is a selvedge denim. Others are saying give me players using and loving them. If you added a [WM] You’ve talked about working closer with
modern comfort through casual stretch denim Bigsby option, people would lap them up in a the artists in the Worship music genre. What
and everything in between. serious way. Ditto with the ES-Les Pauls! kind of program do you have?
So not to say that’s the exact approach, but [JC] I think that’s where we can go, what we [JC] We love musicians, music and guitars.
what I think we’re finding is there’s an emerging had to do was get back to our foundation with There are artists who are on big and small
line between your originals. What we’re hearing our Originals and Moderns and then re-launch stages, who have set their sights on the Gibson
is, “Gibson, go back to that era of 50’s and 60’s the collection with attention to quality. And the alliance and the foundation and on the focus on
with the original look and feel and tone”. And pricing too, we really recalibrated our pricing music through guitars… and we’re open for all.
what made it that way? Was that the wood, against the feature benefit set, both within our I think that has always been the case, but more
was it the way that the neck sat, was it also the own range and also with whatever else is out so than ever.
electronics that went into it? We’ve paid very there among guitars. It got complicated over specific attention to our 50’s and 60’s original the years and we’ve really cleaned that up. I think Gibson, under the heading of “listen,
range, and that’s what it’s called, The Originals. It’s a simpler range, you understand where learn, pivot” is learning. You can tell me, but I
you’re going. It’s clearer to understand and think there are plenty of Gibson’s being played
We’ve also leaned in, to your point there are people can see what they get for their money, in the Worship music world… and Epiphones.
many guitars, so you may like those guitars including the awesome $999.00 G45 acoustic For us, it’s just awesome to see. If in certain
but want more of a modern guitar with an from Montana. ways we could support that even more, we’d
asymmetric neck and have more frets and
love to.
have a little weight relief. And different balance,
different sets of tuners that I can have more
versatility in. So, we’ve now created the
Modern Collection.
So we have Originals and Moderns. A really
good way of framing this, Originals will always
be true to their historic spec, iconic, and we
will continue to have that in our range. Then
the Modern platform is where we can actually
innovate a little bit and we can try new things.
There is a fine line between novelty and
innovation, but we’re starting to find that line
with our Modern guitars and people are loving
what we’re doing there. That’s including not just
the feature benefit, but also the look.
You can experiment further with colors and
shapes on Moderns, whereas what you’re
trying to do with the Originals is make them true
to what they once were. And by the way, that’s
what we did at Levi’s. We made Levi’s vintage
clothing true to what it once was, and then we
also had our new fits and all of that are modern.
Thinking about women on that front, they want
that spectrum, so I think we’re providing that
through our guitars.
[WM] The ES-339 is one of our favorite ‘what
if’ guitars – ever. There are a number of worship
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Bruce Adolph, JC Curleigh, Doug Doppler
September 2019
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