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Logistics - The Backbone of A Successful Enterprise

 
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alexkhan



Joined: 10 Sep 2004
Posts: 2783
Location: Chino, CA

PostPosted: Fri Sep 26, 2014 3:46 am    Post subject: Logistics - The Backbone of A Successful Enterprise Reply with quote

Okay, guys. This is going to be a long essay of sorts on the subject of "Logistics". Not an exciting subject for many people, I know. But being that it is my main area of professional expertise in the guitar industry - which includes my working relationship with the Aristocrats and Guthrie himself - I thought I'd share some insights and thoughts about it in a multi-part series for those who may be interested. So here is part 1. I'm just "improvising" here and am not sure how long it will be but here it goes!

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Whether an enterprise is a huge corporation or a small one-man operation or anything in between, logistics is the backbone that keeps things going. Great ideas or designs don't mean anything if the products or services can't be delivered to market and the customers in an efficient cost-effective manner and on a timely basis. Logistics (which could encompass sub-categories, fields, or disciplines such as supply chain, sourcing, transportation, inventory management, operations, distribution, QC, etc.), in my eyes, is about planning and execution. Whether it's high volumes of entry-level guitars for beginners, the release of a new Aristocrats album, the management of a big Aristocrats' tour or Guthrie's short regional clinic tour, these all require meticulous planning and then executing every process with precision and speed.

After 23+ years in the guitar industry, I've come to see logistics is really what I do best and want to continue doing. It's essentially what I was doing at Fender from '91 to '01 but I felt that I really needed experience in marketing and sales to understand the full scope of the business. So I dived headfirst into retail by starting the Tone Merchants boutique gear shop. People said I was crazy but I felt that I had to do it to experience retail first-hand. And then I met Guthrie in '04 when he did a clinic there and that certainly was a major turning point for me in more ways than one. I hooked Guthrie up with a few Suhr guitars and then I joined Suhr to run its marketing and sales.

So I toiled for 10 years in the boutique realm learning what marketing, sales, customer service, and artist relations are all about and it got to the point where I decided I had enough and it was time for a change. I was never quite comfortable being the marketing and sales guy who interfaces with the public. But I put myself through it to learn as much as I can because it helped me to understand the entire chain much better. There is no substitute for doing something yourself for certain periods of time. In this tiny isolated and quirky industry of ours, experience really is king. And connections... It was a way to connect with various dealers and distributors, music schools and institutions, the press (print and online), other gear companies, artists, customers, and fans in every corner of the world. It was a hard grueling decade but the payback at the end of it to move forward was worth it.

I made another bold (or crazy again as some people have said) change in my career to manage the Aristocrats, a new fusion supergroup trio featuring Guthrie, Bryan Beller and Marco Minnemann. Just like I did with Tone Merchants, I jumped into a field I had absolutely no experience in. I trusted my instinct and my ability in logistics to slog through it and see what happens. But, of course, I wasn't stupid enough to put all of my eggs in that one basket. I quickly came to see that it was too much of an uphill battle to book tours because I didn't have the connections in the music tour industry - the promoters, the booking agents, the venue owners/managers, etc. With this in mind, I got in touch with my contacts in the Asian guitar manufacturing industry and started consulting some large companies there on the side while continuing with the band management work.

At this point, it became all about doing good logistics work - whether it was the release of new Aristocrats albums through a broad distribution network or working with the massive guitar factories in Asia to help them improve quality and increase productivity. And as I delved into it, I thought "Ah~ this is good. This is the kind of work that I really should be doing. It fits me so much better." Again, my experience in the boutique sector only enhanced what I was doing for the factories in Asia. I started applying all that I learned the best I can to help the managers and workers there to understand what good quality is and how to achieve it. It's mostly about education and training. Most of them will never get what it is that guitar players need or want but some do.

