• TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
    Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
    Join free Log in
    Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.

Fender closing Genz Benz and SWR??

#3
SWR has already been placed on the shelf next to Sunn. Neither brands sold well enough to keep themselves alive. Genz Benz is alive and well. They will continue to reinvent themselves and revamp their product line to stay competitive.
 
#4
Linnin said:
SWR has already been placed on the shelf next to Sunn. Neither brands sold well enough to keep themselves alive. Genz Benz is alive and well. They will continue to reinvent themselves and revamp their product line to stay competitive.
Click to expand...

The Genz Benz brand is done. In talking to a retailer this weekend, I was informed that Fender put Genz on the shelve some time ago.

Go look for their products on major sites. Most will show out of stock.

This was sad news to me considering I love my Genz Benz products. Ive met Jeff and toured the Scottsdale facility. He's a stand up guy and was very proud of their amps.

Fender will honor the warranty on the remaining Genz products.

I am going to purchase a Shuttle 9.2 before they are gone forever.
 
  • Like
Reactions: BackToTheGroove
#6
Buy the competition and shut them down.....maybe thats the logic for FMIC? I cant understand why you would buy a brand like SWR or GB only to dilute it with FMIC's ideas and techniques, loose money, and then sell it. Why not just let the companies be who the are, and run independent of themselves....but then just make the money off them??

Auto manufacturers do this kind of crap all the time. Look what GM did to Saab, Ford to Volvo, and Chrysler to MB.....just dumbed down the brand, tarnished the image, and ruined quality.
 
#7
g4string said:
Buy the competition and shut them down.....maybe thats the logic for FMIC? I cant understand why you would buy a brand like SWR or GB only to dilute it with FMIC's ideas and techniques, loose money, and then sell it. Why not just let the companies be who the are, and run independent of themselves....but then just make the money off them??
Click to expand...

That's what FMIC did with SWR for the last decade. Some companies can't get their act together no matter how hard a parent company tries to make them profitable. Fender does not have a history of purposely running brands into the ground as a way to eliminate the competition. They DO have a history of buying brands on the cheap in hopes of earning some money off of them. It doesn't always work.
 
#9
My thought has been this: Fender has been slimming down their amp section over the last year or so and has settled on having a low cost set and a high end set. They want, and likely need to diversify to keep the company totally solvent (not saying "doomed" just afloat and happy). The best way for them to do this would be to expand on their amp offerings, get some good mid price stuff in there and add on to or improve upon the current offerings with the GB tech. They've done an amazing job of restructuring their instrument lines over the last year or so by covering just about every conceivable price point and with some different models as well to get people interested and paying attention to them. They've also cracked down on quality issues and gaps as well it seems.

So if they want to do this right and step up to what should be their intended competition of brands like GK and Ampeg, they're gonna need to do it right and if they did indeed hire some of the big techs from GB (read that somewhere on here) and let them do their magic they might just be able to. They've shown that they're much more capable and open to listening to their market recently so I'm hoping that that continues with this scenario as well.
 
#10
It didn't seem apparent to me that genz Benz was In trouble.

Companies absorbing other companies for the sake of improving their brand is not a new concept.

Fender amplifiers have improved greatly, but carry a stigma and don't tend to be the first choice when someone is in the market for an amp.

Maybe the technologies of the genz Benz amps will be used in a new fender line of amps. They do own it, why would they just get rid of it.?

Or was genz going down the tubes...I don't know.
 
#13
seansbrew said:
It didn't seem apparent to me that genz Benz was In trouble.

....

Or was genz going down the tubes...I don't know.
Click to expand...

It's just corporate machinations, nothing GB did wrong. They happened to be owned by a company (Kaman) that got purchased by Fender, and Fender's a big complicated company financially that sometimes needs to do things that don't make product sense.

Doesn't make it right, but it's just how the business world works.
 
#16
seansbrew said:
The Genz Benz brand is done. In talking to a retailer this weekend, I was informed that Fender put Genz on the shelve some time ago.

Go look for their products on major sites. Most will show out of stock.

This was sad news to me considering I love my Genz Benz products. Ive met Jeff and toured the Scottsdale facility. He's a stand up guy and was very proud of their amps.

Fender will honor the warranty on the remaining Genz products.

I am going to purchase a Shuttle 9.2 before they are goneforever.
Click to expand...


I bought one last night for $495 from the bass place. They only had five left. I've always loved my GenzBenz products. The items I fall in love with are the ones that never make it. :crying:
 

Latest posts

Top Bottom
Back