Part of Peavey's problem is that they were cheap when they started. Then the prices were low but the quality was much higher than competing products in the same price range. This was largely due to Hartley adopting modern manufacturing methods when the rest of the MI industry was wallowing in the '20s still. Peavey was the first US MI company to use automatic insertion of components into circuit boards. While Tapco, Fender, et. al. were having someone put resistors into a PC board with a pair of needle nose pliers, Hartley invested in a machine to put everything in quickly and accurately. He then paid that person to inspect each component before it went into the assembly line. That's just one small example, but it's the kind of thing that lead to them having some pretty sophisticated gear at quite low prices.
Another huge factor was that Peavey made things for a LONG time focused on the guy doing gigs at the local bar, not for stars. Add in that they offered some rather high-end features when few other companies were, and doing it at a price week-end warriors could afford you get a curious problem. Giving someone who doesn't have a clue about how to use a graphic EQ and an active crossover for the same price as a Shure Vocal Master or a Fender Bassman 135 lead to some really awful sounding rigs. Not because the amps etc. were bad sounding, but because they didn't work the way other stuff did.
So many people with those '80s Peaveys immediately drew a smiley face or a deep V on their graphic EQ and sounded bad. Or they cranked the knobs on the amps because that's what you had to do with a Fender. Except on the Peavey each increment made a big change. But the people hearing the bad sounding bands just focused on how many times they saw that awful looking Peavey logo and heard a bad sound.
Now that everyone in the MI industry has learned the lessons the Japanese TV makers taught Peavey, the price advantage isn't there. And he had to move production overseas to remain competitive in large parts of the market, parts that were the company's bread and butter.
It's good stuff. If you don't like the sound, that don't make it crappy gear. I don't like Ampegs at all (I know, TB blasphemy) and there're a lot of crappy sounding Ampeg rigs. But that's not Ampeg's fault, it's the operator.
John
John
. That's a serious wall o' Peavey!
