Guitar Center is the Walmart of music stores lately. If I'm shopping for a guitar, I almost always go to a privately owned store these days. They tend to actually care about their customers.

I get their catalog every few weeks and it always cracks me up when I see the 10% off coupon on the back. Read the fine print and try to find an item in the store that the coupon actually applies to. The only good thing about GC is they were able to price-match a power amp that I found online that was about 60 bucks cheaper. That was a few years ago, I haven't found anything worthwhile in the store since.

The sad part is that they didn’t even bother to remove the complaint sticker before reshipping it. Someone needs to teach this company how to run a proper scam.

The customer should have inspected the item much closer within the 30 days, but I have been guilty of not doing this myself. I have eaten a few purchases as a result too. Most companies want to recognize that revenue and have a hard cutoff to keep the accountants happy.

On the other hand being shipped a used item instead of a new takes it to a new level of negligence, and they need to make good on it.

@I_have_something_to_say:

Unfortunately, because they ARE the walmart of musical instrument stores.. that also means they are usually one of the few places that get limited edition guitars.

Im just a bit confused on the timeline of this all. If he got it and played it for a week then noticed how did it happen to be out of the 30 day period?

While I agree they shouldn't have sent a used guitar...how was it not noticed until 3 months after?

@Chris Chagnon: He wrote the letter to Consumerist after 3 months. He noticed the problems with the guitar after about one month.

I could never buy a guitar mail-order; I have to play 'em first and see if there's some chemistry before I 'pop the question'.

I'm confused...when he received the guitar, wouldn't he have noticed, in his own words, a "big yellow tag that said two things: Musician's Friend and COMPLAINT" on it?

Not saying what the vendor did was right and it was obviously their mistake, but I think no matter how strict or generous a company's return policy is the customer should still practice at least a little due diligence when receiving an item. A "big yellow tag that said two things: Musician's Friend and COMPLAINT" wouldn't have required that much effort to notice when he received the shipment.

I have no idea if they also use this distribution center, but Sweetwater offers more personal customer service. They assign a musician or techie 'sales engineer' to each customer, which helps communication a lot.

I love Guitar Center. Where else can you hear 5 or 6 people playing the opening notes to "Smoke on the Water" at the same time?

I have to echo the responses of some other posters here... whenever I order something online the first thing I do when I get the item is inspect it. The dings on the head, especially on a brand-new guitar, would have raised a flag with me and caused me to do all of the adjusting right then. On top of that, I have a hard time believing he didn't notice the huge "complaint" sticker on the box. There's alot wrong with what Guitar Center did, but at what point is the buyer not responsible? He accepted the delivery and used the guitar for more than 30 days before he decided to complain.

Guitar Center is the place you go to "try out" new merchandise, not to buy from. One never "buys" anything from Guitar Center....well unless you are using their "30 day rental program"...I mean "return program".

A few reasons you should never buy anything from Guitar Center:

1) Guitars are not setup, have been pawed over by every 12 yr old to enter the store and most likely dropped at least once by either store staff or earlier mentioned 12yr old.

2) Guitar Center will not "setup" your guitar because they have no one in the entire store that even knows what the term "setup" actually means let alone know how to do it.

3) I'm sorry, but when making a purchase of an Amp or Guitar that is upwards of $2,000 I'd like my sales person to be able to answer questions with knowledgeable responses that do not contain the words "dude", "yeah man", "totally awesome" or some other variant.

4) THEY CHECK RECEIPTS AT THE DOOR! (which is usually only 5 feet from the register).

5) They only cater to wanna-be musicians by stocking low end crap guitars (priced around $300-$500) and other low end gear that wouldn't make it through 2 shows let alone their 30 day return policy. If you want real gear you have to order it, which usually takes an unbelievably long time (month or better) for some reason.

I could go on all day, but I think you get the point.

@Dan Grossberg:

The magic words you use at GC are "What kind of deal can I get for that?"

Only on a few items (cables mostly) have I ever not had the guy take at least 10% off.

They price match, so if you can find a deal on teh interwebs, print the page and bring it in. I got my Boss TU-2 for $99 years ago when they were advertising it for $140. The guy said he'd be willing to knock it down to $120 and I told him about a site that had it for $99. He confirmed it and sold it to me for the same price.

@jchabotte: Not true. If you find a dealer for the manufacturer you want, they can likely order it. They just might not have it in stock.

