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Topic: Melobar Guitars returns for one more try |
Jim Frost
From:
Mahomet, IL
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Posted 28 Oct 2007 5:33 pm |
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Once again, I’m trying to resurrect Melobar Guitars. The company has been through several fits and starts over the last 6 years, but hopefully (prayerfully), I’ve learned from my mistakes and the mistakes of others. Ted Smith is also back on board with me. To let everyone know what’s happened in the last 4 years, here is the short version. Ted had shut down Melobar, but later brought me in to get it restarted. In the process of finding investors, we found a group in Sweet, Idaho who were interested in keeping production there to help the community. There was one catch—they wanted to own the company, so they bought it with a contract to retain me for sales and distribution and retain Ted on a consulting basis. Unfortunately, they spent a lot of money but never got production back up before running out of funds. So my wife Carrie and I bought the Melobar name and all of its designs an intellectual property in addition to the unfinished products in inventory. I the last six months, I have been able to persuade Ted to join me, and we have a handful of instruments Ted built from the existing parts inventory. We will be taking this slow and not trying to jump start production on a dozen products at once like the last attempt that failed. For now we are producing the Rattler and the Teleratt, in addition to restoring a handful of relics we found in the barn.
I apologize for all of the missed phone calls and emails. It’s hard to keep up with it when you don’t own the company and haven’t been paid. Now that we own the company, we have had to put all of our attention on figuring out a viable business plan. We have just turned the phone back on this week for the first time in over a year. Ted has also requested that Carrie and I handle all of the communication duties as he wants to make steel guitars but not answer the phone or email.
I thank everyone on the forum for the patience and goodwill shown to Melobar through all of these years. You are one of the major reasons we are doing this. We also want to be a part of the music. We don’t expect to get rich, but we do need to make a profit, which Melobar has not done in quite some time. We all have day jobs, so we won’t be able to answer every phone call immediately. A lot of emails and phone calls have been missed, but now we are set up to answer them (and we finally have some product). We will sell our product in our ebay store: www.stores.ebay.com/melobar-guitars. The website should be back up in a few weeks, and we hope to put up some of the old songbooks and tunings for the old instruments. I all goes well, we will be introducing some improvements on previous designs, and a couple of new lap steels.
Sorry for the long post, but I wanted to set the record straight. Thanks to all and stay tuned (pun intended).
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Don Fox
From:
Idaho, USA
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Posted 28 Oct 2007 5:41 pm
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| Hey Jim, best wishes from a fellow Idahoan (and melobar owner)! What do you call the snazzy model in the picture? |
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Jim Frost
From:
Mahomet, IL
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Posted 28 Oct 2007 5:47 pm
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It sure hurts to reread my post with all the typos. And I'm an English professor!
The model shown is a Teleratt and is not on sale on ebay. |
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Jim Frost
From:
Mahomet, IL
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Posted 28 Oct 2007 5:48 pm
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| Just another typo for fun. It is "now" for sale on ebay. |
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Will Houston
From:
Tempe, Az
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Posted 28 Oct 2007 9:12 pm
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| Glad to hear your back in business, I'm a Melobar owner. I keep checkin the website every so often to see if your back, in fact I just checked last night. Best of luck to you. Will |
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Jeff Strouse
From:
Jacksonville, Florida, USA
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Posted 29 Oct 2007 12:54 am
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Great news and best wishes! Please keep us posted!  |
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Gary Boyett
From:
Colorado
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Posted 29 Oct 2007 3:42 am
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As a long time Melobar owner tis is good news. I knew sooner or later you would get back open.
My Melobar has well over 100,000 miles on it from traveling during my work. It has been x-rayed more than Frankenstein (Halloween reference) 
The link did not work but I did find This Melobar
Isn't this the same guitar in the picture?
Welcome back. Please keep us in touch as you get things rolling again. |
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Jim Frost
From:
Mahomet, IL
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Posted 29 Oct 2007 4:57 am
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Hopefully this link works: http://stores.ebay.com/Melobar-Guitars
And yes, that is Ted's first Teleratt in a few years. It was made with left over inventory parts, so it is not entirely representative of what is to come (we trying out laser etching for the fretboard for new models). It does have the very unique Teleratt sound. We are also working on a Stratoratt and a Ratt Paul. My goal is to bring as many guitarist over into the steel world as possible. |
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Hook Moore
From:
South Charleston,West Virginia
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