It's how I communicate to them that matters. I can't go in there and tell them to do this and do that. I have to explain what it is that we are striving for and why. Very often, Asian manufacturers have the "know-how" but not the "know-why", if you get my drift. For instance, one factory manager asked me why there are different types of fingerboard radiuses. I answered in great detail and he nodded along slowly with much interest. He's not a player but he finally understood. It was the same for the type of magnets used in pickups, the material of the frets or the block in a tremolo bridge. I would demo the differences and they could barely hear any of it but some of them were getting it. "Ah! That's why..." Little by little, they were learning.

And I would talk to them about quality - the highest levels of quality... I explained the importance of symmetry, working off center reference points, and developing their eyes and the senses in their hands for what looked good and felt good. I've been doing this for over 3 years now (going there once every 3~4 months for 2~3 weeks at a time) at various factories and only now do I feel that they are really starting to get it and are making significant progress. Things are so much better now than when I first went there for the first time in nearly a decade around 4 years ago. If you want good consistent product out of there, you can't just give them a few drawings or samples to duplicate. You have to work with them every step of the way consistently and over a long period of time.

This is why large companies such as Fender, Gibson, Ibanez, etc. send a small army of people there on a regular basis for product development, procurement, and QC. It's also what I'm doing now at GC and what I used to do at Fender for a decade. It's what Apple and other consumer electronics companies do on a humungous scale in Asia. The guitar industry is a tiny microcosm of that or other large industries like apparel, textiles, machineries, auto, petrochemicals, foods, pharmaceutical, and virtually everything you see in Walmart stores and elsewhere in mass merchandising. Essentially, the guitar industry isn't much different from other industries - it's just a lot smaller and somewhat specialized, i.e. not many people are familiar with the products.

People often forget how small the guitar industry is or how big the rest of the world is. I deal with volumes that are in six figures per month with the factories I deal with and people would ask, "Where do all those guitars go?" Hmmm... Well, Apple is selling over a million phones per day right now although their annual average is less than half of that. And Apple's global marketshare for cellphones in units is less than 10%. So, yes, the world is actually very, very big. Travel around China and other parts of Asia for a while. Take a tour around Europe. It'd give you a different perspective. Heck, America itself is huge but it only makes up 4% of the world's population. But most people are like frogs in a pond that think the pond is all there is.

I admire people who are good at large-scale logistics but it's important in a small scale as well. I follow Apple very closely as a great case study in logistics management. I find Apple's supply chain management much more interesting than their marketing campaigns or even the products themselves. I used to be somewhat of a junkie but now the products are mainly information management tools - and I guess that includes listening to music, reading books and watching movies. I use them because they work good for what I do and help me be as efficient and productive as possible but that's the gist of it. The aesthetics are nice and all that but I'm no fanatic who'll stand in line for hours. But how this company does business - especially in logistics - is quite fascinating. I read up as much as I can about Apple's supply chain management in Asia and all the way through distribution throughout the US and the rest of the world. There is much to learn there that I can apply to what I do at GC and whatever else I'm doing. Innovation can be applied to logistics and supply chain management just as it can to designs and products.

End of Part 1 (to be continued...)
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Ed Yoon
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.strandberg* Guitars USA
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alexkhan



Joined: 10 Sep 2004
Posts: 2783
Location: Chino, CA

PostPosted: Sat Sep 27, 2014 5:47 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Okay, so here goes Part 2...

Logistics is driven by deadlines. It can be a new $100 guitar for Black Friday sales, new products for NAMM, a new album announced for a certain release date, or a major tour in Asia or Europe. Things have to get done over a period of time to meet the deadline and there is very little room for mistakes along the way. I manage numerous projects constantly. I've got over a dozen large projects in all of my jobs running concurrently and each one has a deadline. Some are short-term (over the next few months to a year), medium-term (1~3 years) and long-term (3~5 years). Most are short-term projects that need to be executed over the next year.

Once a project has been determined with a deadline, then it's about the allocation of resources (time, funds, labor, people, etc.) and then doling out who does what by when. I've got multiple Gantt charts and annual wall calendars stretching through all of 2015 and I'm already filling in dates for 2016. Logistics is about looking ahead as far as one can to plan and then setting things in motion to coordinate the various sub-projects so they all come together on a timely basis. Obviously, one has to be very organized and be able to multi-task constantly to pull off these things on a timely basis.