So, go to guitar center, play their guitars, then go to a real store and order one.

@jchabotte: Actually that's not entirely true. Jason out at Drum City Guitar Land in Colorado usually gets a ton of guitars I've never seen at any guitar center.

He sells a ton of stuff directly to artists. I was trying to buy an out of production Fender Flathead a year or two ago and got sniped out by Jim Root from slipknot.

I call shenanigans on the timeline.

If he got it and had an inkling something wasn't right with it, he should've sent it back within the 30-day period.

Sure, Guitar Center may be at fault for shipping him a returned guitar, but if he didn't say anything (and since instruments don't carry serial numbers for backtracking), it's hard to say that he's entitled to anything since he didn't act quickly enough.

@johnfrombrooklyn: and then OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER again

@bravohotel01: So what is to stop someone from coming up with their own website that shows products for less, but actually isn't selling anything?

Guitar Center and Musician's Friend are the same company, so of course they share warehouses.

My understanding was the musician's friend and guitar center aren't actually competition, they're the same company.

Mail ordering instruments is a pretty bad idea, but if you do it in person, you'll get the used car salesmen treatment. It's lose lose unless you're friendly with the staff in my experience.

@bravohotel01: Yeah, I usually take my own amp to the store when I'm trying something out, unless I know the store already has it.

But no two pieces of wood are the same. Unless I'm just looking for a beater, I'd be reluctant to buy a guitar unseen. That doesn't necessarily mean nobody else should, I'm just a bit anal about this stuff.

Well, I spent several minutes searching and not finding it but I'm sure there is a law against selling used or refurbished items as new.

However, as a musician, I've spent several years shopping online now at a lesser known vendor called American Musical Supply (www.americanmusical.com). They appear to be much lesser well known than Musician's Friend or Guitar Center but have much better deals and have alway taken care of my issues promptly on the rare occasions I've had them. In short, they are awesome and I only purchase from GC locally if I need something immediately or MF online when AMS does not have the item.

This is troubling. This is another example of a big cumbersome corporation too big and "efficient" to nimbly deal with a customer in a manner that approximates reasonable.

Corporations make me sad for this country.

I too have to agree there is something wrong with the story. ANYONE who has ever played a guitar with a twisted, back-bowed, forward-bowed neck will know with in a minute of playing it something is wrong. It doesn't take 30 days to figure this out.

@gtrgod01: That is very interesting to learn. I am in the market for a quality guitar for my son, and will definitely go the local mom & pop store instead of the big store down the road.

Sometimes you think the big corporation is going to have more muscle to help it's customers, but it turns out they are big and bloated because they more efficiently screw more customers with their greater capacity.

I understand his frustration, but a few things are weird here..

"Everything shipped smoothly and I absolutely fell in love with the guitar."

then
"Upon initial inspection I noticed a couple of dings near the head of the guitar"

then
" So upon closer inspection of the neck, it appears to be slightly twisted"

then
"About a week later I was cleaning out my basement and noticed that on the box my guitar was shipped in was a big yellow tag that said two things: Musician's Friend and COMPLAINT

If he fell in love with the guitar, it must have been playing alright from the start. [Either that or he has absolutely NO idea about playing guitar]. I'd notice a "couple of dings" on my brand new guitar RIGHT AWAY. Next: a guitar with a twisted neck would not have played well to begin with! he should have noticed that right away as well.

Next: how in the world do you not notice a DIFFERENT COMPANY NAME and BIG YELLOW COMPLAINT TAG on the box?? it took him a month to figure this out?

I feel for the guy, but he should have noticed all of this stuff WELL within the 30 day return period. Stupid is as stupid does, Forest.

@khiltd: Located in Kansas City, MO (or a suburb of KC) if I'm not mistaken.

@AstroPig7: Not every mistake is intentional. The issue here is not what happened, but how Guitar Center resolves this. I am hopeful for Mitch that once he calls, GC will do the right thing.

I used to work at GC as an assistant manager. First of all "GC, MF, and a few other retailers" don't just share a disto center they are the same company! As for mitch and his guitar he should have taken it down to his nearest GC and asked for help from the store manager. GC online does not care about you and sticks to policy. The store has WAY more avenues to deal with problems. Almost anything is negotiable at GC, you would be suprised. The good employees at GC will help out and try to earn your business...they work on commission, at least in CA.

