Hello friends, just to let all of you know that neither myself or the other mods deleted the "Criticisms" topic. Members who start topics also have the option to delete their own topics.
Thanks Josh for letting us know. I'd just drafted a reply and when I went to post the thread had gone up in a puff of smoke!
FWIW, here's what I said, (though can imagine it's a bit like reading the punchline without the rest of the joke!)
The OP as I recall made a few comments trying to get people to set out their constructive criticisms of things they disliked in the Taylor range and thought could be improved, which I thought was a very good idea. The one that caused most response was the general assertion that Taylor guitars were overpriced, bringing a lot of replies arguing that Taylors were very fairly priced compared to the main competitors in the US, but the OP was rather vague as he didn't really spell out overpriced in relation to what.
Re pricing, my response was to ask the OP where he (apologies if it was a she!) was posting from, as there were a few references in the posts to the UK. If so, there may well be a case to be made that Taylor's are overpriced in an overseas market compared to local alternatives because of the import tax structures. For instance, in Australia is a Maton or a Cole Clark better value than a Taylor or a Martin? All of these guitars will be subject to a price jump once they're exported, so you'd arguably get much more bang for your buck buying locally. You may agree or disagree re specific guitars, but clearly a discussion of pricing internationally is not the same discussion as an internal comparison of US brands (which in any event will all remain comparable to each other value wise whether exported or not).
I think specific prices aren't allowed here so I'm trying to stay general, however it's very easy to google and see how much Taylors cost in the UK, every dealer has the same price. It looks like a lot of the sales in the UK are made online, they're not particularly widely distributed there and I doubt that prices are particularly negotiable. Check out the UK cost of an 814ce and you may be surprised (don't forget to multiply the figure by 1.6 to convert to USD).
http://www.dawsons.co.uk/taylor-814ce-electro-acoustic-guitar-naturalThe OP then went on to specifically compare the pricing of the 814ce to the 414ce Ltd (with EIR and CV bracing)... he was arguing it was basically the same guitar without the fancy inlays, and therefore the 814ce was very highly priced. The EIR model was basically a special edition of the 414ce and it was presented as this, rather than as a pared down 814ce. Of course Taylor aren't going to draw attention to the fact it lacks the gloss finish, abalone inlays, fancier bindings, tuners and presumably higher grade tonewoods and workmanship on the 814ce, they're simply going to introduce it as a special edition of the 414ce. Curiously, the prices on these 414ce Ltd's was actually less in the UK than on the standard 414ce models, which I suspect wasn't the case elsewhere - and that would make the price differential between the 800 series even more pronounced.
Finally, he also expressed a dislike for the tone on the Koa Fall Ltd's, as well as a dislike of the Dreadnaught shape, but this provoked fewer responses, and given that there's a considerable demand for both in the marketplace and that all the major manufacturers provide them this seemed to be a moot point.
Apologies to the OP if I've misrepresented things - feel free to correct me. As I said earlier, I think it's very worthwhile to open topics of this nature.
