Not all Collings hold their value

[Markus]

ABmando, I did look and lust after yours ... but ended up going with a non-varnish/waverly version of that mandolin a week ago as it was hard to pass by a italian/birdseye MT2 at the price I got it at [less than the new MT at the local store]. It's hard to pass up a 65% discount off of new.

It is a great combo. Got it last Saturday and it has done everything I asked of it - negated the desire for a monitor at my gig that night as I could hear myself over the mix easily, it could cut through for bluegrass, sounded sweet doing solo classical at home, and rocked a firepit jam. Sweeter than adi but still seems to have all the headroom you could want.

To cap the whole thing, the morning after I got it my wife told me that the audible quality difference between this mandolin and my prior was clear to her. It's hard to beat an instrument upgrade where that happens!

Good luck selling yours. If finances were different I would have bought yours [and that J point Kimble in the classifieds, I've heard it played a number of times and it's an incredible mandolin].

[fatt-dad]

Thile plays classical on a bluegrass instrument!

I’d think an A5 suited to anything!

f-d

[Louise NM]

Thile plays classical on a bluegrass instrument!

I’d think an A5 suited to anything!

f-d

Or, Bill Monroe played bluegrass on a classical instrument. The F5 was developed long before bluegrass began.

[SincereCorgi]

I always look at instruments for their pro-rated cost/hr entertainment, if I think about the cost at all. Your Collings MT2, if sold today, cost you about $6/hr of entertainment if you played it 10 hrs/week X 25 weeks.

That's not too bad. I know plenty of people who dropped much more than that for an evening's "entertainment" at the tables in Las Vegas... or what about Greens fees at a fancy golf resort? Last mandolin I sold cost me $0.25/hr of entertainment value (bought used), and the MT2 I bought new and sold 10 years later was pro-rated at about $0.50/hr. I have taken bigger hits on some instruments, but look at those as the cost of education.

Glad I'm not the only one who is always thinking of my 'instrument per hour' price when I'm playing. I've got a weird old mandola and some other oddballs that are probably still around $40 an hour or something, to my embarrassment. They should have odometers.

[fatt-dad]

Or, Bill Monroe played bluegrass on a classical instrument. The F5 was developed long before bluegrass began.

Hence the absurdity of my statement. Sorry if I was too obtuse!

f-d

[Markus]

SincereCorgi, I do too.

I justified my mandolin upgrade thinking it was $10 per gig for the next decade - possibly much less. But that didn't seem like a lot to be playing a superior instrument.

[LadysSolo]

Glad I'm not the only one who is always thinking of my 'instrument per hour' price when I'm playing. I've got a weird old mandola and some other oddballs that are probably still around $40 an hour or something, to my embarrassment. They should have odometers.

Just be glad it's not a boat! The cost per hour of enjoyment (plus you have dock fees, and have to keep putting gas in them unless it's a sailboat) - I think we have very economical pleasures with our mandolins.

[allenhopkins]

Just be glad it's not a boat! The cost per hour of enjoyment (plus you have dock fees, and have to keep putting gas in them unless it's a sailboat) - I think we have very economical pleasures with our mandolins.

Someone described ocean yacht racing, as standing for days fully clothed in an icy shower, tearing up $100 bills.

Even my worst day playing the mandolin didn't approach that.

[illinoisfiddler]

See my mention of scarcity or particular desirability of a certain model. I am not sure that Ellis mandos are very common, hence the higher resale value.

[Mandobar]

See my mention of scarcity or particular desirability of a certain model. I am not sure that Ellis mandos are very common, hence the higher resale value.

Used a5 prices are around $4500 off the $6k plus new pricing. So the resale is about the same as Collings. A new f5 is around $12.5k with used prices between $9k to $10k. Ymmv.

[Mandobar]

So, a bit of an experiment coming up here, as Collings prices on new instruments are going up. The OP may well see the used value on his instrument rise as well.

After speaking to several dealers, if you are thinking about buying a Collings, new or used, now is the best time to pull the trigger.

[re simmers]

I bought a Flatiron F5 (Weber) new in 1992. I had no idea who Bruce Weber was. I bought for $1,800 including tax and case. I sold it in 2010, excellent condition, for $3,500. From 1992-2010 Flatirons faded and Bruce Weber became more well known. I had no way of predicting either event.
That’s probably the only time I’ve ever made money selling something. Unless my last name were Gruhn, I doubt I could ever make any money reselling an instrument in 2 years.
Bob

[Charles Kelley]

Actually, manufacturers DO have the "sole right" to set the price. They can, and they do. This does then 'filter down' (eventually) to the used market. Another example is the Kentucky KM1000. Just a few years ago you could buy brand new for $1100 or sometimes even less. Used examples could sometimes be found for $750. Street new price now is around $1800. Good luck finding a minty used one for $750 today. Nothing has changed. Same mandolin, but the manufacturer greatly increased the price and this had a trickle-down effect on the used market. Clearly we are talking about generally desirable and sought-after instruments here, not low-class junk than no-one wants to buy. As noted above, Northfield are another example of this.

