Siggery guitars
- Thread starter NUTSguitarchannel
- Start date
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+1 for Waghorn, should get mine this week and it's been a great experience.
They are not social media luthier. Do not expect weekly emails, updates, plenty of pictures etc... Not to say they don't respond to emails, but do not expect hourly responses etc... Let them do their thing, which is building guitars.
Prices are very reasonable, start a £1.5k for a bolt-on. I don't see any other luthier, good or bad, ever charging lower.
They are not social media luthier. Do not expect weekly emails, updates, plenty of pictures etc... Not to say they don't respond to emails, but do not expect hourly responses etc... Let them do their thing, which is building guitars.
Prices are very reasonable, start a £1.5k for a bolt-on. I don't see any other luthier, good or bad, ever charging lower.
Isn't the UK something like an 8 hour drive across? Check out some builders you can see and feel the work of in person and is close enough that they can't hide if things go goofy.
Given what Jaden has said regarding the Siggery situation, I don't think I'd really want to work with him. Shame, his guitars seem great.
Danny Husk
Active Member
If Marty really had any inclination to try and better the situation he could send people the materials he purchased for their build (they were always "almost complete" right? 
) and let the customers finish the build with a different luthier. Even if it's just a body and neck blanks, that's better than nothing. Instead he ceases all communication and vanishes.
What ever happened to adults being honest and up-front about their abilities and inadequacies then moving on with life. Instead we get folks stringing people along with endless vague emails punctuated with long silences.
Lutherie isn't the dying art, professionalism is.
) and let the customers finish the build with a different luthier. Even if it's just a body and neck blanks, that's better than nothing. Instead he ceases all communication and vanishes. What ever happened to adults being honest and up-front about their abilities and inadequacies then moving on with life. Instead we get folks stringing people along with endless vague emails punctuated with long silences.
Lutherie isn't the dying art, professionalism is.
Rorschachswe
Member
Actually, I think they are still around. But only domestic builds has been done in recent years. They built my 8 in 2009, with the usual communication problems.Still, it´s a solid build which I still own.
Pikka Bird
Vaya Con Cornholio
What did he say? I haven't been following all the channels.
If they hadn't already gone up on eBay, like it happened with BRJ.If Marty really had any inclination to try and better the situation he could send people the materials he purchased for their build (they were always "almost complete" right?
What did he say? I haven't been following all the channels.
If they hadn't already gone up on eBay, like it happened with BRJ.
It's linked a few pages back.
The typical "building guitars is hard, customers are annoying" bull.....
He should quit building guitars as he apparently doesn't like dealing with customers or actually building guitars.
Jay Jillard
I make things.
Yeah, sometimes I think about being a crook and stealing thousands of dollars from people JUST to get some more pageviews on my thread. =P
But in all seriousness, it's a very frustrating thing to try and run an honest business in this niche market, with so many stupid business owners and crooked companies.
But there are plenty of us who are doing things right. Ground floor is always a risk/reward situation, but even for more established guys, do your research, ask for client references, see how they handle refunds/returns, and make sure they are running a legal business.
But thanks MaxOfMetal, 'showing promise' is about as good as I can hope to be at this point in my career, within this climate of the market. It's encouraging to be noticed =P
I really mean it as a compliment, and it's about the most honest one I can give not having actually held one of your instruments or ordered one myself.
GuitarBizarre
Listen to physics.
His guitars have always looked great, but I remember his first builds had functional but not great fretwork, twisted fret tangs, that kind of thing.
He apparently got better, but I always use that to remind myself that new builders don't necessarily have the same skills perfected at the same level as an established builder does.
That's not an excuse for the established builders to price gouge (As some of them definitely do), just a reason to bear in mind that sometimes even if you're happy with the work of a new, cheaper luthier, there are some reasons established builders can charge more for instruments.
I don't believe any of the long standing, high end shops/builders price gouge.
What you're paying for is, essentially, a guarantee. A promise that there is pretty much less than a .001% chance of the builder running off, screwing up the specs, or delivering an inferior product.