As a case study, I want to return to Apple. Apple's logistics is probably the best in the world right now. I'd say it's better than their vaunted designs, marketing or products themselves. Apple's logistics doesn't get much press because it's certainly not as glamorous but if one digs around enough (as I have!) through various business-oriented journals and magazines, there's plenty of material. To me, their logistics is simply breathtaking. I often try to imagine the sheer number of companies and people involved at Apple's HQ and in Asia to ramp up to producing well over a million iDevices, Macs, peripherals, and accessory items per day. The largest guitar factories I deal with may produce up to 1,500 guitars per day but that's tiny in comparison to what the likes of Apple and Samsung are doing.

Apple is the quintessential outsourcing company. The entire business model is built around doing the design, engineering, marketing, finance, sales, and customer service work in-house and have all the manufacturing done outside. Most of the guitars you see in music stores or online are produced in this manner as well. Major American brands like Gibson, Fender, Martin, and Taylor get most of the press and there are many other smaller manufacturers in the US but the fact of the matter is that - by units - a little over 90% of the world's guitars are produced in Asia. When it comes to consumer electronics, it's closer to 100% than 90%. I guess that's one thing electronic gadgets and guitars have in common: they're mostly made in Asia.

It's too simplistic to say that offshore manufacturing is all about cheap labor. It's also about the quality you get for the money, efficiency, productivity and the infrastructure already in place to produce the goods and get them shipped reliably and safely to where you need them to be delivered. Still, lower labor costs is certainly the driving factor. Jack Welch, the legendary former-CEO of General Electric, once said that the "ideal" company for him would be on a huge boat or a floating island that travels the seas looking for the cheap labor base. Once found, it would use that labor force for a predetermined amount of time and then move onto somewhere else.

But, as mentioned earlier, it's not just a matter of giving the labor force some drawings of the products and expecting them to produce 'em exactly as you want 'em. There is a lot of planning and training involved with the managers and the workers at the factories. A certain amount of resources has to be devoted to visiting the source on a regular basis. I'm sure that with an operation as large as what Apple is doing in Asia that they have hundreds of employees who are there full-time and they get rotated after several months of tour of duty.

It's a lot of work to keep track of what's going on at the manufacturing base. No matter how often I go there, I always feel like I could have used more time to address more issues. We have to remember that these factories also have their suppliers - lumber, components like fret wires, tuners, bridges, strings, pickups, etc. - and they have to coordinate with them for timely deliveries with acceptable QC. Sometimes the final buyer has to coordinate the product development with the factory's suppliers. Apple obviously has to do this with most of the components going inside an iPhone - the semiconductors, the displays, the cameras, the cases, etc. Foxconn is mainly a final assembler. Most of the stuff in an iPhone is produced by someone else.

With guitars, it's somewhat different. The typical OEM guitar factories in Asia produce the entire instrument from start to finish although the amount of woodworking they do varies from factory to factory. Some large factories start with huge logs of wood and prepare the lumber long before it's used for guitar production. Some factories only get prepared pieces of wood from their lumber suppliers - body blanks, tops and backs of acoustic guitars, braces, neck blanks, acoustic guitar bridges, fingerboard blanks, etc. These factories still have a lot of milling work to do but they're not having to cut and process the logs themselves. Inspecting the quality of the lumber and raw woods is critical. The kiln-drying process is also very important. Again, the processes vary from factory to factory, so I have to make sure they have the woods being prepared properly before they go into production.

There are guitar factories of all sizes, scope and quality levels scattered throughout Asia. Some are very small (less than a thousand a month), most are what I'd say are "medium-sized" producing 3,000 to 10,000 per month. The ones I categorize as "large" are the ones producing 10,000~20,000 per month on a regular basis. And then are the giants like Cort, Samick, and Yamaha who are well over those numbers per month. The PT Cort factory in Surabaya, Indonesia has the capacity to produce around a million guitars per year although their actual output is probably something like three quarters of that. I deal with them all - small, medium, big, and giant. Each factory has a specialty or a niche. Some only produce huge volumes of low-end acoustics. Some are just focused on midrange set-neck electrics. Some just produce archtop jazz guitars. A few make only bluegrass instruments like mandolins and banjos. So the buyer company has to visit all these factories and determine what to get from where for how much and what to sell them for.

