Jol's Website

[gorch]

Greg would never tell us that he'd sold the kit to Jol, would he?

[Siaip Ciuvas]

I guess all those turned downed customers who tried to make something Jol didn't like can have a revenge. 20K$ and Jol has to play your game

[jisham]

I guess all those turned downed customers who tried to make something Jol didn't like can have a revenge. 20K$ and Jol has to play your game

Nah...I think the best revenge is seeing the current people at Hamer cranking out some of the coolest custom orders we've seen to date now that the TRIBE (guess he forgot to trademark "guru") has left the building.

If I had $20K dedicated to custom guitars, I'd spend it all at the Hamer Custom Shop and get a few cool axes.

[Siaip Ciuvas]

Jaye - your option is good if you want guitar. My option is good if you want Jol dance to your music

[jisham]

Jaye - your option is good if you want guitar. My option is good if you want Jol dance to your music

Ah, true. But we're assuming spending $20K with Jol actually means the customer gets to drive the process. He certainly hasn't worked that way in the past.

[gorch]

...He certainly hasn't worked that way in the past.

Doesn't want to in the future either as he told us in his blog.

[Jorge]

At least, finally..... he went for a better looking headstock.

You mean the Gustavsson headstock?

Looks like a $20k Samick to me...

Maybe.

Still better looking than Hamer´s. He was Hamer´s Design Director, therefore, he was responsible for that. Even if he did not design it, he kept it all along.

[BCR Greg]

This thread is very interesting and confusing to me, so many contradictions and much speculation.

Jol and Paul share a vision and start what becomes Hamer guitars.

The guitars are well received and generate a fan base. (Us in many cases)

Jol and Paul cease to share the same vision and split. 3 sides to every story and I don't really care!

Frank U has entered the picture as a partner along the way.

Hamer continues to grow and by the mid 90's is making the most guitars ever in it's existance.

Somewhere in there Kaman buys Hamer and Jol leaves from 93-97, perhaps because his vision isn't

shared by Kaman

Jol is asked to come back and head Hamer and it's new vision, a smaller company with fewer products and

and a higher standard of luthiery.

It's generally recognized that the New Hartford Hamers are the best guitars they have ever produced and

l

....and Jol tells me at the NAMM show one year(after Peter Wolfe tells us that the whole run of $30k PRS Dragons sold in one hour) that Hamer should be looked at like PRS. Over the next several years, the price is raised 10% TWICE A YEAR. I asked Jol why(as the customers started falling off due to the increased pricing) and he told me "If you ask a lot for a product, the public knows that it's worth it". Hamer list prices NEARLY DOUBLED in 10 years.

Nope.

That ain't good designin', hoss.

[Siaip Ciuvas]

yep - you can't just rise the pricelist price without driving perceived value up.

[specialk]

....and Jol tells me at the NAMM show one year(after Peter Wolfe tells us that the whole run of $30k PRS Dragons sold in one hour) that Hamer should be looked at like PRS. Over the next several years, the price is raised 10% TWICE A YEAR. I asked Jol why(as the customers started falling off due to the increased pricing) and he told me "If you ask a lot for a product, the public knows that it's worth it". Hamer list prices NEARLY DOUBLED in 10 years.

Amazing. Just shake-your-head amazing at that statement from Jol. With Hamer's lack of advertising and lack of strong endorsers/players over that time frame, charging through the roof isn't gonna fly, even with Hamer's commitment to quality.

Best of luck to Jol in his future endeavors anyway.

[ArnieZ]

This thread is very interesting and confusing to me, so many contradictions and much speculation. So here is some more

Jol and Paul share a vision and start what becomes Hamer guitars.

The guitars are well received and generate a fan base. (Us in many cases)

Jol and Paul cease to share the same vision and split. 3 sides to every story and I don't really care!

Frank U has entered the picture as a partner along the way.

Hamer continues to grow and by the mid 90's is making the most guitars ever in it's existance.

Somewhere in there Kaman buys Hamer and Jol leaves from 93-97, perhaps because his vision isn't

shared by Kaman

Jol is asked to come back and head Hamer and it's new vision, a smaller company with fewer products and

and a higher standard of luthiery.

It's generally recognized that the New Hartford Hamers are the best guitars they have ever produced and

Jol takes credit for the designs of the guitars.

During this period Hamer is able to sell every guitar it can produce and custom orders can take up to 6 mos

to complete.

