When Gibson Guitar Co. shuttered its operations here in 1984 after 90 years and beat it down the line to Nashville, the former plant managers didn`t spend much time singing the blues.
Within months, three former top managers leased space in the 1917-vintage factory where they had turned out guitars for Gibson, and in April 1985 formed a privately held company: Heritage Guitar Inc.
Five years later, they`re strumming along, turning out about 1,300 guitars a year to the tune of about $1.5 million a year in sales. Their niche is high-quality, premium-priced guitars.
But it`s more than just a business, said owners James Duerloo, Marvin Lamb and J.P. Moats, who were plant manager, plant superintendent and quality control manager, respectively, at Gibson.
Gibson Guitar Co. had been making guitars in Kalamazoo since 1894, when former shoe clerk Orville Gibson found a way to fine-tune violin-making techniques into an efficient way to build guitars. At its peak, Gibson employed 1,100 people in three plants in Kalamazoo, and turned out 300 to 400 guitars a day. Gibson made Kalamazoo one of the centers of U.S. guitarmaking. ”We`re carrying on that heritage,” said Duerloo, who worked 22 years for Gibson, starting out sanding rims. ”Heritage is more than a name. It`s what we are.”
Duerloo, 51, Lamb, 51, and Moats, 54, each spent more than 20 years with Gibson, and have a total of more than 100 years of guitar-making experience.
Because Gibson had been in Kalamazoo so long, the new company was able to hire a veteran work force. None of Heritage`s 18 employees has less than 20 years` experience in the business.
And because Heritage is not a mass manufacturer, the workers can practice a high level of craftsmanship. They have attempted to build a company name on quality, a process that has been more difficult than they expected.
”`I thought sales would be stronger than they are,” said Duerloo. ”I don`t think as many people know about us as I expected. It takes time and money to get a name built.”
Heritage advertises in guitar magazines, but nothing on the scale of better-known major manufacturers such as Gibson, Martin, Fender and Yamaha.
Building a name in the crowded market is a common problem for small companies such as Heritage, said Jerome Hershman, executive vice president of the Guitar and Accessories Music Marketing Association, a New York-based trade group.
”A lot of small manufacturers are struggling because they don`t have the dollars to advertise,” Hershman said.
Heritage has had more success overseas than in the U.S. About 60 percent of its sales are exports, with Japan and Germany the main markets, Duerloo said.
Heritage`s export success comes at a time when foreign companies, particularly those in Japan, dominate the U.S. guitar market. Of about 1.4 million guitars sold in the U.S. last year, only about 120,000 were American made, said Hershman.
Guitar sales in the U.S. took off in the 1960s with increased leisure time and the popularity of folk and then rock music. Sales jumped to 2.2 million in 1970 from about 400,000 in 1960, Hershman said.
But sales peaked a few years later, and imports began to capture more and more of the market. U.S. manufacturers, who 30 years ago made 90 percent of the guitars sold in this country, now make less than 10 percent, Hershman said.
Guitarmakers in the early 1980s also had to contend with a sales slump.
”All the kids in the country thought it was cool to play video games and not musical instruments,” he said.
But since 1985, sales have rebounded to 1.4 million from slightly more than a million guitars. ”Video games wore off. MTV came along, and all you see there is guitars,” said Hershman, referring to the music video television channel.
Heritage builds to order rather than stockpiling inventory. Its process begins with raw wood, mostly maple, which is planed, then cut and routed into guitar components. Some models have touches such as hand-cut mother-of-pearl inlays on the fingerboard. The finished products take six weeks to a year to turn out, and cost from $800 to $7,000.
In the plant, there is sawdust underfoot and the smell of fresh-cut wood in the air. Woodworking machines-routers, saws and sanders-whine, and in another room, a buffer hums as a worker shines a guitar. For a place where musical instruments are made, there is surprisingly little music, save the sound of the finished guitars being tuned.
Despite their long experience making guitars, none of the three founders plays the instrument. ”That`s not to say we can`t plunk around and play a chord or two,” said Duerloo. ”We can tell when a guitar`s good, but being around them all day long, it`s hard to go home and pick one up.”
Among performers, Heritage`s following is mainly country and jazz musicians. Its most prominent customer is country legend Roy Clark. Heritage is bringing out a Roy Clark model this year.
Business has increased steadily since Lamb took to the road in July 1985 to sign up distributors and make sales. The first day, he got orders for 13 guitars.
Those were nervous times, the owners recalled. ”You`ve got to think of where you are if you don`t make it,” said Moats. ”You`re not working for Gibson anymore.”
Duerloo, Lamb and Moats, along with Bill Paige, a former Gibson business manager who handles Heritage`s finances, have not made a fortune. Duerloo said the company makes a profit, but not a big one. Said Lamb, ”We haven`t been on the payroll long, let`s put it that way.”
Heritage does not release sales figures, but with about 1,300 guitars a year being sold and the most popular models in the $1,300 to $1,500 range, its annual sales can be estimated at about $1.5 million. Paige said sales were up 15 percent in 1989 over the previous year and are up about 9 percent this year.
Heritage`s founders could have made more money by going to work for other companies, Lamb said, but have no regrets about the decision to strike out on their own.
”Here, we can make our own destiny,” he said. ”What else did we know?
We were all just kids when we started with Gibson. We don`t know anything but guitars.”
