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Why are Alembics so expensive?

#84
smcd said:
Look...nobody, and I mean NOBODY who has a successful business runs it that way! Raising prices to control increases in demand??!! You can't operate a business that way! Think about it....you raise your prices in 2005 when orders are up, and when orders are down in 2008, you lower your prices. You further lower your prices in 2009, but with an uptick in business you raise your prices again in 2010. No one does this.
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Actually, lots and lots of businesses do this. Ever track commodity prices against the business cycle?
 
#86
Alembics have a pretty low resale ( as a percentage of the original price). I have owned one and loved it but could not justify owning a bass worth more than my car so i sold it. Luckily I bought it used and did not take the major hit in depreciation the original owner did.
 
#87
smcd said:
Sure it does. You just don't understand how much things things cost. Most Alembics don't run anywhere near $20k. The basses in that strata are fairly special. But let's do the math anyway:

How much labor is in a $20k bass? Remember that you have to pay someone for every minute he is rummaging through a pile of lumber, inspecting and comparing grain and color, etc. Given what a Series II looks like, is it plausible that it takes a worker 4 weeks of hand labor to build that bass from start to finish? You bet it is. There's $6.5k in labor alone right there. Hardware and electronics - another $1.5k? Now we're up to $8k just to build the bass. Overhead cost (electricity, heat/AC, taxes, administration, sales, marketing, etc.) - about 60%, so that's another $5k. Now we're up to $13k, and that's just to cover costs. Gotta make a profit, so tack on 50% and we're up to $19k. There you go. THAT'S how you get a $20k bass.
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Hey, if you like their flavor of Kool-Aid, have at it. I stand by my comment. By the way, I design and buy custom tools on a daily basis. Perhaps you are the one that doesn't know what it costs to make things.
 
#88
supremo said:
Are the materials? the woods? the building quality? the fame?
For example Warwick use similar quality woods but they are not so expensive as Alembic.
Also I can't understand why a second hand Alembic has so low resale value.
I have never played an Alembic bass. I'm thinking to get a used Epic 4.
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There are several reasons why Alembics are so expensive. People are willing to pay a lot more for a custom made bass. All Alembics are hand made to order. They do not mass produce for the purpose of having them stocked in stores. However, a store can request a build which they can then place on their sales floor. I have owned 3 Alembic Epics. When I bought the first one, I emailed Alembic for the build sheet and found out that it was actually made for a Guitar Center store. Epics are great basses and improved my playing a great deal because the clarity was such that I could hear every thing I played including mistakes much more clearly than with any other bass. As far as resale value, there really is a limited market for them when compared to mass produced instruments. This is true for many boutique manufacturers.
 
#93
smcd said:
It's simple - the longer it takes to build an item, the more that item will cost. A business has to pay employees to manufacture that item. The business pays them for every hour they work. More hours = more money = higher cost. Now factor in that Alembics are made in the USA, where salaries are - are you ready for this - 20 times higher than they are in China. That means that Squier, Epiphone, SX, et. al. are paying their workers $2/hr. salary and benefits, while it costs Alembic $40/hr. salary and benefits. Consider now that Alembics are entirely hand made, whereas the Chinese products are spit out using automatic machinery.

Now factor in the overhead. Alembic pays property taxes, workmans comp insurance, building and property insurance. They also have an administrative staff that gets paid around the same rate as the production staff. Now factor in the raw materials and electronics, which are MUCH higher quality than those on any Chinese bass. The electronics and hardware are proprietary, which means they are MUCH MUCH higher cost than what the Chinese are using.

And there you are. THAT'S why Alembics are so expensive. Resale isn't any worse than most high-end builders. In fact, resale isn't any worse than most non-Fender basses. It's just that when you take a 50% hit on a bass that costs $11k, it's more noticeable than when you take a 50% hit on a $1.5k bass.
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Yep.

Alembic does things their way.

I'm certain they could pattern their basses and do a lot of the work on cnc machines, out-source electronics and hardware and have them manufactured to their specs, cut their production staff and benefits and move out California and reduce the costs of their instruments by quite a bit...but that's not what they do.

They're great people and they build great instruments, but they're not for everybody.
 
#95
IMO they're amazing and I'm very happy to own one. They have a unique voice, yet they're incredibly versatile. Their quality is as close to flawless as it can get.


No, they're not for everyone, yes, they're very expensive, -especially if you're the original owner of the instrument.
 
#96
smcd said:
I own and operate a manufacturing operation. You don't know what you're talking about. Trust me on that.
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I'm an artist and artists do not "manufacture" their works. You don't know what you are talking about. Trust me on that.

The cost of a Ritter has everything to do with the name of the artist on the headstock and nothing to do with manufacturing formulas for costs, salaries, materials, etc. Wrap your head around the idea that a piece of canvas and some tubes of paint can "manufacture" a product selling for a million bucks. What's your "formula" for that? It's about whose name is signed down in the corner.
 
#97
smcd said:
My old Spolier. I wish I could find a photo of the control cavity.


img2075b.jpg
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Holy **** that thing's awesome. I think the Spoiler is the best of the body shapes. You could always find another.
 
#98
Alembics are more expensive because a) of the craft involved in building them, b) the proprietary electronics of the highest quality, and c) the popularity of the brand. Meticulous craft commands a high price, and when you're a company with a 50 year history of doing this, people who want the "best of the best" will be checking you out.
 

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