We are getting ripped off!

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bobmyers

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OK, :(
Did I get your attention?
I just purchased (on ebay) from a music store, a brand new Guitar. A Seagull Maritime SWS Folk type guitar made in Canada. Solid cedar top and solid Mahogany back and sides. With hard case I purchased this guitar for less than $750 delivered. It is unbelievable in construction, materials , finish and sound. I have a William King tenor a Compass Rose tenor and a Kanile'a Super tenor, all cost a lot more than the Seagull and barely sound or look as good. I wish Seagull made ukuleles.
Really, I don't know how they do it. No cheap Chinese labor.
I paid $2000 plus for my King, both are hand made but value and quality are totally different. Quality I perceive as equal, value is no contest, Seagull wins.
I can't figure it?
Bob
 
I'm pretty sure Seagulls are chinese made. I checked out the website, a lot of asians working there! Just kidding. The key here is volume. Bigger market for the guitars.
 
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seagulls have always been a great instrument for the money. I used to own an S6 and it was great!
 
If they made Ukes it would be a high quality solid wood, very likely cherry, and sell for about $275 with a nice bag.....
 
Well, aside from the volume of business, you also have to consider that the Canadian dollar is low compared to the US dollar (works in our favor), plus cedar is cheaper than koa, and even though it's a beautiful instrument, that Seagull guitar is mass produced, while your Compass Rose and Kanilea have much more hand-crafting associated with them

Perhaps a better comparison would have been the Seagull to the Mainland or solid wood Islander.

I'm just saying ...
 
The CDN dollar is basically at par with the USD. Hey, I'm Canadian and take pride in the fact. :D
 
Some of the custom uke prices can buy a vintage brazillian rosewood acoustic guitar.
 
Great purchase Bob!

My first acoustic steel string guitar was a Seagull Maritime Mini Jumbo - Cedar Top/Mahogany Back & Sides. Great guitar!
 
I agree, I bought one ages ago and love it. Mine was the rosewood back and sides and ceder top. Mine also came with a LL Bags pick up.
 
I have heard that building a uke that sounds good is much more difficult than making a guitar that sounds good. You will always pay more for a custom anything over a mass produced instrument.

I own a Seagull Mini Jumbo and it is a nice instrument. Godin knows how to mass produce a nice product.
 
I wish Seagull made ukuleles.
You should email them and suggest they start building ukes. I'm sure a guitar company won't "rip us off". Just look at the reasonable prices of Taylor, Collings, Martin & Breedlove ukes.

Didn't one of the guitar company reps say that the uke was a quarter the size of a guitar and twice as difficult to make? Maybe that's marketing spin, but there might also be some truth in there.

Everyone is free to play either instrument and pay a wide range of prices for either instrument. I think others have pointed out that compared to many stringed instruments (mandolin, violin, etc.), ukes are relatively inexpensive.
 
I'm amazed at how nice my little $100 Kala laminate sounds. It's been my experience that an equivalently priced guitar is pretty much a clunker.
 
The CDN dollar is basically at par with the USD. Hey, I'm Canadian and take pride in the fact. :D

Well, we in the states are looking up at both the Australian dollar and the Pound Sterling, so it's not like the US can brag about its currency.
 
Are you seriously comparing a guitar to ukuleles? That's like comparing grand pianos to auto harps. Trying comparing your Seagull to a King or Turner guitar, that might be of more interest.
 
Maybe you are being "ripped off" in your ukulele purchases but not me. For example, my solid mahogany body, solid maple neck Bruko#6 exudes impeccable German craftsmanship for merely $228.93 shipped with a gig bag. Made in a family owned small factory in Germany. In every way it is the equal to your beautiful Seagull guitar.
 
Seagulls are great guitars but they really aren't quite in the same category as a Martin or a Taylor. I wouldn't hesitate to buy a new Martin or Taylor sight unseen via mail order - I've owned a Seagull and it was a great axe but I wouldn't order one sight unseen unless there was a fantastic return policy.

There is quite a bit of variation across the line, or there was back when I got mine (99 or 2000, if I remember right). I hit a number of music shops around the metroplex and played several S6 models before choosing one. All but one of them were very good value, but the "voice" was very different across the samples I played. One of them honestly shouldn't have gotten out of the factory. It had a very nasty rough burl on the fretboard up around the 12th fret that appeared to be unstable.

Back then the price for an S6 was about $300 US and I felt like I got very good value for my money. If I'd ordered via mail or the web and gotten that one with the gnarly fretboard it would have been a different story. :)

I kept that guitar for quite a while, gave it to my son-in-law for a while, then traded him a Taylor jumbo to get it back (the Jumbo was too hard on my hands). I gave it to a friend when I found out that she'd broken the headstock on her guitar (I'd purchased a Taylor 312CE by then so the Seagull was becoming a closet queen and was too nice a guitar to let languish).

John
 
I have two Godin guitars, a Simon & Patrick mini-jumbo acoustic and a La Patrie Motif classical. Both are outstanding and far exceed their price point, and I can only marvel at how they do it. I would love to see Godin try its hand at making ukes.
 
I consider your purchase to be just average value Bob, really. You're talking about a stock, factory instrument. 750 for a seagull...yeah, ok. Not sure how you can make a serious comparison in terms of value and quality when you're trying to make a 'look' and 'sound' comparison between a seagull guitar and a custom, hand built ukulele. They're different instruments mate, which look and sound completely different. I have a couple of custom ukes which were very expensive, and yet I consider them to be well worth the price in terms of both value and quality. Ripped off? Again, not sure where you're going with that, apart from making a facetious remark which is at best debatable, and at worst, offensive and inflammatory. You're talking about - in terms of both build process, sound and aesthetics - chalk and cheese
 
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