String Trials, a question for the whole TB community

[Champagne]

I have been thinking about this for about a month and wanted to ask everyone here.

1: If I put together a monster collection of strings and made them available for tryout so people could find "their sound" using a selection of strings, would people be willing to pay a fee to do so? $x per string/$x per set, etc.

2: If yes to question 1, how much would you expect to pay for a string trial?

When you put a number down, realize that strings wear and tear being on an off basses and the collection will have to be refreshed from time to time.

3: If yes to question 1, would you be willing to pay up front the full cost of the strings you are renting and once I receive them back, receive a refund of it less the rental fee?

4: How long of a trial period would you want?



I do realize of that if someone wanted the entire collection of strings, it would be quite a lot of money. Singles or sets would be available. When you receive the strings, there will be a return mailer included for sending the strings back, so all you would have to do is drop them in the mail box or post office. Larger collections would be covered with shipping insurance.

This all came up because I have dumped about a grand in strings recently. If this service was available, I could have saved a lot of money and found my sound preference with separate string/manufactures or even full sets.


Curious to your thoughts/concerns and feedback.

[Champagne]

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[Champagne]

2nd place holder for developments

[Champagne]

99 views and not a single response.



I really thought DB string searchers would be interested in this.

[Eric Hochberg]

I thought about doing this at one point. While it could be useful, there is a pretty good market here on talkbass for selling used strings, so it kind of takes care of itself in that way. I thought the logistics of the back and forth rentals would get pretty tiresome...

Give it a shot, see what happens!

[Chris Fitzgerald]

Originally Posted by Champagne

99 views and not a single response.



I really thought DB string searchers would be interested in this.

Great emoticon! you have to be more patient with the DB forums - they move a lot slower. Probably because everybody is so old. You also will find that a lot of people have already done their string searching, found the string they want to marry, and gotten on with it (this is the case with me and a few others I know of around here). However, there will always be people closer to the beginning of the journey who might be interested in something like this, so by all means, go for it.

[mjac28]

It sounds like a great idea "NetStrings"?

[Eric Hochberg]

Originally Posted by Chris Fitzgerald

you have to be more patient with the DB forums - they move a lot slower. Probably because everybody is so old.

I resemble that remark...

[Champagne]

Thanks for the flood of responses.

The hunt for strings for me was gruesome for one of my basses. My other bass, when I was at my luthier's joint buying it, we went through a lot of strings and came up with my personal set which wound up being 3 different brands/brand types. The bass that was gruesome I did on my own and even after I read up here on all the ones I wanted to try, I found when I bought them and put them on my bass, they did not resemble what I read very closely, so off to buy, wait, try, take off, buy a different set, wait... and so on. To have a boatload of strings to swap around in one fell swoop with a fraction of financial investment for personalizing your sound in relation to the response of the bass... I will keep an eye on the used string sales here to see if I can cover the costs of putting this together and maintaining a system of operation.

I'm getting the back end of this all together and the vision Netstrings may totally come together.

I am very interested in what people would expect to pay for this type of service along with my other questions. That is the biggest deciding factor if I am going do this. If I cannot cover the overhead as well as a little for my admin time, I probably will not do it.

Now the other idea I had was a user to user DB community service but there are a lot of wildcards to that other idea that could bring a quick death to it. I'll write about that another time, but it has to do with a DB string registry maintained by each user of the service. Not that I am a control freak, but counting on users to keep up with that and their own personal part may be tough since we all can get pretty busy and fall behind on things. It would be a spiderweb of strings instead of a central location.

[hdiddy]

I think it's an interesting idea but pragmatically not that feasible. Strings are way too expensive and some won't hold up to repeated stringing and restringing without losing life (Animas come to mind). Most strings take about a month or more to actually settle in before you really know what it'll end up sounding like. And then even longer for the sound to develop further (my Spiro Solos are a great example - it keeps getting better month to month). And then you get wishy washy users (like those who want to stray from Spiros) who keep going back and forth and can't make up their minds about what to use. And then theres quibbling about what gauges to use, what to mix and match from different string sets, etc. etc.

Don't forget that people have different body chemistries... some folks will eat through a set of Spiros in a matter of months because of the sweat from their hands.

In my own string search, I've spent at least $3K if not more over an 8 year period. $1K is just the beginning. The Gamut expedition was pretty expensive, and although I don't use them anymore, highly valuable experience.

Your competition in terms of feasibility is the open market. I can get used strings fairly quickly and if I take good care of them and they're in demand, usually I can recoup much of my costs back. It's amazing how fast some of the strings get exchanged here.

Also, I do like having my own collection of strings. I've found that I like to match strings to the tension of the bass. If the tension changes, I'd go back to the collection and pick a suitable string. It's what happened recently on my bass and why I went to Spiro Solos. It helps to have those strings immediately on hand.

[Treyzer]

This little vid has been making the rounds. Apologies if you've already seen it, but it is perfect for this Quest For Strings.

http://youtu.be/Ol0tFSl50VU

[TroyK]

Originally Posted by hdiddy

I think it's an interesting idea ...

Your competition in terms of feasibility is the open market. I can get used strings fairly quickly and if I take good care of them and they're in demand, usually I can recoup much of my costs back. It's amazing how fast some of the strings get exchanged here.

Also, I do like having my own collection of strings. I've found that I like to match strings to the tension of the bass. If the tension changes, I'd go back to the collection and pick a suitable string. It's what happened recently on my bass and why I went to Spiro Solos. It helps to have those strings immediately on hand.

I agree on these points. I'll add that we've done this through the classifieds both for passing things around for a few bucks, trading and in a few cases even indefiniate loans. One great member sent me a box of G's with a note that said "send them back when you're done or if you really want to keep something, we can talk about it". I've done similar things for members known personally and not to me.

Locally, John and I have loaned strings, quivers, etc. Most of it, went back to the original owner, some of it found a new home.

I'm reformed and landed with some stuff now, but in the height of my addiction, I might have subscribed to a netflicks for strings, if it existed, but I wouldn't need it now, even if I was looking to experiment.

[bribass]

Interesting idea...sounds like a lot of work.

[Champagne]

Sorry for the late response. I was away in SF for a number of days. Looks like I will hold off. Thanks for the feedback.

[johninmemphis]

Also been thinking about the same - the newbie pack for $60 that has two each G and D strings to try - and the $120 pack with 2 E and A strings. Decent used strings to begin with that are not returnable.

[johninmemphis]

Probably a different slant on your original post though

[Champagne]

A little different, but very similar. Perhaps this isn't a dead idea. ( write this as I am about to buy yet another set of strings LOL)

[iiipopes]

Basschat.co.uk does this with Innovation strings.