For me, it's important to get to know all of these factories intimately to develop the trust necessary to work for a long time together. Just meeting the owners and the high-level executives isn't good enough. I need to go to the floor and work with the mid-level factory managers and the workers to really see what's going on and what the products are like as they flow off the line. I can never trust samples they fly over to your door. I need to be on the floor as the guitars are being produced. I need to know what the employee turnover rate is like. I need to know about the key personnel changes. I need to know what new processes they've implemented and what new machines they are using. I need to know what the local economic conditions are like and if the pay rate is competitive to retain the good workers. I grill the factory managers about these things constantly as I know these things affect the quality and productivity. I always enquire about the politics, culture, and socio-economic situations in each locale as well. I want to know as much as I can as it helps me to predict what will happen or, at the very least, be prepared and not get in a situation of being surprised.

And, that's really important in logistics and supply chain management: don't get blindsided by things you didn't expect. It's about predictability and have things running like clockwork. It's about being on top of the companies and the people who are expected to deliver on a timely basis with good quality at a reasonable cost. Again, they have to meet deadlines because I have deadlines to meet. I can't work with people who promise to do something and then fail to deliver. I have an extremely low tolerance for that. That's the main reason I found the boutique gear realm so frustrating. Talking about something and then not being able to deliver is simply the norm in that world. Imagine being a dealer who took deposits for some hot new products and then the manufacturer can't deliver and the customers are totally ticked off and want their deposits back. Been there, done that, and never again! Wink

End of Part 2 (to be continued...)
_________________
Ed Yoon
Certified Guthrie Fan-atic
BOING Music LLC - Managing Partner
.strandberg* Guitars USA
Ed Yoon Consulting & Management
Guitar Center Inc.
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alexkhan



Joined: 10 Sep 2004
Posts: 2783
Location: Chino, CA

PostPosted: Thu Oct 02, 2014 4:07 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Part 3...

Great time management is the key in logistics. When you really think about it, time is the most valuable resource of all - both professionally and personally. You can recover money or other material resources lost but you can't recover time. Once time passes it's gone forever. I always keep this in mind for all of my endeavors: don't waste time. This also means efficient use of time over a given project. If one has a project of 10 tasks with numerous sub-tasks for each, one has to understand that "Task B" can't be started until "Task A" is completed and so on.

I often imagine what Apple is doing with the release of each new iGadget - all the resources that go into developing it and how tight the deadlines must be for it to be released on a timely basis. The pressure and stress must be enormous for each employee involved from top to bottom. There can't be any screw-ups and each person needs to deliver by a certain date or he or she'll let the rest of the team down and have the project come to a screeching halt. This is the mindset I work with for all of the various projects I manage, whether it's a new acoustic guitar being developed for GC, a new Aristocrats album that's in production, or a Guthrie clinic tour that I'm arranging. And I can proudly say that I never missed a deadline. If it means I work until 4am, that's what I have to do get it done and I've done that more than a few times.

Planning ahead and being aware of all the contingencies - i.e. things that can go wrong or are unexpected - is extremely important. Things always do go wrong or not as you had planned. Whether it's the new iPhone, a new guitar, a new album or a new tour, time to deal with the contingencies must be planned. And when the unexpected happens, you have to know how to deal with it and then take care of it in a short amount of time. "It can't be done" is simply not acceptable. It's what I deal with in logistics for all of my jobs and projects. I try to anticipate the things that can go wrong and how I would deal with a particular problem that may arise.

Doing so means that you can't be in a catch-up mode. That's when things get overwhelming and makes people just throw up their hands. That's why I keep my email inbox at zero so I can think ahead and plan accordingly. Having things that are hanging and are overdue are a big distraction when trying to look ahead. I've seen and still see many people in my line of work who are always trying to just catch up and it seems they can never get out of that mode. What happens is that they'll just get stagnant and progress will cease. This is what needs to be eliminated if one is going to create, plan and execute for the future. It is indeed easier said than done. It requires self-discipline and the drive to get the job done effectively and expediently.

