glassmoon0fo
Some Say...
It's amazing how determined some people are to keep this shit even more miserable than it has to be 
The BRJ Black Friday Thread (Only for updates for/by customers.)[Ad Free]
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It's amazing how determined some people are to keep this shit even more miserable than it has to be
I think it's time you moved on bro - you seem to be just trying to bait people to respond to your posts. The other one about the moderation about this thread also wasn't unnoticed. We all know you're on the BRJ bandwagon/BRJ fanboi trip but you need to stop getting butt hurt that this thread is bringing out the bad news that you may not like.
Consider this a warning.
glassmoon0fo
Some Say...
Not the case at all man. I have no sympathy for the situation Bernie's in, only the fact that he may indeed be sick. The business practices are pretty heinous, no doubt. I just don't understand the need a few people have to remind everyone on the waiting list how fucked they are. I always say, "If you cant change a situation, change the way you deal with it." I couldn't possibly care any less if people respond to me or not, just hope they hear what I have to say. Hell, I thought I was being pretty civil. But hey, your call bro, do what you will.
JPMike
Totally Random
Bro, you are my hero!!
Nothing is being done... but the next "baited" post will get you a nap especially when I'm not even sure you're a current BFR customer.
glassmoon0fo
Some Say...
PM incoming DJ
glassmoon0fo
Some Say...
Right, well I'm obviously bating people, and no positive things can possibly be upheld in this thread so I'll take my permenent leave. I don't even have a guitar on order, what the hell I'm I doing here?! Crazy.
Good luck guys, really hope the best for you all
Good luck guys, really hope the best for you all
spawnsc
Well-Known Member
i'm curious, how long have some of you been waiting? i'm going on 2 years soon.. not trying to open any wounds or sore spots just trying to forecast how long I could still have to wait.
Larrikin666
Deadite
Alright. I tend to stay out of here as much as possible. This is probably going to be the last time I post in the thread, because I genuinely get upset reading a lot of these things. I'm laying this out for the last time.
I have the MOST money invested in all of these. Not counting the guitar I already received, there are 6 guitars Bernie is working on for me in various stages. In theory, I have the most to lose, the most to worry about, the most entitled to complain about everything. Is that how things work? Of course not. If you are upset, then you feel the way you do. I get that. It doesn't matter where you paid a $600 deposit, paid off an entire guitar, or you have ~$15,000 in guitars at play.
I feel for Bernie. The two of us got pretty close AFTER my first guitar came in. I wasn't a customer whose ass he needed to kiss at that point. I already loved my guitar and had nothing else in the pipeline then. I liked my guitar and transaction with him so much, that I immediately put in two full custom orders with him for 7s. When the shit hit the fan with the wait times on BFR orders, I saw two things: 1.) I could help calm Bernie down and customers by jumping on every order that someone didn't want. 2.) I'd be getting a bunch of guitars I love for an awesome deal.
I jumped on it. I picked up two 6s pretty quickly. I picked up another 6 and 8 (I don't even play 8s) in the last few weeks. I don't throw money around like that if I'm not certain it's worth it. I didn't even buy NEW guitars before my BRJ. It was unheard of for me. Everything was always used because I hated losing 25-40% of the value immediately after the purchase. That's a big jump for me, but that's what I felt was justified.
I was also trying to handle ALL of Bernie's communication through here for a few months. It's a lot....infinitely more than I ever anticipated. Just on this forum, I was spending 2 or 3 hours each and every day trying to coordinate updates, answer questions, etc. I'm already working 10 hours a day and trying to be in a band. His handful of customers on here had me overwhelmed and started affect my ability to do everything else. He picked up on that after a period, so I pulled back from doing those things.
That's right around the time he was hospitalized.....twice. Anyone who says he wasn't....you're wrong. I'm telling you it happened. Period. End of story. Accept it or don't. Your beliefs about it are irrelevant. I spoke to him regularly throughout the entire thing, and I know how much it still affects him. Should it matter to a consumer when something like that happened? Probably not. It doesn't change the fact that it happened though.
There's also something else he had to deal with right after that which I can't go into detail on. It was bad. It broke my heart, and I really felt for him. Maybe he'll come out and talk about it at some point, but that's not my call. I agreed that it wasn't prudent to discuss it at the time, and his feelings on it still haven't changed.
