Gibson guitars made of wood seized in raids are sold out

[Swingman]

[Lee Michaels]

Brilliant. He took a big hit from the government and now can make some of it back by using this horrible experience to market some product. Talk about making lemonade out of lemons.

Reminds me of what happens when the catholic church "ban" a movie. It becomes an instant hit and folks (mostly Catholics) line up to see it. It does wonders for the film's box office numbers.

Now if we could figure out a way for the gubnint to size and return some more wood and have it not cost anything. Some marketing guys are scheming on that right now. ;-)

[Leon]

Yeah!!!!! The little guy, so to speak, wins the battle with a cherry on top. One has to wonder if the sales of this series of guitars even comes close to the expense of defending themselves in court and getting back what is rightfully theirs to begin with.

I find it interesting that the guitars made with the seized and returned wood are termed Government Series guitars. LOL

Now normally one would not want to have a thing to do with something that has the association of Government Series attached to it.

I'm guessing that the majority of the buyers are liberals. If the government is involved it must be better. ;~)

[woodchucker]

Nice that they reclaimed it, but not nice about the cost to them. I agree with the Lacey act, we need to protect the gorillas, the elephants, and the wood.

But I can see the other side of it too. How it can destroy a business. I think Gibson needs to make sure it buys legal wood in the future.

[nailshooter41]

Not remotely close. When the government wants to bring the full weight of its bullying stupidity to bear, they don't mess around.

Karl's link says they made and sold 1750 guitars. So let's say that they a ctually made 2000 of them to go to private hands, friends of the factory, a nd any other folks that get those deals we don't hear about. The link also says that the base model starts at $1099 (irony not lost on me!) and we ca n bump it to a $1500 average to take in some higher priced models.

So... 2000 X $1500 = $3,000,000 gross. Take away the fact that it cost t hem money (say they keystone and simply double the cost to manufacture) and half of that is what they keep. Now you are looking at a possible income of about $1,500,000.

Nowhere near the $5,000,000 Juszkiewicz says the company paid to defend its elf and its property against the illegal government seizure.

There is no cherry on the top. There is no victory here except the hollow victory of "being right". And that is a pile of shit since they were never in the wrong, not even with the government making two runs at them. The g overnment simply screwed yet another small business and go away with it. S omeway, the Gibson folks found a way put the time and energy together and f ocus on turning this into something positive instead of simply walking away from it all. I don't think I could have done that, personally.

Robert

[krw]

...and donate to the Democratic party, rather than the other guys. Lesson learned!

[-MIKE-]

To top that off, they never actually proved the wood was attained legally.

[krw]

Huh? Why would they have to prove that it was obtained legally. Doesn't the government have to prove the opposite?

[-MIKE-]

Oops. Typo. Of course I meant legally.

[Markem]

Is there another try?

[-MIKE-]

WTF!!?!!! Is there auto correct on my computer, now!?

"i l l e g a l l y"

I give up.

[Markem]

Do not worry Mike. I was working on a bench fixing circuit boards, quick fix spotted reversed IC, zip zap boom chip replaced. Plug it in WTF, damn chip still in backward.....

did it three times in a row.

You got it right in less.

(feel better now)

Mark

[krw]

Jus' checkin'. ;-)

[-MIKE-]

I did a LOT of soldering at my last "real" job. One day I was making a bunch of audio cables with 1/4" connectors. You have to put the cable through the outer metal casing before soldering the inner connections. Well, about the third time in a row I forgot to do that on the *SAME* 1/4" connector, I was really pissed and started the process over for the forth time. Suddenly, I realized that I was working with a bare cable with no connecter on the other end. I could've just slid the casing onto the cable from the other cut end, like I'd done a hundred times before!

I tossed the thing down on the bench, turned off the iron, said fu@k it! and went home for the rest of the day. I figured at that point I was a safety hazard. :-)

[Kevin Miller]

On 02/19/2014 08:57 AM, -MIKE- wrote: snip

I make those my shop cleaning days. Figure anything more dangerous than a broom will just have to wait...

...Kevin

[Mac Cool]

Swingman:

I guess crime does pay.

[Just Wondering]

Since Gibson committed no crime, to what crime do you refer?

[krw]

Government's use of force, perhaps?

[Mac Cool]

Just Wondering:

Read the documentation rather than headlines.

[Swingman]

You would do well to do the same yourself.

There was a criminal investigation, but no criminal charges were ever brought against Gibson, only the threat of same.

The DOJ had did nothing but "allege"; and the agreement between Gibson and the DOJ specifically uses that phrase, as well as the phrase "_may have_ violated laws ..." but those "allegations" was never proven.

Gibson made a business decision and agreed to a "settlement" for $350k instead of spending millions on legal fees and thereby being put out of business defending themselves against what was arguably an egregious political action, while facing the same type of overzealous prosecutorical misconduct of the current DOJ we saw with the Aaron Swartz case.

IOW, Gibson was never found guilty of any "crime" ... damned Uncool of you to say so.