Its time to start recycling....great guitars!

You may think dear readers that a huge 9.6% slump in Japanese factory output announced today would have little or no effect on the world of guitar. But think again that factory output includes the factories that make many of the guitars imported from the Far East, South Korea and China are showing similar if not quite so bad figures. This means only one thing, global trade is starting to dry up as the recession/depression bites. I am not saying it will be as bad as the 1950's with trade barriers and high import duties, but neither will there be a free flow of goods between nations. At the moment this is due to supply chain corrections where dealers don't order from distributors and so on back to the factory gate. So get used to looking at pretty much the same stock on dealers walls until this recession sorts itself. Until then I foresee much of the trade as being in second hand guitars, swaps and trade ins....second hand goods always sell well in times of recession as people "cut their cloth". I foresee guitars coming out of private collections and from under people's beds. What will be interesting is what prices they realise when they do actually appear.