@gtrgod01:

This definitely seems like it varies a lot from store to store. My boyfriend and I have been going to one in central jersey for a year and half now, and have gotten *very good* service. The level of knowledge certainly varies from person to person, but we've developed a friendly relationship with a few of the guys on the floor and manager, and after having bought a total of 7 guitars and 2 amps, we've only had good experiences. This is also true of the guitar repair shop they have in-store to do setups and repairs.

Guitar Center in the one place that doesn't bother me with their receipt checking/guitar check-ins because they actually pay attention to what the receipt says, unlike every other retailer.

It's absolutely true that the equipment on the floor can get abused, but you can also inspect it for such damage before you buy it. Do they cater to the more beginner end of the spectrum? Sure. But ordering through them sure beats having to trek into NYC all the time when we haven't been playing long to know what we want in the high end guitars, and probably will never be serious enough to drop more than $2000 on a guitar.

Does the FCC rules not apply from DSW?
"Merchants who ship unordered merchandise with knowledge that it is unlawful to do so can be subject to civil penalties of up to $11,000 per violation. Moreover, customers who receive unordered merchandise are legally entitled to treat the merchandise as a gift. Using the U.S. mails to ship unordered merchandise also violates the Postal laws."

It sounds like he was shipped an item he did not order. How incorrect does an order have to be in order to apply? Sending a used item when a new one was purchased seems like it should apply.

I am bit lost as to why this writer took so darn long to fully inspect their merchandise. A 30 day return policy is not uncommon but it seems to have taken him "a week" to try the item "another week" to set the guitar and notice the problem with the neck and then "about a week later" to "clean out his basement" and finally notice the yellow tag on the box.

Hello??

Who orders merchandise, tosses the box in their basement and then takes WEEKS to fully inspect the product and packaging knowing ALL STORES have a window for returning merchandise.

I hope he somehow gets help and should not have been shipped defective merchandise, but how someone doesn't find time in 30 days to fully check an item escapes me. It seems he bought this and maybe someday down the road sometime in the future was gonna maybe see if it was what he ordered. Odd.

Calling shenanigans on this too. Wal*Mart of Music stores maybe, but I have bought a ton from stuff from these guys, and, for a big company, they have always treated me right(at least at my local locations). Considering the fact that I have had the Return policy waved for me before to do an exchange (I had bad turntable cartage which only has a 7 or 14 day exchange policy, after asking nicely they let me exchange it after about a month), I find it hard to believe that they would deny an exchange on a shipping error unless something was totally screwy.

My one experience with Guitar center was far from stellar. I needed a boundary microphone for a project that I was doing. Unfortunately my favorite store(www.bhphotovideo.com)was out of stock, and I would not have received it in time had I ordered it. I opted instead to go to the local Guitar Center store. A Salesman approached me and asked me what I needed. I pulled out the printout from their website which had the exact manufacturer (Shure), part number, Guitar Center stock number and a picture and said that I needed 2 of these. He wanders around for a bit we come across their microphone case "How about these? These are much better" he says. I agree that the $2000 studio unidirectional microphones were better than the $200 Omni-directional boundary mics, but had I wanted a studio microphone, I would have asked for a studio microphone.

"How about this Heil Handheld" Again...not what I asked for.
"Well Dude, I am not sure we have the Boundary microphones, or whatever you call them" He goes to check the computer, and while he is doing this, I spot the boxes on the shelf behind him and advise him of my discovery.
"Oh, I have never seen a Boundary microphone before. How do you use it? That's pretty wild"

Needless to say, I try to avoid shopping at Guitar Center if at all possible.

The sad thing is that there will always be a stream of new musicians that will still buy from GC. Seriously, there should be a book that is given to amatuer musicians that tells them about Rondo Music, Guitar Fetish, and Sweetwater.

@Shadowman615:

I am not a musician and never even tried, but I think I would agree with above posters about buying a musical instrument. Most musicians I've met have personal relationships with their musical instruments, so buying mail order doesn't make sense to me.

There should be a book given to new musicians that tells them about Rondo Music, Guitar Fetish, and Sweetwater. Then we could all just laugh and frolic merrily through the empty storfronts that USED to be Guitar Center.

@johnfrombrooklyn: Or how about the guy in the back playing "One" over and over?

@I_have_something_to_say: I find there are very few instrruments worth buying new. Used insturments hold their value very well. I buy almost all mine off ebay or craigslist. If after a few weeks I find its not exactly what I was looking for I know I can resell it for what I bought it for.