The fact that there is a MSRP and a street price proves my point. The MSRP is the manufacturers "sole right" to set the price The street price is where the consumer set the price. Which one is the real selling price? If the manufacturer won't move from the MSRP, and the consumer won't pay it there is no sale. Who really sets the price?

This looks like disagreement about nomenclature. When almeriastrings uses the word "price" it seems he is using it to mean the amount of money a person says he will take for a mandolin. When Mandoplumb uses the word "price" it seems he is using it to mean the price at which a transaction occurs. And they are both right. The MSRP or quoted price by a manufacturer certainly has some effect on the psychology of the people involved in the secondary market. I agree with almeriastrings on that. The supply and demand curves dictate the price at which a good exchanges hands. I agree with Mandoplumb on that.

[Charles Kelley]

I wasn't going to comment on this thread until I saw your comment.

I won't say who I was working for, but it was a major Acoustic Retailer. A customer called in asking about a Collings Guitar, a custom order. If they paid in advance and didn't bug us, could we cut them a deal? He told me that the best deal that he could find was 10% off MSRP. I said that we could, thinking that a guitar all paid up front was worth a decent discount. The next day I was called in for a chat with the owners. Bill Collings had called, and they were informed of what I had agreed to, which was a discount of greater than 10% off "MSRP". I was told that Bill was irate and upset and told them that if they wanted to continue selling his products, that a 10% discount was the most that they were allowed to offer. I was new and didn't know better. I have a Collings Guitar. I had met Bill years earlier. When I re-met him I told him the story and he said that I wasn't the only one that he had to shock back to toe the line.

So, not really. In this case, Bill set the price and if you wanted to sell his products, you sold at his prices. I think that Collings Mandolins will "hold their value" in the long run, but if you purchase a new one and want to flip it the next year, you'll take a loss.

Yikes. Very few people with admit on the record to that. See https://dictionary.findlaw.com/defin...ce-fixing.html

[SincereCorgi]

Yikes. Very few people with admit on the record to that. See https://dictionary.findlaw.com/defin...ce-fixing.html

This is extremely common for musical instrument companies- they don't want their dealers to undercut each other and race to the bottom. If you don't sell at their price -- or at least advertise at their price -- they drop you as a dealer. This results in the current weird system where there's a silly 'retail' price, a 'street' price, and then a weird secret discounted price that only applies to old stock or maybe employee purchases.

This does sort of seem like price fixing, but so does the price of my dad's blood medicine, and I don't see anybody trying to police that.

[luthier88]

Yikes. Very few people with admit on the record to that. See https://dictionary.findlaw.com/defin...ce-fixing.html

Yes, well, Bill is dead so there isn't really a case there. In the Musical Instrument world it really isn't that uncommon. You create things and tell your dealers what to sell them for. If they don't want to sell them for that price, then you find someone else to sell your instruments. If you make good enough instruments, you won't have problems finding people willing to sell them for a price that you demand.

[fatt-dad]

Getting back to the topic. . .

Italian spruce? I sort of get sitka and red spruce. I have a redwood top mandolin. I have no ideas what to expect from Italian spruce? I guess unless you know about that tone wood, the subject MT2V is a bit of a mystery to many.

Now if that was red spruce, varnish, waverleys, wide nut, Collings? More folks would guess what it may be regarding sound. Just not sure about the Italian. . .

f-d

[Markus]

Getting back to the topic. . .

Italian spruce? f-d

Music Emporium has a `crazy bright' recording of a 2017 Italian topped MT2. IMO, all their videos sound super super bright [not sure that's the best way to feature a Collings which often lean toward bright] ... but I judged it based on that.

But your point is good - the differences in tone between Italian and others is not so well known or perfectly defined.

I tell ya, I really like the used MT2 with Italian that I got a week and a half ago. When I play it hard bluegrass it seems to hold together ala adi [and not get whompy like my sitka breedlove does]. It also seems to do really well at lower volumes, while I expected Italian to do well when turned up to 11 I really like it at low volumes too.

While there's a lot I've noticed in the past 10 days stepping up to a much better instrument, it's seems like a much higher level instrument has many more `gears' in terms of volume/tone than $1000 instruments - both a broader range and the ability to sound great at any level of loud/soft.

Where the Italian is in that equation is a question mark to me. If you want to send me an Engleman MT2, Torrified Sitka MT2, and Adi MT2 I'd be happy to compare them for you. I'm wordy, I'm sure I can find a lot to say lol

[Mandobar]

All of the top woods have different tonal ranges when paired with different varieties of maple for back and sides. Birdseye with Adirondack, Sugar Maple with Adirondack, Birdseye with Italian, Sugar Maple with Italian, Big Curl Sugar Maple like the OP's mandolin brings its own thing to Italian, etc. Tone can be shaped by many things, including strings and picks.