Bryan Beller and I talk a lot about the Aristocrats' business activities. Bryan is the manager of the Aristocrats and we talk or email almost on a daily basis about a variety of matters that need to be addressed. Most of those matters have to do with planning and how to execute with the future in mind. Arranging tours and following one through is a major exercise in logistics - from travel (transportation and lodging) and gear rental/setup to dealing with the venues and the press as well as supplying the tour with merch to sell, a big tour is a huge undertaking.

My main tool for managing logistics is the spreadsheet. Bryan and I are both Excel freaks and we are constantly exchanging spreadsheets going over various scenarios and making comparisons. I use the Excel more than any other app except for email. That goes for my work at GC as well for QC inspection reports and various statistical analysis work. I also act as the "CFO" for the band's record label business and do all the accounting work. I never would have thought that I'd "enjoy" this kind of work but I've become very good at it - even dealing with the IRS for all the tax-related headaches. But it all ties in with logistics and it's something I must do. It allows the guys to focus on what they do best - create and make music, in the studio and on the road.

When you're selling CD's and merch like t-shirts, dealing with the vendors and having a good grasp of inventory management is very important. You have to keep constant track of sales by distributor (including our own online store) and by SKU. You have to know the lead-times involved and order accordingly to order just the right amount to be delivered just in time so you can supply the distributors exactly when they need the goods. Again, good time management is the key. This also applies to the tens of thousands of guitars I deal with on a monthly basis. From the factories in Asia through QC inspection and setup in our distribution center to getting the guitars out to the stores just as they are running out of 'em, there is very little room for error. The key is getting things right at the source and I suppose that's my area of expertise - working with the vendors and communicating with them clearly so that the quality meets our requirements and the stuff is delivered on time. Whether it's a shipment of thousands of CD's or guitars, my objective and modus operandi are the same.

Managing tours is a whole different kind of beast although the end goals are roughly the same. Now you are providing a "service" (the shows themselves) instead of a tangible product like CD's and musical instruments. I jumped headfirst into the touring business when I became the manager of the Aristocrats back in '11. I went on tours of Far East Asia and of the US/Canada northeast that took many months to arrange and book. Tours typically take 6 months or longer to book completely. There are so many moving pieces that all need to fall into place neatly for a tour to take place. It's funny to read some emails from fans who would ask in midst of a tour, "Hey, I see that you'll be passing by my town in between city A and city B. Why don't you stop by on your way to city B and play a show here?" Sorry, things just don't work that way. Once a tour schedule is finalized it's set in stone. The only exception is adding a few more dates at the end of a tour but other changes are virtually impossible.

For me, it's very important to understand and be aware of the time length of a cycle for new product development and release (like new guitar models), new album production and release, and a new tour. Each one of these products or a tour means conceiving and planning 9~12 months in advance and then executing all the tasks in between flawlessly and on a timely basis. Then there are the bigger general goals and projects that fall under a larger umbrella of long-term vision. I've got a bunch of those going as well with the execution of certain tasks and jobs that may not produce tangible results until next year or 2~3 years down the road or even longer. And those long-term goals and projects need to complement the more immediate projects. For instance, Apple must have the iPhone 7 and 8 already in early phases of development implementing new technologies that are not yet available or in wide use.

I think along the same lines for what I'm now doing at GC, with the Aristocrats, with Guthrie, and my work with Strandberg. And, for me, they're all interrelated even though they're seemingly disparate and disconnected. They serve a bigger vision and goal of providing great music and great instruments that provide value and joy to the customers. I have the same amount of passion for providing the best sub-$100 acoustic for beginners as I do for a $4K Strandberg for a seasoned pro artist or discerning and well-heeled hobbyist. I still teach beginners, young pre-teen kids and teenagers and completely understand the frustrations they have and the challenges they face when learning to play. I apply this knowledge and experience at the factories to improve the setup quality so the kids can better enjoy the experience of playing the guitar. And working with the top pros is the same. It's about helping them achieve their very best with the tools of their trade.

