CCD versus Custom Shop and CLF

[FZTNT]

Couple of questions for the G&L folks.

The Custom Creations Department, or CCD, is now making high quality custom guitars in the same fashion as Fender's Custom Shop. I know they have been designing various limited edition guitars ever since the 1998 ASAT Clasic III. They already had a logo that said G&L Custom Creations, basic looking but tells the correct story. Now it appears as if the logo says G&L Custom Shop in an inlaid piece of wood with an oval surrounding the words. It looks real nice and is a special way of applying a logo. My question is, why call it Custom Shop on the logo instead of Custom Creations? I was under the impression that you guys typically try to get away from any Fender similarities when you can. I have not seen the new certificates that come with these guitars but the old ones had the CCD logo on them. What's the deal?

Also, will there be another "Brand" called CLF Research, as in the new Skyhawk? This would end up with three sub-brands under the G&L umbrella?

Thanks for the answer,

Tom

[Danley]

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Looks like CLF is getting treated more like a series than a brand? At least the CLF instruments are getting back to more unique G&L styling (away from Fender,) even if 'Custom Shop' is a name associated with Fender at the same time.

[yowhatsshakin]

As I understand it, the Custom Creations Department (CCD) has ceased to be, is a stiff one, has gone up to meet its creator, is pushing up daisies, pining for the fjords, etc. ...

Mainly because, as Dave McLaren stated already in 2015, the dealers considered it to be the Custom Shop anyway. So it seems they finally bit the bullet and changed the name with corresponding change in logo. Compare this:

with this:

So the CCD, and especially its Limited Editions, started with the ASAT 'Classic III' in 1998 and effectively ended with the Savannah Collection in 2013. If you want to access the old CCD webpage, go here

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https://web.archive.org/web/20170813142835/http://www.glguitars.com:80/instruments/USA/customcreations/index2.asp

The term should therefore not be used anymore. I have no knowledge whether other Collections will be created by the Custom Shop in the future; for now it seems they are focussing on one-offs. Maybe that is where CLF Research comes in although otherwise those instruments seem to be "ordinary" production models mixed in with the other production models on the G&L website. The fact that CLF Research is just indicated by the extra phrase in the serial number seems to be another indicator of the above. See CLF Research more as G&L's Reissue line of instruments, just like Gibson's RI instruments which in their case is something separate from their Custom Shop too and falls more in line with ordinary production models.

- Jos

[FZTNT]

This is an EX Parrot!

[Aetrox]

Thank you for the link to the old custom creations dept. I really wish there was a catalogue of the projects they did. On a personal note I always felt that the CCD was one of the things that made G&L special. It was an outlet for designers and engineers to 'play', try out new things and create some very cool limited runs of stuff that may not have ever gotten to market in the first place. I hope that under the new model, we will see the guys at G&L getting to have to opprotunity to create some more limited runs like we did in the past.