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What is your opinion of Musician's Friend online store

#81
bass4u said:
Just wanted experiences or opinions of this online retailer. Recently I made two separate purchases from them and was quite pleased.
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I haven't purchased anything from Musician's Friend for close to 15 years or so. So my opinion of them isn't very current. I recall finding their service and prices to be "adequate", but nothing to get excited about.

For at least the past decade, my go-to online music gear retailer has been American Musical Supply. In my experience, their inventory has been every bit as good as Musician's Friend, and their service probably better. And since they're just on the other side of the Hudson River from me, I receive my purchases within one (1) business day via UPS Ground - as opposed to nearly one calendar week from Musician's Friend.

That said, all of the major online music gear retailers tend to specialize in brands that are toward the lower end of the price/value continuum. So if my tastes run to anything higher end than Hartke or Squier, I've gotta go elsewhere anyway. :hmm:

In recent years, I've found both Amazon & Sweetwater Sound have been able to fill that gap rather nicely... :cool:

MM
 
#82
MysticMichael said:
I haven't purchased anything from Musician's Friend for close to 15 years or so. So my opinion of them isn't very current. I recall finding their service and prices to be "adequate", but nothing to get excited about.

For at least the past decade, my go-to online music gear retailer has been American Musical Supply. In my experience, their inventory has been every bit as good as Musician's Friend, and their service probably better. And since they're just on the other side of the Hudson River from me, I receive my purchases within one (1) business day via UPS Ground - as opposed to nearly one calendar week from Musician's Friend.

That said, all of the major online music gear retailers tend to specialize in brands that are toward the lower end of the price/value continuum. So if my tastes run to anything higher end than Hartke or Squier, I've gotta go elsewhere anyway. :hmm:

In recent years, I've found both Amazon & Sweetwater Sound have been able to fill that gap rather nicely... :cool:

MM
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MF is good with stuff like Fender and Ampeg..
 
#83
cr250_977 said:
I have been ordering through MF for years.. No problems. Only gripe I have is it seems like 80% of what they sell is always excluded from the discount codes....
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afzoomie67 said:
Yeah, it seems like what I want and have enough money for at the time does not get included in the sale. It's like "Noooo! :scowl: " cause then it's full price.
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Have you guys tried giving us a call? Those manufacturers have chosen not to participate, but we will do what we can to help.

I fear I may be treading close to breaking TB's CUP, so if you have any further questions on exclusions, shoot me an email at [email protected] and I'll do what I can to clear up any confusion.
 
#85
Every time that I have tried to buy something online and enter a discount code I get a message that says, "the item that you have selected does not qualify for a discount".
That really pisses me off. Also, they now charge tax for purchases shipped to California. That pisses me off more.
 
#86
Bongolation said:
I used to buy a lot of gear from them -- hundreds of orders, many thousands of dollars. I no longer do.

Shipping is uniformly the slowest off the mark in the industry. It may take three business days to get the thing into UPS's hands.

This was even before Mitt Romney's Bain Capital Holdings bought Guitar Center, Inc., which owns MF, M123, etc.

Everyone I knew who worked for a Bain-acquired company told me that was bad news for customers and workers.

It was.

Service has drastically deteriorated, prices have gone up, discounts have gone down, sales and blowouts have drastically become fewer and less impressive, they've screwed up and made themselves subject to collecting California sales tax, etc.

Worst is their new policy of free shipping on nearly everything, which means they dilute their profitability by shipping small orders at (or near) a loss rather than by giving lower prices and big sales on the major items.

They've lost ~95% of my business in the past few years. :hmm:
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Okay, if it is true that Bain Capitol owns these companies then I will not spend another penny with them.
Zip, nadda, done, over, forget-about-it!
 
#88
I just bought a new sub for our PA from Sweetwater. They had a demo in stock, so I saved about 15%. 5 minutes after ordering online I get a call from my "sales engineer" double checking all the info, that I'm aware it's a demo and there will be a few scuffs, shipping address, etc. Ships free, ordered Tuesday, arrived Thursday (today) at 2 pm via Fedex Ground.

Last thing I ordered from MF was a guitar strap. Took 6 days to arrive.
 
#89
cr250_977 said:
I have been ordering through MF for years.. No problems. Only gripe I have is it seems like 80% of what they sell is always excluded from the discount codes....
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Must have jinxed myself.. Order arrived yesterday. Ordered 2 sets of strings(Elixir @ 38.99 a pop) + a double gig bag. Only one set of strings was in the box. Box was undamaged & still sealed. Called CS and was told they will have to do an inventory check and get back to me. We will see what happens.....
 
#91
wong99 said:
Every time that I have tried to buy something online and enter a discount code I get a message that says, "the item that you have selected does not qualify for a discount".
That really pisses me off. Also, they now charge tax for purchases shipped to California. That pisses me off more.
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I never shop online with MF, by just going through their website. I email them at the forums address, and they give me the most unreal deals.

I do agree that the advertising of 15% off on "selected items" is stupidly frustrating. Thus why I avoid MF's website ordering.
 
#92
staurosjohn said:
I have ordered from MF, Sweetwater, GC, Zzounds, Music 123 & a few others... while Sweetwater has the best 'customer care, my experience is that MF (Chris) is, ny far, the most willing to accommodate my needs (returns & pricing deals).
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SW has great cust svc, but sometimes it's a little much. I bought a strap from them, and every now and again, the same sales guy calls me at various times of the day and night to see if I need anything. Feels like I'm being stalked...
 
#96
cr250_977 said:
Must have jinxed myself.. Order arrived yesterday. Ordered 2 sets of strings(Elixir @ 38.99 a pop) + a double gig bag. Only one set of strings was in the box. Box was undamaged & still sealed. Called CS and was told they will have to do an inventory check and get back to me. We will see what happens.....
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Shoot me an email at [email protected] with your order number and I'll make sure we get this taken care of ASAP.
 
#97
staurosjohn said:
yea... I went thru the SW 'stalking' phase... it actually did curtail sone of my purchases from them... but once my 'personal' salesman realized he wasn't retiring on my business... he now just sends generic emails... it was a bit weird- at first...
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That's not a problem with my particular SW rep. He's only really called me maybe once after an order and maybe once again some months later. The calls were few and far between. Certainly nowhere near as many times as others here have said.
Maybe I got a Sweetwater equivalent of a slacker, LOL.
 
#100
"Sweetwater stalking" pretty funny but in a way has a ring of truth to it.
They are nothing compared to IT industry companies. I run the IT dept of a small division of a very large company. My budget is modest (about $175k for everything non payroll next year). But I get hammered by cold callers or follow up calls daily because our parent companies name is like blood in the water.
But back to sweetwater. I actually dig that their sales staff know what the heck they are talking about.
Nothing scotches a sale for me so fast than an overeager sales guys shooting himself in the foot with an ignorant comment.
SW guys have music gear trainings they do, and it seems to help.
They also do that 3 pay or 6 pay plan similar to AMS. And I really like that they dont use stock photos for guitars/basses. That is why they and basscentral get almost all my online bass buying money. I like to SEE the actual bass if I can't play it!

MF, I always resent "deals" that are just the regular street price with an inflated MSRP.
MSRP: $124.00
Your Savings: - $25.00
Free Shipping on Orders over $49
Your Price: $99.
Dude, nobody has paid over $100 for a 58 in the last 20 years!
Sure plenty of other businesses do the same. But IME GC and MF are the kings of this.
They even put some of these in their sales flyers and "stupid deals of the day".
That stuff worked in pre-internet days when only nerds like me had the prices of everything memorized, but smart phones are ubiquitous now.
 

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