End of Part 3 (to be continued...)
_________________
Ed Yoon
Certified Guthrie Fan-atic
BOING Music LLC - Managing Partner
.strandberg* Guitars USA
Ed Yoon Consulting & Management
Guitar Center Inc.
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alexkhan



Joined: 10 Sep 2004
Posts: 2783
Location: Chino, CA

PostPosted: Tue Oct 07, 2014 3:26 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Part 4...

I'm following Apple's rollout of iPhone 6/Plus and the logistics involved with a great deal of interest - more so than getting one myself. And what I'm seeing is that Apple's chief rival, Samsung from my homeland, is going to get crushed and will most likely not be able to recover its short glory run of a few years ago. Ultimately, Apple out-strategized Samsung by taking a long-term approach and leveraging its strengths (loyal customers, the timing of the upgrade cycles, its vast ecosystem, superior design sense and an unmatched logistics and supply chain operation).

I've followed the tech industry since the 90's the way NFL fans follow their favorite football teams and players. For me, the tech industry is way more interesting and fun than pro sports. In fact, I don't watch or follow any sports at all anymore. There isn't much to learn from it and I find the games utterly boring now. Believe me, I used to be a big NFL and MLB fan but the tech industry is so much more stimulating to the intellect. And it moves fast. And it's huge. It's like a huge elephant running faster than a cheetah. In comparison, the guitar industry seems like a slug crawling over a tomato plant in the home garden. Laughing

Kidding aside, I read a recent Bloomberg business magazine article about the gyrations that the Asia supply chain goes through when Apple ramps up production of a new iPhone. It literally mobilizes millions of people across the Asian continent as all the suppliers and sub-suppliers get in gear to meet the unprecedented demand. Recruiters and shady agents scour the entire continent hiring workers from the rice fields of Nepal to fly them to Kuala Lumpur to work on camera lenses that go in the iPhone. These agents "own" these workers and their passports until the production run is finished and that may take 6~9 months of 12~15 hour workdays with two off days per month.

I read some harrowing stories of what some of these workers have to deal with and it's a bit scary and sad. But the truth is that they're considered to be the lucky ones to find such jobs as they'd bring in many times more money than whatever they were doing before. There is a lot of criticism directed towards Apple about how the company uses "slave labor" while the company makes insane amount of profits but people who say these things simply don't see the big picture or have little understanding of global economics. The truth is that $1/hour in China is often worth a lot more than $10/hour in the US. In fact, the typical factory workers in China can save almost everything they earn because they are often housed and fed all three daily meals by the employing factories. They actually send their earnings back to their families and some even save enough over 5~7 years to start their own businesses.

Every Asian country has its own unique conditions that are unimaginable in the US or most western nations. So, to me, some Americans saying that this and that should be produced here in the US holds no water. The truth of the matter is that most American consumers don't want to spend more than $200 on a guitar - acoustic or electric. Units-wise, guitars at this price point make up the vast majority of sales. I work at GC and scour the guitar manufacturing base in Asia so I should know this. And it's not just guitars, of course. It could be some kitchenware you buy at the local Walmart, some stuff you buy at Costco or an iGadget you pick up at an Apple Store. People want to pay less for more. They want value and, ultimately, that's at the root of what's happened. Consumers want it cheaper and cheaper while demanding better and better quality.

It's certainly what I see in the guitar industry. The $100 acoustic and electric guitars of today (well, at least some of 'em) are way better than $250 acoustics and electrics of '91 when I started working at Fender. Not even close. Back then, $250 was considered the bottom of the barrel. Taking inflation into account, those "junk" guitars should be something like $700 now. Instead, we've got $100 guitars that are so much better. And, guess what... Demand for guitars (mainly the electric), year-over-year, is shrinking. No, this isn't the industry you want to be in if you want to make real money. There are many socio-economic and socio-cultural factors that drove things to this inexplicable business situation but that's another whole subject.

