Page 3 of 4

Posted: Mon Apr 17, 2006 9:21 am
by leftyguitars
As it says in the good book "Seek and ye shall find". I'm not sure if it meant Rickenbackers or not!

Posted: Mon Apr 17, 2006 12:36 pm
by johnallg
"As it says in the good book "Seek and ye shall find". I'm not sure if it meant Rickenbackers or not!"

Sure they did - just listen to the heavenly sounds!!

Posted: Mon Apr 17, 2006 3:24 pm
by thumper
whats bad is that musicians friend say these changing "due dates" are directly from rickenbacker and that's not right. all i wanted was a reasonable date to expect my bass. i can't even get the date the order was placed with rickenbacker. 6-9 months i understand but from when?

Posted: Tue Apr 18, 2006 1:23 am
by cheyenne
6-9 months seems wayyyyy to long for a Jetglo...Unless its a 4004L or 4004CII.

I dont think John Hall will post here,,,,but maybe Ben Hall could add some insight.

Im assuming you either paid upfront for the bass, or you put down an unrefundable deposit.

If in fact this is not the case, I'd cancel my order and go elsewhere. A new 4003 in Jetglo isnt hard to find.

Posted: Tue Apr 18, 2006 2:15 am
by thumper
6-9 months for the 4003 jg is what i was told by a ric sales rep.

Posted: Tue Apr 18, 2006 3:00 am
by cheyenne
Hmmm, wonder why so long???????????????

Posted: Tue Apr 18, 2006 4:43 am
by drathbun
LONNIE: JH will tell you exactly what he told me... their "dates" at MF are pure fiction and have nothing to do with Rickenbacker. I was told by a rep at Music123 the same thing. She said "This is just the way Rickenbacker does business Sir!" I told her she was full of BS because I had spoken with the CEO of Rickenbacker and he said you never received any shipment estimations from RIC.

MF and Music123 order lots of RICs on a continuing basis. They are just frustrated because they can't get that shipping estimate from RIC and so they make the dates up based on previous history to snag customers.

Posted: Tue Apr 18, 2006 6:09 am
by dwade
This topic is frequent and aged on many forums.

The ball should be placed in Rickenbackers court to solve this IMO. The retailers wouldnt have the opportunity to screw with "waiting lists/dates" if the supply imbalance was met.

I have like many of you, owned/played/tossed dozens of Basses. The Rics are never tossed (converted maybe, but not sold). The consistency of their quality in my experience is astoundingly solid. (thats been echoed here ad nauseum) And John Hall & Co. are Stand-up respectable people, talented, original and authentic masters.

Its time for them to do something about the supply vs. demand imbalance IMO. I know, skilled labor shortage, training, time, etc. etc. are all real factors that could risk their quality at the price of increased production, BUT, thats the cause of the "backlog". Thousands of small and large industries successfully grow their production to meet demand without sacrificing QC. Theres gotta be a way for Ric to do it. (Best practices)

Go ahead, flame me.

Posted: Tue Apr 18, 2006 6:43 am
by billy_sacco
Ok

Image

Just kidding I agree but what can ya do huh.

Posted: Tue Apr 18, 2006 6:48 am
by charlyg
RIC would have a big problem expanding. Here in SoCal, I am sure they are Grandfathered in for some of the environmental issues. I'll bet if they expanded or moved, they would be spending a ton of money to fall within all of the new regs.

Posted: Tue Apr 18, 2006 7:07 am
by alanz
Except RIC doesn't really care, Dave. They (and others here) will say, "We sell everything we make. That's a situation every manufacturing business wants to be in."

They also probably lose sales because their stock isn't plentiful and most people want to play an instrument before they buy, if for no other reason than to see if the instrument's basic ergonomics are compatible. But, since many people who buy Ricks already have one or more and already know what they are getting sight unseen/hand untouched they don't really need to have a huge manufacturing capacity.

Regarding ignoring newbies, two of those links asked very specific questions. One was about a bass pedal. Is it value-added to have 20 guys respond, "No, I never used that pedal."? I'd say... no. No, it is not value-added. If someone has used it then they have the option of responding or not, but infering some sort of snub or slight from a 0-response thread is probably not justified.

And now I'm going to go make a post about Jeff Rath, flatwounds and playing a full-width inlay cap-bypassed 4001 with a pick.

Posted: Tue Apr 18, 2006 7:45 am
by doctorwho
Alan, I think that it is unfair to say "... RIC doesn't really care ...".

I can not speak for the company, but I can speak from my experience as a chemist: existing stock is a good thing, but if one needs a particular item that requires a wait, then one waits for it.

One other comment, and it might make an interesting poll: I would think that for most of us our first Rickenbacker was a used one, and we later bought a new one (or two ...). The permutations (categories) as I see them would be:

1. Only Used
2. Used - New
3. New - Used
4. Only New

I maintain that most of us fall into category 2, myself included.

Posted: Tue Apr 18, 2006 7:48 am
by alanz
Why is it unfair? They seem to be happy with the way things are, so, yes, I'd say they don't really care about expanding their capacity. If they did, they would.

And...

I'm a 1.

Posted: Tue Apr 18, 2006 8:30 am
by drathbun
I'm a 2 and damned proud of it!

Posted: Tue Apr 18, 2006 8:59 am
by dwade
I'm a 3. Wanna be a 4 but cant stand "waiting".