@uberbitter: Must be store to store because neither of the 2 I have near me have an "in-store shop" for any type of repair or setup. Both are staffed by what appear to be high-school dropouts or the guys that hold on to the 80's a little too much. You'd think I lived in the middle of nowhere...does St. Louis qualify as a small city?

The receipt check for guitar check-ins is a little bit different than the kid with 3 colors of hair sputtering barely coherent sentence fragments checking your receipt for the 3 packs of strings he just watched you buy 5 feet away from him.

As for the gear on the floor being abused...I can go into just about any of my local guitar stores (not GC) and rest assured that 99% of the time I wouldn't have any issues picking something up and buying it without looking it over with a magnifying glass. With GC, you have to search for the guitars that DON'T have things visibly wrong with them.

...again I guess this is store to store.

I recently also had a horrible experience and even though I should have known better (as an experienced musician I know GC sucks, seriously, support your local stores if you can) and used it for consumables, my dear ol' Mom bought me a GC gift card for Christmas. I used it to help buy a guitar on-line as a live back-up as my band is starting to play shows as of next week and was subjected to this gauntlet of stupidity:

1. Place order. Tell phone guy several times "hey I need to make sure my shipping address is different, I want this delivered to my office." Never get asked. Order gets placed, I get cut short - my address is forgotten. I live in Wyoming - having a guitar sit on my porch during the dead of winter isn't a great idea.

2. Call back to change my shipping address.

3. Get called by Guitar Center saying: ummmmm heyyyyy we like totally accidentally canceled your order. I should have given up here.

4. Re-order. Am told 'we won't bill you until before the guitar is shipped'.

5. Guess what? I was billed before the guitar was shipped.

6. Guess what else? When I put in my new order and give them my shipping address they forget to enter it. I called them out on this when I called to figure out why I had several hundred dollars withdrawn for a guitar that hadn't shipped yet (it was under severe backorder).

The whole ordeal took me a month. Never again. I agree with the statement above: Guitar center is great for trying out gear first hand or for consumables you need right that second for a gig. I usually just walk by the receipt station. GC also loses some points for some pretty severe homogenization of equipment; local stores always do it better.

@johnfrombrooklyn: Guitar Center on the weekends is Hell on Earth because of things like that.

@gtrgod01: As to point #5: How dare they sell guitars to people who don't already have at least two gold albums out. The nerve!

For every gigging musician, there are probably dozens of people who just buy for home use to play around with, learn with, and have fun. They stock what sells the most! I can't fault them for that.

I would drop some choice phrases to them too when you call. Tell them the product does not conform to the terms they accepted. (you offered to buy a brand new guitar for X dollars, they accepted, and sent you a non-conforming product.) This is material breach of the terms. Also note the date you received the guitar, and the date you noticed and contacted musicians friend. If this is under the thirty day return period then I'd use those dates to argue that 30 days is the period that guitar center thinks is reasonable to inspect the product to ensure conformity with the terms. If that window is not in line with the 30 day period I'd skip it all together and just go with the fact that guitar breached the purchase agreement at the time of delivery. They had no reason to think you would accept the guitar which does not conform with the agreement's terms, and they need to cure this non-conformity immediately because they have breached the agreement. All of this stuff will make it sound like you talked to a lawyer.

@Rachacha: What you have described IS the typical Guitar Center experience.

Ask for anything out of the narrow minded scope of the high schooler helping you and he endlessly shows you unsuitable non-related items while feverishly trying to talk you out of needing the item you've requested even though he knows nothing about said item or it's purpose/specific uses.

@Jason Jamal Nakleh: This is all true, but guitar center is in a better position to insure the product, and they are breach of the contract when they ship the non-conforming goods, not when they are accepted. Further in order for the reasonable time period to inspect to take effect, there must be reason to believe that the goods will be acceptable. If the guitar had been damaged in transit, this would be reason to believe by guitar center that the goods would have been accepted, but sending a used guitar from the source cannnot qualify as reasonably acceptable. they were in breach when they sent it, not when it was received.

PS Forrest has two "r's"

@gtrgod01: It's the timeless, "Commisioned salesmen will tyr to sell you expensive shit," situation.

@Kevin Harrelson: Perhaps they should change their name to "Beginning Guitar Center" then....