On roughly September 15th, 2025, G&L Guitars shut down operations on Fender Avenue. From what we understand, the entire operation — tools, machines, inventory — is being sold to a new owner. The persistent rumor is that the new owner is Fender (FMIC). If that’s the case production is certainly over at Fender Avenue, and if G&L is to continue as a brand, it will continue elsewhere. We certainly hope so as we love the brand, and know and respect many of the former employees of G&L. What follows is our observations on the past few years with G&L leading up to now, and discussions with past employees.

Since Leo Fender’s passing, G&L has been owned for many years by the McLaren family under the corporate name of BBE sound. We’ve been working with the company since 2010, and while G&L has likely never been highly prosperous, the post-COVID years seemed to be increasingly troubled. During the COVID era boom G&L could not build guitars fast enough, and we were waiting several months to receive guitar orders. This was due to both heavy backlog at the factory and component shortages. Product quality was still good, and COVID-era guitars were not lacking in terms of fit and finish. Like a lot of manufacturers, G&L caught up with demand just in time for it to crater. Customers bought “everything they ever wanted” during COVID and 2022-2024 were rough for a lot of manufacturers and dealers.

In 2019 before COVID hit, G&L Guitars released the Fullerton Deluxe series. These were “SKU” guitars meant for large retailers like Sweetwater that did not want to specify each guitar. It simplified ordering and manufacturing. But it also encouraged G&L to build for inventory rather than immediate demand such as a Build-to-Order guitar (BTO). Building to stock keeps the factory running, but if there are not orders on the books, it ties up cash and materials. BTO guitars are a form of “just in time” manufacturing, and every guitar has a buyer. No labor or material is wasted in tied up inventory. For the record, we rarely ordered Fullerton Deluxe guitars purely for the reason that it made no sense to compete directly with Sweetwater, Musicians Friend, etc. They are not any lessor in quality than a BTO.

Early in 2022 G&L started to “factor” their accounts receivables. What does that mean? Essentially, if UpFront Guitars bought a guitar from G&L, G&L “sells” the invoice to a finance company, and we would actually pay the finance company for the invoice based on our established payment terms. But G&L was paid right away by the finance company. This allowed G&L to get cash immediately, but naturally the finance company takes a cut, lowering the profit margin at G&L. How big a cut that is we’ll never know, but it was a sign that cash flow might have been an issue at G&L. Some of our internal contacts were highly negative regarding the finance company relationship, and that it was a bad deal for G&L. While it’s total conjecture on our part, chasing the big box sales with SKU guitars, building inventory, and factoring invoices could all be part of the same cycle. Big outlets like Sweetwater likely had favorable terms — and pricing — all which lowered overall profitability.

2023-2024 seemed in some ways back to normal with G&L. Hard cases were gone in lieu of gig bags, but the gig bag was not up to the price of the guitar. It got better when they went to the Protec Gold bag, but many customers saw this as a cheapening of the product (although the G&G hard case declined in quality and increased in price). But delays due to component issues started to crop up again. But this time is was not COVID, but more likely due to supplier payment issues.

From late 2024 to the last days if materials were available, we were getting guitars very quickly, and build quality was good. And G&L was happy to do special runs to keep the shop running. Such was the case with a small batch of SC-2 guitars made for us in late 2024. But in retrospect, this was likely a sign that there were not enough new regular orders to keep the factory busy. This past summer shipments started coming via UPS instead of FedEx (were learned that G&L got cut off by FedEx until they paid their bill).

Between 2024 and the end G&L released new models — 45th Anniversary Series, Rampage 24, Rampage with Kahler, JB MFD, Fullerton Standard — but in every case did not launch any consistent or sustained marketing effort. The first Fullerton Standard products came out only about 6 weeks before G&L closed. While conventional wisdom these days is that you can do a few Instagram videos and go viral, sometimes it’s good to get professional help.

And what about the recent tariffs? While tariffs are inflationary, they were not the straw that broke G&L. Some at G&L viewed the tariffs as helping them to be more competitive against imports from Mexico, China and Indonesia. The Fullerton Standard line was intended to be a “tariff beater” guitar much like the American Performer Tele. Imported content for G&L was mainly tuners, bridge hardware and some woods like rosewood. Tariffs would have a much greater impact on the Tribute line, but no more so than Schecter, LTD, PRS SE, etc. And if G&L had decided to raise prices $50-75 on the USA line, most customers would have understood.

In mid-September and without warning, G&L Guitars ceased operations. And there has still been no formal communication from the company. We had a dozen customer BTO’s on order at the time, and about as many BTO’s for our own store stock. Their future is uncertain at best and we are starting to return deposits.

The short story is that G&L likely ran out of money for good. Which is how most small businesses fail. G&L fans are justifiably upset at the prospect of what they see as Leo’s legacy dying, or worse falling into the wrong hands. Some also bemoan what they view as declining quality and lack of being “true” to Leo Fender’s innovations as the real downfall of the company. But I doubt changing to a four-bolt neck or sourcing hardware from Taiwan — like most companies — was the end-times. And if the G&L Espada was honoring Leo Fender, they should have spent the R&D money on improving the consistency of the existing products.