Not to mention those shops usually put out products you can't get anywhere else, which has a premium of it's own.
Is paying upper four to five figures for a Fodera, Alembic, Conklin, Toone, or Lawrence a lot of money? Damn right it is. But if you notice those shops consistently put out world class instruments on consistent schedules with no drama, and the instruments they make are unique.
Established builders shouldn't have to lower their prices to compete with the new guys, the new guys should increase their quality until they can command what the established builders can deliver.
Pikka Bird
Vaya Con Cornholio
Definitely true. And TBH you can end up paying that kind of big bucks for some of the limited editions from several big brand manufacturers anyways and those are usually just the same old model they always release only this time it has a new kind of wood for the top or a themed commemorative paintjob. People spend out the wazoo for that stuff and complain about single-man operations charging a pretty penny, even though these small gys don't have the luxury of buying wood in bulk, having an assembly line, etc.
Sure, I like good deals as much as the next guy but really, there's a reason they have to charge as much as they do for their work (and it's the work that costs, not so much the specs). It's the way some of them manage their time that gets to me, and Marty seems to have been guilty of this to such an extent that he ended up getting behind on his payments and put the cart before the horse, money-wise.
That is usually the case, but I think many people assumed a guy like BRJ was pretty much at this tier, and then he shat the bed spectacularly. (and didn't he ship out a few lemons before the thing hit the fan?). Also, though he's not exactly an old stalwart ViK seems to be flaky as all heck with his customer priorities.
So yeah, it's a perceived guarantee, but there's never going to be an actual guarantee of anything ever. People go crazy, lose their motivation, hit bad times, etc. all the time. I'm holding out for Rob of KXK, but I'm not seeing much output from him lately, and that 8-string run is what, four years in the running now?
GuitarBizarre
Listen to physics.
I was more thinking of the guys who build five figure Les Pauls and never change the design, build in all the old flaws etc. I have nothing against Toone et al.
Anyone who didn't see the BRJ thing turning into a .... show was either stupid, naive, or too blinded by the price.
There were serious red flags from the get go, not to mention anyone in the big guitar circles knew Bernie was know for being kind of a jerk, who at best was a little dishonest and at worst a scammer...which he showed the world pretty soon after.
Check that thread from the beginning, stuff gets murky really fast.
As for KxK........that's the .001% I was talking about. That said, he's supposedly still building, and he never listed a completion date for those builds. He wasn't exactly known for being quick so it's not like anything was misrepresented. In a twist of fate Rob's business dropped off dramatically after the BRJ stuff went down and folks were afraid to go for budget builders just long enough to mess up the good guys like Rob.
Those guys have a market too. I think guys like Grosh put more into a guitar than most other builders. They might not make something cutting edge, but you can't question the quality and attention to detail.
GuitarBizarre
Listen to physics.
Some of them do, but for every guy who really genuinely believes the Les Paul is the pinnacle and builds every one like it's the mona lisa, there's 20 more building them for £5k or more when they're no better, sometimes worse, than off the shelf. I've played some £3k second hand Les pauls that my EC401 ....s on. That's just not on.
Pikka Bird
Vaya Con Cornholio
I actually have read through all of that thread since it started and yeah, I quickly lost whatever faith I might have had in that whole thing. But I'll allow myself to assume that there are plenty of customers who aren't all that internet-savvy or in the loop on what's going down in the world of perceived "upper-class boutique" guitars. Those people just go by good ol' faith in the family name and the kind of rep the guitars get from reviews (plus, the guy had a decent artist roster, and a couple of his big profile guys came out and defended him when he went absent) and now they're royally boned because they're too trusting but I can't blame them for not smelling the ashes all things considered. A guy like this just exploits all that goodwill that he didn't even earn for himself to begin with and it's kinda inexcusable. Especially once some new BRJs came up on eBay, which is happening with Siggery now too.
...have we had any proper Siggery shills here, by the way?
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