This is pointed at GHS Official. I'm not shooting the messenger, but I do expect him to forward my criticisms upstream to management.
My folks have had a variety of businesses, large and small, for a century. They all did well, irrespective of the type or time of the business, because they all studied how to market it properly, irrespective of season, the economy, or any other factor. There is only one reason that the strings were discontinued. It's not because they didn't sell. They didn't sell because they weren't marketed properly.
For example, my favorite that got discontinued, the .138 Super Steels regular long, is about the perfect B string to match conventional 34-inch scale, top load bridges without binding at either end for about 80% of the five-string basses that are out there, irrespective of the brand or gauge of stainless roundwound used for the EADG, and the string has consistent tone and tension to match with most stainless steel .105's, or in GHS case, also their .106 stainless roundwound E string.
If all the great things about this string were marketed, along with putting it in a set of .045-.105 instead of the wimpy .121 or .126 that is only good to use as a garrote, then it would still be on the factory line.
The same goes for the .135 & .136 Progressives, which are about the best round non-stainless wrap B string out there. But because they weren't marketed, company management gets the chicken and the egg turned around and we all starve.
Yes, I am angry. But I did manage to find a half dozen of the .138 Super Steel singles, which should last me about a decade. Then I'll think about using something else if GHS doesn't start making them again in the meantime, which they should.
Just like the century old rivalry between Ford and Chevy, D'Addario, as opposed to GHS right now, does market their strings and puts the odd gauges in sets, and has been reevaluating their sets in the past few years. GHS hasn't changed their sets makeup (except for the short-lived B-52 Boomers, which needed to go away) since I started playing guitar in the mid-'70's (Well, they do have a few more Boomers guitar sets, including those with wound 3rds instead of plain so I don't have to custom order guitar G strings anymore, but I digress). Currently, I'm using flats for a bunch of things, including my favorite, the new Fenders. But I don't like the Fender B string, either, and D'Addario is marketing the packaging off their .132 Chromes B string, which is a great string. It's not going to be discontinued anytime soon, because they include it in their Chromes 5-string sets. It is what I have on now, and it goes well with Chromes otherwise, as well as Fender Flats and the GHS Precision Flats.
Marketing. It's all in the proper marketing. GHS used to be the best at it, especially when Progressives were introduced a little more than twenty years ago. I remember when they were new, and I could get singles, and my Rick 4002 has worn nothing but them in 45-60-80-105 since there were Progressives to purchase.
Did I say proper marketing and reintroduction of the product? The recession is over. Time to start marketing.
Marketing. Proper marketing.