My own opinion — and everyone has one at this point — is that G&L tried to chase growth and volume but were not sufficiently capitalized to successfully pull it off. And the brand marketing or lack thereof never reached an audience large enough to support those goals. To be successful you need to know who your are, and how big you want to be. G&L Guitars was never going to be a big company: But they had Leo Fender’s signature, likeness, and late-career innovations that are virtually priceless in the right hands. We’ll see what the next pair of hands do with Leo’s legacy.

For those who follow the G&L brand, 2023 brings quite a few changes to their price list and available options. The new 2023 Build-to-Order and Custom Shop option books are now uploaded and available. We’ve recently updated our BTO wish list so please check out the latest updates at http://www.upfrontguitars.com/resources . So what’s going on?

BTO (Build to Order) – The BTO has been the Hallmark for G&L and pretty much was G&L did until the Fullerton Deluxe line and the Custom Shop came along. For 2023 it’s a good news/bad news story. The good news is that it still exists as it’s very rare to have any guitar company offer a build-to-order plan without entering some type of high-end custom shop environment. And while prices have gone up again to the tune of about 15%, the cost of certain options have been built into the price, or greatly reduced. Option woods like swamp ash are now only $75 instead of $230 like last year, and other option woods are no charge. Tinted satin necks are no longer an up-charge, along with pick guard pickup options and DFV/Saddle lock selection. So while the base cost of the guitar has jumped, there are fewer cost adders. Also all finishes are now available on all woods. You want Clear Blue on Okoume? No problem, and since Okoume is no longer an up-charge the clear finish is also no additional cost. Some combos may look funky, but that’s up to your and your dealer.

The bad news? Many options are no longer available such as block inlays, graphite nut, white and black plastic binding, and vintage frets. All those are Custom Shop only. Bizarrely, body contours, scraped wood binding, and any neck profile options are also missing. It does not make much sense that you can get a rear contour on a Fullerton Deluxe but not on a BTO. This is a subject of conversation with G&L by us and I’m sure other dealers. Many of these options are the press of the button on a CNC machine. We’ll continue to lobby management, but we’ll miss those block inlays.

Note: We have been entering orders with contours, wood binding and neck profile substitutions, and G&L is not pushing back.

Other points of note is that the RMC (rear mounted control) guitars are gone, along with the M-Series bass guitars. But on the bright side the Skyhawk, Skyhawk HH and Fallout bass are now official BTO guitars.

And finally, gig bags are standard, although the price for a hard case upgrade is only $100. Other companies have gone to gig bags quite a while ago, and eliminated them entirely.

Custom Shop – The popularity of the Custom Shop continues to grow, and lead times are now running 8-12 months and frequently longer. Which just proves that in this price range somebody always has the money. This year the Custom Shop adds a list of pre-configured guitars, and G&L hopes to build up a small stock of these models for buyers who want something nifty but don’t want to wait a year. Once we get the price list uploaded you’ll get a chance to peruse those. Prices are up, and the typical guitar is going to be in the $3500-$4000 range depending on options. Naturally, many buyers for the Custom Shop ask G&L to do something not on the price list, and that’s all subject to discussion with the factory. But our experience is that the farther you stray from the price book, the longer it takes.

The whole section on custom wound pickups is gone. My guess is that they still wind them in the Custom Shop (I’ve seen the equipment there in 2022) but they are standard G&L specification, and all the year-specific flavors have been eliminated.

Much to our delight the ASAT Jr. is one of the pre-configured models. We’ve always like this guitar and while we assume it has two P-90 pickups, the typically sparse G&L price list does not say much. The Rampage is back both as an option guitar and pre-configured, complete with Kahler tremolo. There is now an Espada HH, and the pre-configured model features the slick silver-to-gold flake fade seen around the time of 2022 NAMM. And all those RMC and M-series bass guitars can still be found in the custom shop. Other fun additions are that you can get a Tone Pros bridge on an ASAT or Doheny (we’ve been asking for the ASAT for a while), there are some new neck tint offerings, and Wenge is now available as a fretboard material.

Fullerton Deluxe and CLF – These are the guitars designed to keep the factory humming, and these “SKU” guitars with UPC codes are the meat-and-potatoes of Sweetwater and the other large internet retailers. Prices are up about 10% and while they continue to tweak the available colors, the typical offerings are intact. The big news is that the Rampage is back in single, HH, and Fishman Fluence formats. There is a new color called Purpleburst which we really like a lot, and as always G&L remains lefty-friendly with a good selection of models.

In the CLF world the Espada HH and HH Active also joins the price list. The Espada is a nice looking guitar and we imagine that G&L is wagering that people turned off by the look of the split pickups will be attracted to a more conventional HH format (and the HH is available in more finishes than the original model). Other than that, no big changes to lineup, although we really wish they would stop using that bar-type string tree, whether Leo thought it was a good idea or not. We’ve put more than our share of shims under the bar to get enough string pressure.

