Lee Anderton Shares his Secret to Better Budget Guitars 

You? Talk? Nothing new there Capt LOL 🙂

You do, and we know that, but this was the first time I think it was the right amount of talking. Usually I felt it was on the too much side. I'm very impressed with your approach to the business, and it was great to hear this. We need more business owners with this mindset. Honestly, I've always felt odd, that they call you the Captain. I understand who Is the boss, but still sounds cocky to me if you are not running a pirate ship. But now i really appreciated the vision of the Andertons shop, and I'll feel a lot less bothered by the name.

@andertons Lee, I bought my first electric guitar from Anderson’s aged 13 in the early 80s. Even back then I remember the guys in the shop always being happy to stop and chat to a kid who was keen and wanted to learn more. I’m still playing and still totally in love with the guitar. You’re continuing a fine tradition and, for what it is worth, you have had a fair few more purchases from me over the years so the strategy works 😊

Please send Andy a Soloking.

Your a kind person Lee and its very appreciated in the guitar world

definitely

I genuinely think the thing thats special about Andertons is how it literally grew out of a very old school local music store, the ones where guitarists used to hang around all day before youtube, and where all the local musicians used to go to get a job, and Lee literally grew up in his dads shop. From everything I heard and saw it really seems they managed to grow into an international mailorder powerhouse without losing that specific kind of relationship and care. (Without having been there but I heard the same about the feeling when you actually go to Thomann in bavaria).

@@ithemba For how big thomann is they still manage to keep the personality of a local family run shop. Been there once and spent almost an hour with the guy talking about everything. Even swayed me towards a less expensive guitar that played and suited me perfectly

@@Naytexo yeah thats about what I've heard, too. A bandmate of mine actually plans to go and travel there (basically across germany from the Ruhrgebiet) to check out and playtest Basses since he plans on spending big but is genuinely not into youtube and second hand knowledge and just wants time and as many interesting instruments as possible to check out. It'd be a two day trip basically. When you got to that level of basically being an traveling destination and adventure park for musicians when they plan their next bigger acquisition (compared to the less expansive ones that you order online without thinking too tuch) you've done hell of a lot right.

Its kind of like what business call a loss leader, I think its great, get everyone playing.

"Out of character"?????

You could hear the passion and emotion. Lee has a great sense of humour but it was great to hear the care and responsibility.

TBH I don’t think he puts on a character in the Anderton’s videos. What I like about their channel and the That Pedal Show lads is that you get the presenters as their genuine selfs (something I can confirm having met Mick and Dan from TPS). Sometimes they are tired and grumpy, sometimes animated and enthusiastic. They are being their authentic selves. The one thing that separates Anderton’s and TPS is that Anderton’s is a shop, so it’s a given that there is a promotion aspect. But I think this video shows that Lee has a genuine desire to bring quality budget beginners guitars out to the world.

This is fantastic to read!

Bullet mustang in white was my lock down project and it's in heavy rotation now (after zebra humbuckers and a black pearl pick guard) that I'm out with band mates. Picked up the ss mustang in green and it was near flawless neck wise. The singles are great. Look into them!

Hi Tim. Thanks for your kind words. Was a pleasure talking to a like minded person like Lee

I had the same experience and almost quit. I never bought anything from that store again; not even one single pick.

Good advice

They're not really decent guitars. They're guitars that are reasonably playable compared with cheaper, guitar shaped objects that appear outside traditional guitar retail- i.e like on Amazon or Argos etc.. I think Richard from Richard guitars largely went nuts because he created the premise that he could reject enough of these mass produced guitars, and then get a guitar tech to set the remaining ones up (all for free?!?) in a way that made them into decent guitars. But they'll never be that and you don't make any money selling them for all that effort you put into selling one. You'll start to become really, really busy trying to keep on top of all the orders. You're better selling one or two boutique guitars a week with that level of attention rather than trying to fool yourself and the world that a £120 guitar is decent. Good pickups retail for more than this guitar costs. It's intended to be 2 things (a) Close enough in price that a few parents get it from Andertons rather than Amazon and (b) Good enough that in 6 months time you'll progress in terms of your playing ability that your parents will buy a better guitar. The other side here is, we see a lot of handpicked guitars on youtube where someone is playing something that is mass produced and they'll nearly always get a good one. When you actually ask about people's experiences with not just the cheapest guitars, but even stuff like Ibanez premium etc, there's a ton of QC issues - sometimes just with fit and finish - which doesn't affect playability but it takes the shine off it a bit when loads of people get a guitar and the tone knob is loose and there are sanding marks etc etc...as well there are often issues with frets etc etc. That's why people pay £2k+ for a guitar. Because they know the lower tiers of guitars is, at best, a lottery, at worse a delusion that you're getting a les paul for £120 - it looks nice and shiny with a maple top etc, and a lot of parents would be asking junior "Well why would you spend more - this guitar looks just as good as the others" - if junior is clued up enough to know that the cheap guitar isn't a scam per se but it isn't honestly sold. Take, e.g the ichi10 guitar or Tim Henson signatures and you end up with 2 high profile players demoing them (and they obviously get a good version that's made in japan) and then every youtube channel waxes lyrical because they want more free stuff from Ibanez...and these guitars are £800+,, so they should be more than good, right? But the reality is most of them are not. Pretty much all of them have flaws and arrive in a way that means the player has to either reject a few times, fix issues themselves or take it to someone who can fix it. There is, of course, a point at which the amount of money you're paying you're not really getting anything - this is because there are as many fools with lots of money as there are without any - which is where stuff like PRS private stock comes in or the other really expensive custom shop.

@@michael1 exactly right - everyone wants brand loyalty. ive bought a couple squiers in my time, some have been awful and needed a lot more set up than they should of, others were perfect and played as great as a real fender right out of the box. all a potluck - lee has clearly had some success with the east coast brand getting more loyal customers etc. and the slightly higher tier brand he discussed in the video is just going to continue people down the andertons path. truth is there will always be QC issues with guitars, and that's how It Will always be with all these guitars made in china, Indonesia etc. some will be great, some fine, and other will just be shit. there's a reason why Fender kept Squier from being labeled Fender. They know its a gamble with those guitars so they want to distance the shit from those less so.

Nice work!

and now I’m waiting on east coast drums!

Hi Chris. Thank you for writing that. I think it’s important to actually care about what one does regardless of what that is

@@TheGuitarGeek ... and that shines through loud and clear.