Sam Ash closing


Just saw Sam Ash will be closing all its stores by the end of July after 100 years of being in business. I remember going there as a kid and gawking at all the awesome drum sets I could never afford.  Yet another sad internet casualty and sign of the times but maybe an opportunity for the musicians among us to pick up a good deal.  Oh well.

https://www.samash.com/closing-stores

soix

the company line is that retail rents were too high, but i surmise the real reason for their sad demise is that never fully embraced online sales--their used inventory was always a fraction of guitar center or sweetwater. it's sad, in any event--nice people.

I’ve never lived near a Sam Ash but G.C. never impressed me much. Limited inventory and poor customer service have been the norm, in my experience. I once went into my local store and told them I was shopping for a short-scale electric. The response was "What’s a scale guitar?" You can’t make this stuff up.

We have an independent music store but the owner has always tried to sell me what he has on the wall. I don’t mind this in principal but the sleazy way he’s gone about it has resulted in zero sales to me. I did purchase a couple of Godin electrics from another shop that eventually closed. They were not focused mostly on guitars, though. They sold more violins, brass and keyboards.

I’ve found the customer service at Sweetwater to be excellent but have never bought any high-ticket items from them

My last guitar purchase was from SoundPure. Maybe I just lucked out with the particular sales guy but he was terrific. I bought a 7K acoustic from him -- by far my most expensive guitar purchase in 50 years of playing and I couldn’t have asked for better treatment.