The Wrap – After two years of hot sales, price increases material shortages the guitar market is cooling off in a big way. Not because players are abandoning the guitar, but because with stimulus money many people have bought what the needed, wanted, or thought they wanted. And with travel/leisure wide open since mid-2021 consumers have more options on where to spend their money. This is true with just about every other musical product category. Now manufacturers are cutting models, trying to save cost, and simplifying their offerings. G&L is not immune to those pressures, but much of the line remains intact. And if you’ve shopped for an American Vintage II Fender — which has no options — the BTO’s are very close in price, and the Fullerton Deluxe very competitive. Our early experience with the Custom Shop was a bit rocky, but they’ve honed their processes over the past couple years and their recent work has been stellar. Nothing ever stays the same, but G&L has done better than most to stay true to their mission.

For many, that is an incendiary question; as for some players tube amps are the only way to amplify a guitar. But solid state guitar amplifiers have been around since the mid-60’s and sooner or later they are bound to get it right. And in many ways they have.

As with many guitar-related traditions that are considered sacred, tubes were not used because they were better, they were used because they were the only available technology. As technology advanced, amp builders quickly tried to employ those advancements, mainly to save cost. For example, once silicon diodes became affordable, builders used them to replace the tube rectifier. It saved a tube, and simplified the input transformer. It was not a matter of sounding better, and in certain circumstances it changed the sound of the amp. And if you wanted more clean headroom, it actually helped.

Amplifier designers came to understand what made tube amplifiers so appealing, and the challenge was to make a solid state circuit emulate tubes. Fast forward to the last few years and this has been pretty successfully achieved both through modelling (digital signal processing) or purely analog solid state circuits. The vast majority of players today would fail a blind test between a tube amp and it’s Kemper-modeled version. And if you think about it, your pedal board is most likely entirely solid state, and your distortion is coming from a saturated transistor, op amp, or clipping diodes.

While players of means may insist on playing a tube amp, many players on a budget simply cannot afford a good tube amplifier. But that does not mean they have to settle for bad tone. Tube amps are inherently more expensive to make, and dollar-for-dollar a new $500 solid state amp is likely better and more versatile than a new $500 tube amp (if you could even find one). At lower price points there are some hybrid solid state amps with a tube or two in the preamp section. Whether that makes them better than all solid state, at minimum it’s a good marketing tactic (“it must be better, it has a tube”).

In my view, solid state amplifiers have been quite good for years at very clean tones (think Roland Jazz Chorus, Blues Cube) or high gain (Peavey, Randall, Line 6, Hughes & Kettner, etc.). When it comes to high gain there are lots of ways to do a great job (like your pedals) without tubes. Where tube amps shine is that in-between world where it sounds clean, with just a little bit of pick-induced dirt, crunch or compression: All those intangibles that make people love tube amps. But solid state continues to get closer every day, and at minimum there are many solid state amplifiers that make great pedal platforms, where you can chase the tone dragon with pedals (at more reasonable volume levels too). And frankly attempts to make tube amps “do their thing” at lower volume levels (like attenuators) have their own sonic thumbprint that does not always sound particularly natural either.

Solid state amps will probably always have a problem emulating the edge-of-meltdown sound and feel of a small tweed amp from the 50’s. Those are incredibly organic, tactile little boxes that were a happy accident of early amp technology. But most people don’t want a little tweed: They have very little headroom and don’t handle pedals well. It’s a narrow segment of players that want that, and for them maybe it’s gotta be tube.

Aside from the obvious benefits of solid state: Weight, reliability, cost….they do have some inherently useful sonic properties: 1) They are less prone to have a sweet spot for good tone. Many tube amps have a “just right” place where they sound really good (Everybody has had an amp that sounded anemic at “2.5” but was too loud at “3”). Solid state amps tend to be more linear and don’t greatly change character throughout the volume control sweep. Most solid state amps also have active EQ controls that actually boost and cut frequencies. Most tube amps are passive tone controls that only cut frequencies (10 on the dial is wide open, and from there you are removing frequencies). Active EQ controls are just plainly more effective (just ask your bass player).

I’ve been hauling tube amps to gigs for years, but my last gig was solid state for a host of reasons: It was a multi band night where we had to move gear around easily (weight, size) the room was hard and reflective, and the active EQ made dialing in a difficult room much easier. Plus any edge that a tube amp may have in certain situations is often lost in a noisy club. Or when the drummer starts.

Solid state amplification is now a choice, not a compromise. There will be players — especially professionals — who will always play specific tube amps. In many cases it’s part of their image…and they have roadies to carry them. You could give Yngwie Malmsteen a Roland Jazz Chorus and a pedal and he would still sound pretty much like Yngwie, just quieter. Much of the tone is in the hands.

Regardless of technology, quality materials, design and construction matter the most. Tubes are not a guarantee of anything, and there are as many lack luster tube amps out there as there are solid state. My philosophy is to find an amp with a really good fundamental clean tone knowing that I will likely use pedals for everything else. If an amp does not sound good by itself, no pedal will ever fix that. If technology allows me to get the tone I want from solid state, why not?