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Dirty-South Blues Harp forum: wail on! >
Discontinued Hedrick Combs
Discontinued Hedrick Combs
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REM
217 posts
Jan 07, 2013
10:58 PM
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I've been thinking about possibly getting a custom comb for my 12 hole Marine Band 364. I decided to go check out the different options at the Hetrick site because I knew that they made combs for the 364 model, and they have(or I should say "had") a lot of different materials and color options available, plus they guarantee the flatness of their combs (which is good because flatness is the most important part of a custom comb, and yet there have been people who make/sell custom combs that don't put much thought or effort into achieving "perfect" flatness. Just doing a quick sanding on a flat surface isn't enough to ensure the necessary level of flatness, it can takes quite a bit of work and proper tools for checking flatness in order to get "perfect" flatness. Just because a comb looks and feels flat after you sand it, it doesn't mean that it actually is flat.)I got a little off track, sorry. As I was saying......
I'd used Hetrick combs in the past and they worked out well and they were an affordable price as well. But when I got to there website I was shocked to discover that they've stopped selling all the different comb materials except for bamboo!
http://www.Hetrickharmonica.com/harmonicacombs_s/1670.htm
You can still get their combs in some other materials, BUT only if you purchase it as part of one of their custom harmonicas. You can no longer just buy the combs themselves, unless you settle for the bamboo combs. Personally I really don't like Bamboo combs at all. Aesthetically, I don't find them appealing at all, I just don't like the look/color of bamboo combs (and being able to pick out a comb that you think looks good is part of the whole idea behind getting a custom comb, and it's one of the most important criteria I look for, next to flatness). The brown bamboo looks a little better (this my subjective p.o.v. obviously) but I'm still not crazy about it, I certainly wouldn't be willing to spend $28 on it.
I know some people absolutely love bamboo combs, but I'm sure even they would agree that it's nice to have other material and color options available. Even if I did like bamboo combs, I wouldn't want all my harps (or at least the ones with "custom" combs) to have only bamboo combs, I would want a variety of different materials and colors.
I guess I just don't understand their decision to discontinue everything except the bamboo. Part of what was so awesome and about Hetrick, and made them so popular, was all the different material and color options they made available, and now they've completely stopped doing that. This seems like it's simply going to cause a large number of their long time customers to switch their business to other custom comb producers. At least in my case, I plan on making all my future comb purchases from other comb makers, simply because Hetrick no longer offers any combs that I would want to use. Which is unfortunate, because I'd purchased quite a few great combs from them in the past, and now it seems I won't be doing business with them anymore.
It just seems like a strange business decision, especially when very recently they sent out emails adervertising the new comb materials they were offering. There was a lot advertising about them now being the first and only comb producer to use Evanswood, and they had quotes talking about how great it looked and what a great sounding comb material it is. And now after their Evanswood "release campaign", almost as soon as they made it available, they get rid of it, along with every other material except bamboo. It's just really unfortunate. I really hope they change their minds on this decision.
Last Edited by on Jan 08, 2013 9:32 AM
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harp-er
301 posts
Jan 08, 2013
6:24 AM
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Looks to me like they've decided to focus on Seydel "optimized" harps and Elk River "bluesified" harps.
Must be more money in those items. As for me, I'm glad they're still gonna make the bamboo combs. I like 'em.
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groyster1
2122 posts
Jan 08, 2013
6:31 AM
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hetrick bamboo combs are great...you would have a hard time finding better combs than these
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Seven.Oh.Three.
185 posts
Jan 08, 2013
6:33 AM
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http://www.genesisharmonicas.net/ I've bought custom combs from Randy a few times. He has lots of different woods and corian combs options. I've read many times over that his combs are meticulously checked for flatness.
7.o.3.
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HarpNinja
3072 posts
Jan 08, 2013
6:46 AM
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Here is the comment from the site:
"Dear customers, due to the overwhelming demand and labor requirements to manufacture DuPont Corian, Solid Surface, and Dymondwood harmonica combs, we are no longer able to keep up with individual orders. You may still purchase them in our harmonicas. Which includes:
· Pre-Built Optimized/Customized Harmonicas in our online store (when available)
· Personalized Custom Harmonicas made to order
A select number of approved retailers and customizers will still carry them in small quantity. We may also offer special promotional sales in the future. We apologize for the inconvenience. Thank you for your patronage.
Bamboo harmonica combs will still be available for individual purchase in all models."
I am going to say three things about this and end it at that.
1.) More than one person owns and/or works at Hetrick
2.) People have to make a living, and that is very difficult to do, especially in the harmonica world. Anyone who thinks people are getting "rich" off of aftermarket parts or customization has little insight into the business.
3.) People assume malice when they don't understand something way too often.
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Custom Harmonicas
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HarpNinja
3073 posts
Jan 08, 2013
6:52 AM
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@harp-er
As a business partner relative to harmonicas - I have nothing to do or an business interest in anything else related to Hetrick - your comments aren't accurate.
I apologize that I can't be overly specific, but regarding Hetrick's involvement with custom harps, their direction is to, as stated on the site, is to offer pre-built harmonicas and individual customs. That is not limited to the Seydel brand. Currently, the site lists all the options for personalized customs in various brands and models.