What I've seen over the past several years traveling to Asia and visiting various factories is that great quality guitars can be built virtually anywhere. World-class guitars are now being produced in Japan and Korea. The volume of such high-quality guitars is limited from a few smaller factories but I've seen them and their instruments. They can and they do make some great guitars - some that are as good as anything built elsewhere. It's really a matter of understanding the details and paying attention to them during the manufacturing process. There is no "magic" or "rocket science" involved. If the makers really understand what makes a great looking, feeling, playing, and sounding guitar, they can figure it out.

The problem there is that guitars aren't a part of their pop culture so very few kids grow up developing an interest in them - even in the well-developed, relatively rich and technologically advanced country like South Korea. There are many more who are interested than there used to be, say, 20 years ago, but compared to the US and EU, the number is quite small. Japan, of course, is quite different from Korea, China and the rest of Asia. Japan's guitar market is considered bigger than all of Europe combined. Again, it's a different national psyche and condition. I haven't been able to figure it out either - not that I really tried to or feel the need to understand why... The Japanese people love the guitar and I consider it a different market altogether from the rest of Asia.

For me, as a QC and logistics guy, it's about helping the engineers, the managers and the workers to understand the details that go into producing better instruments. Yes, I do a lot of training and conduct educational classes about what to achieve and why. As mentioned earlier, I want them to understand "why", not just "how". The way I look at it, even if only 1 out of 10 people get what I'm getting at, then it's a success. Then I can work with them to work with others who don't quite get it to bring them up to speed or work on finding more who will. And, little by little, I'd see improvements every 3~4 months. Those months add up and over the past three years, the improvements have been quite significant. The progress in quality has been very impressive and even some factories in China now seem only a few-to-several years away from achieving world-class quality status.

But, it takes a lot of work on my part. I need to go there every several months to measure the progress and give them directions on what to shoot for next. Once they reach a certain goal, I then set a higher standard for them to strive for and achieve within a designated time frame. It's not about eliminating obvious flaws anymore like pinholes in the finish or fret buzz due to uneven frets. That stuff just shouldn't happen even for $200 guitars. Now it's about making sure the pickguard is centered at the lower horn of the Strat body and that the frets are polished and that they feel silky when doing string bends. I stress build quality and attention-to-detail - all the stuff I learned in the boutique realm. From picking out the lumber all the way through the setup work and how often the packers are replacing their well-used polishing cloths, I'm looking over every little process and detail and emphasizing why that's important.

Our industry needs the younger generation to pick up the guitar and stick with it. That's the overarching goal I have - to get more and more beginners to develop the enthusiasm and, hopefully, passion for playing the guitar. It's a real uphill battle now because kids just don't seem interested or they give it a try for a bit and quit too easily and too quickly. I've been teaching beginner kids for over a year now and it's a constant revolving door because so many kids just give up after several months or less. And I often see some junk sub-$100 guitar they bought at a Best Buy clearance blowout sale that has some nut slots so high that it's painful for even me to press down the strings to the frets and it's no wonder. Kids just go, "Eh, I rather text with my friends and post photos on Instagram." And that kid who may have stuck with playing the guitar 20~30 years ago because there was nothing else to do and gone onto buy high-end guitars later on in life will never buy another guitar again in this era... Kind of a sad thing to observe...

But that makes me want to work harder and simply provide the very best instruments possible at every price point. And, if I have to, I'll work on weekends at the factories until well into the evening to help them get things right. It's what I've been doing for around 3 years now after deciding that managing a rock-fusion instrumental trio (no matter how good!) isn't going to leverage my experience in the industry at this point in my career. So I've found a way to do that part-time and balance that with what I do know and have a great deal of experience in. It's a lot of juggling (along with a family life) but everything little thing I do is fun, interesting and intellectually stimulating so I keep at it, which requires proficient logistics of its own. And that's a whole different kind of challenge - the logistics of managing different kinds of logistics...

End of Part 4 (to be continued...)
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Ed Yoon
Certified Guthrie Fan-atic
BOING Music LLC - Managing Partner
.strandberg* Guitars USA
Ed Yoon Consulting & Management
Guitar Center Inc.
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