After my experience dealing with all of the SSO communication, we talked about how to move forward. What works best? How do you please everyone? Obviously, that can't happen. Can he hire more people? Not with how things are. Does he refund builds? Not possible. Does he spend all day on the phone, answering emails, chasing down updates? No. I told him to stay away from the internet, stop checking the hundreds (sometimes thousands) of emails that roll in daily, stop letting people change specs daily on builds that were supposed to have ZERO changes to them except adding a neck pickup. He's just digging himself further and further down. Nobody is EVER going to get any resolution that way. I told him to focus on what he can control....builds. Spreading yourself thin is bad.....we've seen the result of that. You need to give something up at some point. I thought communication was the logical option. Is it going to be silent for a long time? I really hope so.
If he's focused on builds, then he's working on getting things done. Guitars get finished, cases come in from G&G (eventually), guitars go out. No new customers. Get the backlog. Get the mess behind him. When this is all wrapped up, figure out how to make sure it never happens again.
To wrap this up, I have zero doubt that my guitars will be finished, they'll be everything I wanted, or that he'll make it right if there are issues. That's all I want. I'm sorry that people out there are having bad experiences. Dwelling on things you can't change isn't good. That's not how I roll. I keep things moving. Don't want the guitar, sell the build. I'll probably end up buying more as time passes. You aren't helping other customers (or potential ones) by repeating the same things over and over again. If 114 pages of experiences don't change their mind, then you aren't either.
I'm here if anything needs me. I've never ignored a PM about this stuff. Don't ask me about your builds. I've stopped bugging him about my builds, so I'm not going to ask about yours.
Keep it real,
Chad
I have the MOST money invested in all of these. Not counting the guitar I already received, there are 6 guitars Bernie is working on for me in various stages. In theory, I have the most to lose, the most to worry about, the most entitled to complain about everything. Is that how things work? Of course not. If you are upset, then you feel the way you do. I get that. It doesn't matter where you paid a $600 deposit, paid off an entire guitar, or you have ~$15,000 in guitars at play.
I feel for Bernie. The two of us got pretty close AFTER my first guitar came in. I wasn't a customer whose ass he needed to kiss at that point. I already loved my guitar and had nothing else in the pipeline then. I liked my guitar and transaction with him so much, that I immediately put in two full custom orders with him for 7s. When the shit hit the fan with the wait times on BFR orders, I saw two things: 1.) I could help calm Bernie down and customers by jumping on every order that someone didn't want. 2.) I'd be getting a bunch of guitars I love for an awesome deal.
I jumped on it. I picked up two 6s pretty quickly. I picked up another 6 and 8 (I don't even play 8s) in the last few weeks. I don't throw money around like that if I'm not certain it's worth it. I didn't even buy NEW guitars before my BRJ. It was unheard of for me. Everything was always used because I hated losing 25-40% of the value immediately after the purchase. That's a big jump for me, but that's what I felt was justified.
I was also trying to handle ALL of Bernie's communication through here for a few months. It's a lot....infinitely more than I ever anticipated. Just on this forum, I was spending 2 or 3 hours each and every day trying to coordinate updates, answer questions, etc. I'm already working 10 hours a day and trying to be in a band. His handful of customers on here had me overwhelmed and started affect my ability to do everything else. He picked up on that after a period, so I pulled back from doing those things.
That's right around the time he was hospitalized.....twice. Anyone who says he wasn't....you're wrong. I'm telling you it happened. Period. End of story. Accept it or don't. Your beliefs about it are irrelevant. I spoke to him regularly throughout the entire thing, and I know how much it still affects him. Should it matter to a consumer when something like that happened? Probably not. It doesn't change the fact that it happened though.
There's also something else he had to deal with right after that which I can't go into detail on. It was bad. It broke my heart, and I really felt for him. Maybe he'll come out and talk about it at some point, but that's not my call. I agreed that it wasn't prudent to discuss it at the time, and his feelings on it still haven't changed.
After my experience dealing with all of the SSO communication, we talked about how to move forward. What works best? How do you please everyone? Obviously, that can't happen. Can he hire more people? Not with how things are. Does he refund builds? Not possible. Does he spend all day on the phone, answering emails, chasing down updates? No. I told him to stay away from the internet, stop checking the hundreds (sometimes thousands) of emails that roll in daily, stop letting people change specs daily on builds that were supposed to have ZERO changes to them except adding a neck pickup. He's just digging himself further and further down. Nobody is EVER going to get any resolution that way. I told him to focus on what he can control....builds. Spreading yourself thin is bad.....we've seen the result of that. You need to give something up at some point. I thought communication was the logical option. Is it going to be silent for a long time? I really hope so.
If he's focused on builds, then he's working on getting things done. Guitars get finished, cases come in from G&G (eventually), guitars go out. No new customers. Get the backlog. Get the mess behind him. When this is all wrapped up, figure out how to make sure it never happens again.