I will be so bold as to say that our group offers absolutely amazing Seydel steel harps for both traditional and overblow players.
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Custom Harmonicas
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harp-er
302 posts
Jan 08, 2013
7:08 AM
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No problem on my end, Mike. "They" can do whatever they care to do as far as I'm concerned. It just looks like, to me, that what's available for sale right now, based on what is showing (no Hohner's for example, except an optimized chromatic; no Suzuki's) - mostly Seydel's and Elk River's - that that might have been a deliberate decision. Since I don't expect to be a customer for any of those harps anyway, my personal interest is limited to the bamboo combs, which I like and have several of.
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HarpNinja
3074 posts
Jan 08, 2013
7:14 AM
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There are Suzuki Manji and Hohner Marine Bands (maybe a couple of GM's) that will be listed soon. The Seydels are listed as such because they were ready first.
At $129.99, the Optimized Seydels (which have really really short lead times, often just a couple of weeks) are the best deal out there.
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Custom Harmonicas
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nacoran
6361 posts
Jan 08, 2013
8:22 AM
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There are some other great comb guys out there. Seven.oh.three already mentioned Randy Sandoval.
Chris Reynolds: http://www.builderofstuff.com/harpsforsale.html
Tom Halchak:
http://www.bluemoonharmonicas.com/
There is also Bluexlab:
https://www.facebook.com/pages/BLUEXLAB/154586844507
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Nate
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ElkRiverHarmonicas
1468 posts
Jan 08, 2013
11:46 AM
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The thing is DuPont Corian is really labor intensive, especially the way Matt was doing them. Getting Corian perfectly flat is a very labor-intensive process. Offering the colors he was was even more labor intensive, because you couldn't get it in a quarter inch and it had to be thinned down. Each step of that process to get a flat comb is very labor intensive. He had a very labor intensive polishing process to get that finish that he had.
It was quite a feat of engineering to get them as flat as he did, they came up with some pretty unique solutions. There are problems that crop up when you try to get something as irregularly shaped as a harmonica comb perfectly flat.
Matt's stuff has always been underpriced for what it took to make them and people still complained about the price as it was, so Matt was always hesitant to raise them. People think that if something takes 2 hours to make, they should be able to buy it for 10 bucks or something, that may sound harsh, but it's just a simple fact that I express with no emotion, it is just a fact. If he raised the price where it needed to be, they wouldn't sell.
As it was, he was working 15-hour days and had little to show for it.
The profit margin was very slim and he has to pay the People's Republic of Georgia 7 percent sales tax so they can plant peach trees on the interstate or whatever, seven percent of the amount of every sale. That in itself was very crippling.
Here's his options:
Let's say he raised the prices to where they need to be. It's a significant increase and any small increase in price has had a large negative affect on sales. He has all these costs that are fixed to keep the comb operation going and there would not be enough volume in that scenario to make it work. Thus, option 1 is not an option.
Option 2:
He can lower standards to reduce labor. He could lower his standards of flatness, or his standards of finish. He spent a lot of time polishing to get that finish he had. He's not willing to do skimp on that.
That leaves us with option 3:
Discontinue corian combs, except in customs and similar products.
Even with the optimized harmonicas, the margin is very, very slim. If Brad Harrison hadn't shown me ways of setting action, etc. quickly, it wouldn't even be remotely possible to do it.
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David
____________________
At the time of his birth, it was widely accepted that no one man could play that much music so well or raise that much hell. He proved them all wrong.
R.I.P. H. Cecil Payne
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David
Elk River Harmonicas
 
Last Edited by on Jan 08, 2013 11:54 AM
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florida-trader
268 posts
Mar 11, 2013
3:35 AM
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Stick. Can I get you to contact me directly? Since there is no email address in your profile, I'm sorry, but I don't know who you are.
Thanks,
Tom
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Tom Halchak
www.BlueMoonHarmonicas.com
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arzajac
1004 posts
Mar 11, 2013
7:22 AM
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I want to stay on topic, and that is Hetrick combs. But I need to go off on a little tangent...
There is still no ideal comb.
Stock combs need work. Most other material combs suffer from the same problem. Some other materials warp over time. Some other materials break a little too easily to be used as harmonica combs....
The closest thing to the ideal solution is bamboo. It's easy to flatten, it stays flat, you can drop your harp and it won't break. It's non-toxic... You can even argue that it can be environmentally responsible. If I had to pick one type of comb, it would be bamboo.
Maybe that's why Hetrick only offers one type of off-the-shelf comb today? I dunno...
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HarpNinja
3241 posts
Mar 11, 2013
8:43 AM
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I second bamboo being my favorite. The only con is that it gets dirty over time. I don't dislike Corian, but it has pros and cons just as much as anything else.
I really, really, really like dymonwood too. I see the con of it having a taste for some, and it isn't a good idea to ingest the material it is made from, but it is easy to work with...you just have to make sure you get all the dust from it off the comb before using it.
A Maine Band with a dymonwood comb that has been sanded to match with the reedplates is the best!
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Mantra Customized Harmonicas
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