Hamer continues with it's poor marketing and fails to capture it's market. The cost of the high quality of the

guitars makes it nearly impossible to make a low cost guitar profitable.

Hamer discontinues some of it's lower end offerings because they are not profitable and prices continue to

rise both at Hamer and across the industry.

FMIC buys Kaman, they really don't care about Hamer, it's just part of Kaman. We all know change is coming

and are fearful of what will happen to Hamer.

The economy tanks and Hamer sales decline. It was generally rumored that Hamer in New Hartford never

made a profit. I don't know

Hamer "announces" that will will be a custom shop only, no stock guitars.

Jol leaves the company, not by his choice. (from what I gather)

Some of the HFC rejoices in his departure because he ruined the company and now it will morph into something better.

So here are the contradictions and questions.

Were all the decisions Jol's alone? What about Kaman and FMIC? Does Frank U, who I like very much, get a pass because he was not the face of the company?

Does the founder/head of the company not have the right to change his vision? Chvey doesn't make Bel Airs any longer and Ferrari doesn't make Testarosas any longer.

We're upset because we loved the HFC gatherings so much and they discontinued them. Shouldn't we be grateful that they had them at all. Was it Jol's decision alone to discontinue them? Was it his decision to start them?

We're happy that now that Jol is gone Hamer is more open custom orders that were refused in the past. Are we certain that the refusals were all Jol and they were purely whimsical? Is it possible that there were other reasons at the time the decision was made? If Hamer is not going to accept the custom orders they are receiving what will they do? They are a custom order shop ONLY now.

We're angry that Hamer wouldn't build some of the guitars we wanted but why did we want Hamer to build them? Because Hamer was making damn fine guitars and we knew they would do a great job.

If we are going to place all the blame on Jol for Hamer's failures should we not then credit him for all it's successes. When the team wins the coach gets a lot of the credit and when it loses takes a lot of the blame.

I won't be buying a Dantzig design guitar, can't afford it and my playing certainly doesn't warrant an instrument of that cost. I wish Jol the best in following his vision and hope he is successful. We've yet to see what his instruments will be like. I won't criticize his targeted market or his design aesthetic, there is plenty of gear out there that is costly and doesn't appeal to me but does to others.

Just my 2 cents worth that nobody asked for on a coffee filled morning, hope I didn't make you gag !

ArnieZ

Deleted the first post cause I wasn't done rambling and didn't know the partial was posted!

[serial]

I find this whole thing a bit interesting and even more amusing. If a guitar "builder" or "designer", whatever he is at the moment is photoshopping pics of himself spraying an already finished Tele body (of which there are countless precut and prefinished ones on the market on any given day), how would I, as a potential consumer, have any faith that he's doing $16-20k worth of work on a guitar? After my extremely poor experience with the sham artist known as "Revelator", I have less trust in someone who claims to "hand build" any Fender clone. It puzzles me that Jol would have used this as a selling point on his blog-especially a faked shot.

[hectorp]

Chris Herman is FINALLY getting the pink fuzzy Hello Kitty-shaped Eclipse with the little red heart inlays and the Wonderbar?

All is indeed right in the world...

I know....after years of being told "No."

Soon it 'Twill be a good day

[BCR Greg]

Oh, yessssss.......

[HamerHokie]

I find this whole thing a bit interesting and even more amusing. If a guitar "builder" or "designer", whatever he is at the moment is photoshopping pics of himself spraying an already finished Tele body (of which there are countless precut and prefinished ones on the market on any given day), how would I, as a potential consumer, have any faith that he's doing $16-20k worth of work on a guitar? After my extremely poor experience with the sham artist known as "Revelator", I have less trust in someone who claims to "hand build" any Fender clone. It puzzles me that Jol would have used this as a selling point on his blog-especially a faked shot.

All I care about is that he's able to chrome plate it and etch in a picture of a naked woman.

[MCChris]

From Jol's Blog: "For the most part, I view lingering in the past as a cry for help"

I highly doubt it, but maybe it's possible that folks like Jol and the Guitar Aficionado crew have conducted extensive market research and determined that one can indeed tap into a lucrative customer base by being an arrogant, abject prick.

[Lockbody]

That kind of attitiude reminds me of a friend who once mentioned he wanted to open a coffee house up that only served the coffee "he" liked to make, which was frankly undrinkable due to how strong he made it.