To wrap this up, I have zero doubt that my guitars will be finished, they'll be everything I wanted, or that he'll make it right if there are issues. That's all I want. I'm sorry that people out there are having bad experiences. Dwelling on things you can't change isn't good. That's not how I roll. I keep things moving. Don't want the guitar, sell the build. I'll probably end up buying more as time passes. You aren't helping other customers (or potential ones) by repeating the same things over and over again. If 114 pages of experiences don't change their mind, then you aren't either.
I'm here if anything needs me. I've never ignored a PM about this stuff. Don't ask me about your builds. I've stopped bugging him about my builds, so I'm not going to ask about yours.
Keep it real,
Chad
26 months and counting. I haven't seen any pics of my guitar yet, but I've spoken to Bernie twice in those 2+ years to discuss the specs. That's about it.
"I told him to stay away from the internet, stop checking the hundreds (sometimes thousands) of emails that roll in daily"
I was told there were somewhere around 300 guitars ordered in the black friday run. Hundreds or thousands of emails a day seems like quite a stretch for 300 customers. Maybe hundreds a year.
Larrikin666
Deadite
I'll respond since this is still directly related to my post. There more way more customers than just what came with the BF run. Add in previous customers, normal custom guitars, and the ridiculous amount of "artists" requesting free guitars.....the numbers gets ridiculous pretty quickly. Trust me. The amount of emails coming in daily is ridiculous.
msalazar
Oso
Anyone in contact, I'm trying to sell my slot and have gotten no response.
spawnsc
Well-Known Member
we all are in the dark with whats going on, only updates are his been sick again and out of guitar cases. Let's hope his working hard on the guitars and hopefully his filtering his emails because his going to have a hell of a time trying to sort through it all. I doubt you will even be able to sell a spot until his finished with the guitar... that's my opinion anyhow.
Anyone know if Keith Merrow still helps Bernie out?
Phrygian
Lefty
If I was still in this mess I'd get a lawyer to end it and get my money back. There is no way in hell Bernies counterthreats to anyone wanting a refund hold water - he broke the deal over 2 years ago when he didn't commit to the 60 day build times, so if anyone wants to end their part of the deal now it's not fathomable that he would get far with suing his customers after fucking them over this bad.
My advice to everyone - keep all documentation and document all communication (and lack thereof) of this ordeal, just in case. You might need it.
spawnsc
Well-Known Member
Is this how you got out of this mess or did you ever have an order with him at all?
Phrygian
Lefty
I bought a spot second hand, which I sold last fall. If I still had a spot and couldn't get a sale confirmed by bernie I would want my money refunded. He has previously given a somewhat threatening answer to anyone who wanted a refund, so I would want to have documantion that shows how he failed to do his part of the deal and be ready to take it to the next level if he continues with the attitude of either threaten the customer or keep silent until the guitar is done and basically force the customer to pay for a merchandise they don't want anymore.
spawnsc
Well-Known Member
I understand where you are coming from, but Bernie hasn't threatened me and the few times I've spoke to him, he seemed pretty cool and laid back. We all knew going into this there is a no refund policy so we shouldn't even ask for one. He should have someone managing the spot sells tho. The part that pisses me off is the lack of communication even if it was "Hey all I'm going to be away from emails and phone calls for awhile so I can hammer out these guitars I will update soon as I can in a few weeks." post on facebook. Thats simple enough for me to know his working and not to expect any responses for awhile.
Phrygian
Lefty
Well, someone here posted that they asked Bernie for a refund and he replied pretty harsh about it and pointed to that no refunds bullshit. Well what about the promised 60-day build time? Can B choose which parts of the deal that suits him and neglect the others? He has even had people pay up front when he told them their guitars where basically ready to ship just to see another 6-12 months pass without a single word. Mindblowing!
I bet Bernie is a really cool and nice guy, but this is business, and he is not doing it right at all. And as you said, if he had even spent just 5-10 minutes typing up a quick update for everyone on facebook then most customers would be a lot more tolerant. but to just disappear for months at a time is, well, you know - dee dee dee!
I bet Bernie is a really cool and nice guy, but this is business, and he is not doing it right at all. And as you said, if he had even spent just 5-10 minutes typing up a quick update for everyone on facebook then most customers would be a lot more tolerant. but to just disappear for months at a time is, well, you know - dee dee dee!
spawnsc
Well-Known Member
I missed that post about refund, he has no right to be a dick to anyone that's for sure.
