help of both of them. We have built a network of local interests between which there is a certain unwritten mutual assistance agreement. These are manufacturers of guitar cases, hardware parts, timber/wood warehouses, etc. This initiative is the result of various situations related to this whole guitar-building related business. Of course, customers are in the first place in all of this. @Wolfhorsky and @BlacKat Guitars were faster than me to pay attention to it. Thanks Wojtek, thanks Tomek.

Something else that occurred to me later is that some of the capital may be in the form of raw material- timber, pickups, tuners, etc. that could be used for the build still.
If my $500 deposit is gone in terms of liquid cash, but RAN can send Skervesen the pickups, bridge, tuners, and wood that RAN bought for my build, that's effectively an equivalent transfer of value in this situation.

I was not going into details, but this is one of the solutions we use. Also there is no split so if you paid for example 900 EUR deposit then this entire deposit goes to your Skervesen Guitars build.

 

[BlacKat Guitars]

Yup, we are all big family except Roter.

 

[Nightside]

Yup, we are all big family except Roter.

How about Mayones?

 

[narad]

How about Mayones?

Papa.

 

[Nightside]

Also, I wonder why people think it is fine and dandy for US, UK, and Japanese builders to make copies but somehow it is not ok for Eastern Europe or China to make copies. RAN made copies of guitars that people here had no chance of being able to afford the original. People in Poland saving up money for ages to order a custom RAN worked the same as a kid saving up for ages in the US to buy an RR1 or KV2. You have to be pretty rich over here to afford any hand made guitars. Idk it just bothers me that people love to trash RAN for making copies yet have no problem with the copies made by Ibanez, ESP, or *gasp* Daemoness...
It's not like they were making straight up forgeries trying to pass off as originals.

 

[BlacKat Guitars]

Papa.

More like godfathers. I'm in touch with Mateusz from Mayones and he is an awesome dude. So still family.

Also, I wonder why people think it is fine and dandy for US, UK, and Japanese builders to make copies.

Polish companies made copies mainly for domestic market because of demand and neccesity. There is still a big salary gap between Poland and western Europe or USA, in 90s and early 2000s it was way worse than now. We now have national teachers strike because they are fighting for higher wages, some of them earn 600 € gross (before taxes). Compare this to price of typical instrument made in Japan or USA. When I grew up guitars were just impossibly expensive even if we talk about Korean builds (which were way worse in quality than current Indo builds) and also most of the stuff was impossible to get. When I finally managed to save up enough money to buy RG2020x that was my dream guitar at that time, it turned out that distributor had 2 pieces available - one with damaged finish, another with damaged trem. And it was still very expensive for me, it took me a year to collect money to get it. It was also difficult to import something used and domestic market needed good quality guitars.

Builders at that time made mainly stuff for Polish musicians on a budget. And they were copies or at least inspired by something. People wanted guitars that looked like Jackson, ESP, Ibanez, Gibson etc. and they bought these because 1 they couldn't afford original, 2 they couldn't buy original because it was not available in shops. And believe me, everyone wanted originals and even if quality of those custom instruments was incredible (especially for their price), they were always regarded as copies. At some point situation changed - wages went up and inventories in shops improved. Somewhere in later 2000s some of those Polish companies grew up and worked on their own lineup - Mayones introduced Regius and Setius, Ran came up with Crusher. Copies slowly faded away and they're history now.

Edit: attached my 3 Ibanez copies made by Malwood and BC Rich Warlock copy made by Witkowski