tegs07

26 minutes ago, Burns-bass said:

I can understand banks wanting to prop up the housing market, but I can’t imagine the price of Fenders is on their list. (I see air fryers are no longer considered an essential commodity either.)

I don’t think for a minute that they will prop up the price of vintage Fenders

Every asset is in a bubble. It’s either all going to burst (starting with things like vintage instruments) or there’s going to be a tsunami of liquidity to keep it all afloat that will devalue the value of currency and pump the price of all assets. Anyhow wrong thread for this. Personally if I had the spare cash I would like a vintage Fender Precision. I would put it in my Man Cave garage next to my vintage car collection.

14 minutes ago, SumOne said:

 

..... (or, they might just not be the sort of people Fox News viewers like!) 

 

 

 

Fans of Fox News must be Psychotic!

first and last and always - sisters of mercy 

8 hours ago, Reggaebass said:

I think it’s essential to spread the music and keep reggae alive 

Absolutely. It’s always great when the next generation get into music that you love. My kids are really into reggae and have started introducing me to new artists. Here’s something a little different that my teenage son has been playing recently:

The price of vintage instruments has diverged hugely from the earning power of your average person. Logically it should correct but the economic system appears to have also diverted from all logic over the last few decades. Instead of big recessions we have seen epic borrowing at unprecedented levels in peacetime. Whilst most of us are getting poorer for every £1 we owe someone else has that £1 plus interest. There is a lot of money sloshing around still looking for assets and investments.

Central banks and governments are just itching to rinse and repeat so I would not bet on prices going down. They might if a recession is allowed to let rip, but until then I will look at a vintage Fender bass priced at £10K plus and think that’s crazy in the same way I look at a 500K+ average home in a leafy suburb and think that’s crazy but they still appear to attract buyers.

Howl - BRMC

It would be easier if FB Marketplace place just renamed itself FB Scams, Lies and Tosspots.

My favourite bass. It never asked for anything but was never as extroverted or flamboyant as my Clownfish. Now that could really party and win over a crowd.

Nilo share the drugs.

Just my tupence worth. Pretty much every large company is in a race to the bottom in terms of customer service. Whether they appear on these pages is probably more due to people falling foul of whatever workflow or process they use to extract cash and provide the most basic service they can get away with.

Just now, SumOne said:

I'm talking in massive generalisations (and have lived in the US) 

If you are working off massive generalisation then the UK is just about XFactor tosh and insipid Beatles rehash bands.

1 hour ago, SumOne said:

Not so much US popularity for bands along the lines of Erasure, Pet Shop Boys, Pulp, Suede, The Cure. They'd be considered too sissy and odd for a lot of the US market that go for more conformist stuff like Country music that doesn't do so well in the UK.

Take a trip to places like Seattle, Nashville, Portland or Brooklyn. You might revise your opinion.

The USA is such a huge and diverse place that there is a market for a very diverse range of music.

Pretty much every new artist that grabs my attention is from the USA and this is across a wide spectrum of genres.

I found on every visit I make to the USA that my preconceptions are proven wrong. I would totally disagree with the macho/conformist argument. 

Mainstream fodder is invariably rubbish whatever continent you live in.

9 minutes ago, Mykesbass said:

Whatever happened to the jumble sale? They don't seem to exist anymore. Then again, there wasn't the proliferation of charity shops and car boot sales when the jumble sale ruled the second hand world.

vinted and depop happened 

Seems appropriate:

This is such a good bass and such good value. If I lived near you I could not resist. Sadly I have zero confidence in courier services anymore so have to reluctantly let this one go. 

Just now, Bolo said:

And that leads you to believe 40% of their revenue came from the UK?

Nope, just another hurdle that companies like Thomann have to overcome. Brexit is frequently mentioned but is just one factor at play.

7 minutes ago, Bolo said:

Do you have any source at all for those numbers because they don't make much sense to me. Thomann is located in the south of Germany and supplies the majority of mainland Europe, mostly without the hassle of ferry/airfare and taxes.

 

But I would hazard guess that the majority of the goods it sells originate in the Far East and ship via Suez are the Red Sea. 

Supply chains are so vulnerable to disruption now. Covid and more recently geopolitical factors are causing chaos with these businesses models.

I have found that the quality of goods and services has steadily declined in proportion to their price. Time for a rethink. 

23 minutes ago, Jack said:

Lovely bass, but how on Earth is it cheaper to send a bass to another country for painting (even if it is next door) then bring it back again?

Fuel is cheap. Labour, rent and business rates aren’t. Paint and prep are labour and time intensive.

Nice bass btw. Scotland seems to be the home of the great value bass atm judging from what is coming up here!

If you were in Bristol I would pop round this evening:)

Who knows. Maybe globalisation is reversing and people will need to get used to buying fewer (and in many cases better quality) things?

Edit: How Harley Benton continues with such rock bottom prices is a mystery. I guess no licensing deals, little in the way of bricks and mortar for sale and distribution and some very slick workflows to allow volume sales at low margins. Even so.

There are some exceptions but GDP and salaries are increasing in many East Asian countries. Simultaneously there are some demographic issues (eg China) where the workforce is aging. Labour is getting more expensive, particularly skilled labour.

grinderman - grinderman

38 minutes ago, Baloney Balderdash said:

*sigh* 

 

So if labour doesn't have any value, but is just an expense, then why would a company want it?

 

You think they are running a charity or something?

 

The product/service workers are selling is their labour, because it has value for the companies.

 

If a companies products increase in value, so does the value of the labour of those who actually produced it.

 

 

If a company’s profit increases yes otherwise no.

If profits decrease as costs increase then they have to charge more or lose staff.

You can’t just say that workers value increases because the price of things their company sells increases.

We are seeing prices increase (but this is finite) at the same time as the cost of production is increasing (materials, energy, rents, labour).

Companies can do this for some time, but if profits fall and costs continue to rise then ultimately people lose their jobs.

Of course workers have value but that value is dependent upon productivity and profitability and not on the price of the product sold.

That’s not backwards thinking. Profit is the gap between what something costs to produce and what you can sell it for. Whether this is food, a table or a gig at the dog and duck.

5 minutes ago, Baloney Balderdash said:

 

 

 

Which I quoted in my initial post, and the whole reason why we are even discussing this.

 

I must have missed something. You just said as the cost of things rise so does the value of your labour?

Sadly not. Your labour is a cost rather than a value. If you come up with a process that makes yourself more efficient so you can produce more or cheaper then yes your value increases but until then it’s a fixed cost leading to no increase in value.