He to this day wonders why all present that day laughed in his face and told him to save his money

[elduave]

From Jol's Blog: "For the most part, I view lingering in the past as a cry for help"

I highly doubt it, but maybe it's possible that folks like Jol and the Guitar Aficionado crew have conducted extensive market research and determined that one can indeed tap into a lucrative customer base by being an arrogant, abject prick.

You know he was taking a swipe at Hamer with that remark since I'm sure he sees that they are now building the classic guitars he refused to.

I perceive the Jol quote as a swipe at some (most?) of the HFC community. That's some pretty heady shit to put out there.

[jwhitcomb3]

From Jol's Blog: "For the most part, I view lingering in the past as a cry for help"

I highly doubt it, but maybe it's possible that folks like Jol and the Guitar Aficionado crew have conducted extensive market research and determined that one can indeed tap into a lucrative customer base by being an arrogant, abject prick.

You know he was taking a swipe at Hamer with that remark since I'm sure he sees that they are now building the classic guitars he refused to.

I perceive the Jol quote as a swipe at some (most?) of the HFC community. That's some pretty heady shit to put out there.

Particularly from a guy pretending to spray a Telecaster.

-Jonathan

[Devnor]

Ya'll are really beginning to sound like a bunch of crybabies. It's just a picture and to someone without an axe to grind its just a pic of a guy spraying a guitar. That's all. Jol tried to elevate the brand past the three fiddy crowd, alienated some customers and was shown the door. Now he's got his own thing & clearly doesn't need to earn a living or sell a single guitar. If anything the HFC comes off a pricks for shitting on everything about a website & business in development without even seeing a completed instrument. Funny thing is if Jol builds a guitar for Tipton this forum will collectively blow its wad. Flame on.

[elduave]

Yeah, my mascara's running.

Ya'll are really beginning to sound like a bunch of crybabies. It's just a picture and to someone without an axe to grind its just a pic of a guy spraying a guitar. That's all. Jol tried to elevate the brand past the three fiddy crowd, alienated some customers and was shown the door. Now he's got his own thing & clearly doesn't need to earn a living or sell a single guitar. If anything the HFC comes off a pricks for shitting on everything about a website & business in development without even seeing a completed instrument. Funny thing is if Jol builds a guitar for Tipton this forum will collectively blow its wad. Flame on.

[BCR Greg]

Funny thing is if Jol builds a guitar for Tipton this forum will collectively blow its wad. Flame on.

I won't blow a wad.

He can do what he wants.

I have gotten some pretty strong emails....let me say that I like Jol as a person. I miss our phone calls(we talked more about cars than guitars), but I do not miss his constant use of the word "no".

Things that I asked for and was told NEVER....

*Chambered guitars (read his copy about the chambers after he started doing it)

*TonePros (my buddy Dwight owns TP and gave me a care package to bring to CT on one of my many trips.) I handed the stuff to Jol and he handed it back. "Our guitars don't need this stuff, they are good enough".

*Stain finishes (Black Trans is stained, as is Root Beer, Jol has blasted me about staining as "cheating")

*Inlaid logos (when a $300 Epi has an inlaid logo and a $3k Hamer has a decal.....)

*Sustain Blocks "If you want them so bad....YOU make them"

*Juniors

....and plenty more.

Jol is free to have the company that HE wants, now. THAT was the issue....not that we consumers wanted Hamer to be different; JOL wanted Hamer to be different from what it was.

Power to him.

I just got ordered some amazingly cool guitars that were not possible a year ago. MY customers win.

[burningyen]

Leather jacket aside, I don't care if it is waterbased clear-where's the damn respirator?

The spray's no doubt been 'shopped in, which adds to the overall asshattery on display in that image.

How sure are we that it's been photoshopped? I would've thought those kinds of shenanigans would be beneath Jol. Maybe he's spraying it with some kind of coolant to artificially age it?

[MCChris]

Ya'll are really beginning to sound like a bunch of crybabies. It's just a picture and to someone without an axe to grind its just a pic of a guy spraying a guitar. That's all.

It has nothing to do with being a crybaby or having an axe to grind. It has everything to do with having a low tolerance for bullshit. The maskless, designer-leather-jacket bit is beyond ridiculous.

[SteveB]

Jol obviously wanted to play in the small builder boutique market, which probably didn't play well as a component of FMIC's business plan. I wonder if they've considered trying to pump the brand up again, get some production guitars out there in the stores?