Sign Of The Times? Whats Happening?

Taylor recently announced a new SB line, G&L has announced the Korina models which are a group of several types of styles and Fender just announced the American Tele 69 Thinline Reissue. I find the Fender announcement especially interesting in that they have been targeting there Mexican (Road Worn) Japan (Pawn Shop) and lower American Special series. This Tele Thinline is basically a reissue of a 69 Tele, and is a chambered, Mahogany f hole version with the F tuners and 7.25 radius neck. I would see it as similar to a chambered, f hole ASAT Classic without any options other than color. There are only two colors. These things are going for $1700 on line at all the stores. I could understand an American Thinline with some modern updates such as locking tuners, maybe a 9 in radius neck option and possibly a humbucker option. This seems like a very narrow market to me especially considering that the Thinlines are represented in the Mexican build. It would be highly unlikely for me to pop for one of these as It is very limited, no options. I understand that it is a reissue but this is pretty pricey for the platform. I guess it would be the cats meow for someone looking for that particular configuration. Am I warped in my thinking? I do own many Fenders and they are almost all American models. But this seems like such a narrow marketing strategy in todays world.-- Darwin

Hi Darwin,

Nothing wrong woth your thinking. I agree the market will be narrow. But these marketing guys at companies always want to create buzz. So you throw in a 'new' model. i.e. it might be a reissue or a slight variation of an existing model potentially tied to some star's 'favorite' model, just to create buzz and get your name out. And many times it is nothing more then that. It is for us consumers to figure out which instrument is actually worth playing and which not. Oh well ...

- Jos