Rickenbackers from Japan

[tcsmit29]

Hey guys, I frequently lurk around on internet auction sites looking for my favorite guitars. I've noticed a very large amount of Rickenbacker guitars for sale from Japan. In fact this morning, I did an ebay search for 'Rickenbacker', sorted the listings by price (highest to lowest), and counted the first three pages of guitars. Out of a total of 150 guitars, 37 of them were from Japan (about 25%). What's up with this?

They appear to be real Ricks, however I would be hesitant in buying one of these due to the rampant numbers of fake vintage guitars from Asia. BTW, this isn't limited to Ricks, I see similar things when looking for Gibsons and Fenders as well.

So what do you guys think? Why is this? Would you consider buying one?

[jdogric12]

Japan is very different from China. They're actually two separate nations!

Japan is into Ricks big time, some might argue more than the USA. Their distributor gets all kinds of goodies we don't get here in the USA as a result, and there is a large market for Ricks in Japan, so it's not surprising that there are a lot available for sale from Japan.

To learn more about Japan and Rickenbackers, visit your local library, or do a search on this site for "Rittor book."

[squirebass]

Japan is very different from China. They're actually two separate nations!


To learn more about Japan and Rickenbackers, visit your local library, or do a search on this site for "Rittor book."

You've got to be kidding! Two countries?

Seriously though, I've had the opportunity to "read" the Rittor book (its written in Japanese), actually I just looked at the pictures, and the Ricks in there transcend any language barrier! I tried to buy the copy I got to look at from the owner, but the book is out of print in Japan, so he wouldn't budge... And yes, Japan loves some Ricks, they recently offered a limited run of 4003 basses with checkerboard binding to the Japan mkt only. I believe there was a guitar involved in that run as well....

[antipodean]

Japan is very different from China. They're actually two separate nations!

Japan is into Ricks big time, some might argue more than the USA. Their distributor gets all kinds of goodies we don't get here in the USA as a result, and there is a large market for Ricks in Japan, so it's not surprising that there are a lot available for sale from Japan.

To learn more about Japan and Rickenbackers, visit your local library, or do a search on this site for "Rittor book."

To echo Jason, Japan is a great market for RIC - there have been a number of limited edition instruments that have been for the Japan market only.

A few factors make Japan a great source for used instruments:

- Cultural integrity. Japanese sellers are amongst the most trustworthy in the world;
- Reasonable mark-down for used instruments;
- Weak Yen at the moment;
- Fairly low international shipping costs.

Things to be careful of:

- Misunderstandings due to language or cultural issues. It pays to be very clear and extremely polite (almost formally so) in all communications;
- Due diligence on vintage Rickenbackers (with old-style truss rods). Not every seller in Japan will be on top of the old truss rod mechanism.

In addition to auction sites, a number of Japanese dealers will happily ship internationally. I have used a few of these in the past and found them to be extremely easy to deal with:
- Ishibashi - http://www.ishibashi.co.jp/u_box/e/
- Kurosawa Gakki - http://www.kurosawagakki.com/kurosawa_used/
- Guitar Shelter - http://www.digimart.net/shop/70/
- Nico Nico - http://www.niconico-guitars.com/html/
- Far East Guitars - http://www.digimart.net/shop/4761/
- Guitar Craft - http://www.digimart.net/shop/1800/
- Hyper Guitars (vintage specialist - can be expensive but will have some interesting rarities from time to time) - http://www.hyperguitars.com/

Ishibashi and Kurosawa are large chains that have huge turnover and can have the occasional amazing bargain. The rest are small specialists that have excellent attention to detail.