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Lee Anderton says spending an extra $5 making a budget guitar can make it “twice as good”
The retail boss says it doesn’t increase the price of the end product much, either.
Credit: Jesse Grant/Getty Images Getty Images for NAMM
How far does $5 go? Well, according to Lee Anderton of UK guitar gear retailers Andertons, spending even just an extra $5 when making a budget guitar can make it as much as twice as good.
Speaking to Andy Ferris, aka The Guitar Geek, Anderton discusses the economics of budget instruments, explaining that investing just a little more can have a huge impact on the quality and value of the end product.
He uses Andertons’ budget guitar brand, EastCoast, as an example, suggesting that as long as the factory’s minimum orders are met, spending an extra $5 to $10 on each instrument will make them better than most budget guitars, and without increasing the price of the guitar much either.
He says, “I was looking at these models and thinking it was mad how much better I could make the guitar relative to these £99 ones by just saying to the factory, ‘What if we just spend five dollars more?’
“Like, not 50 dollars more, 100 dollars more, something really that would really inflate the retail price. What if we just spent five dollars more so that we are only really maybe putting the price of the guitar up by 10 or 20 quid after it has gone through all the various import processes and stuff?”
Anderton brings up the entry-level EastCoast ST-1 model as an example, explaining that the players of the guitar could really notice the extra money spent in making it. And, when Ferris asks if it’s hardware or better finish options that improve the guitars, he replies that it’s the “attention to detail.”
He continues, “I would imagine the cost price on that is probably only five to 10 dollars more than the guitar that comes in the pack for £99 but it is, like, twice as good.”