In the boutique guitar world, it's hard to find anyone who has a bad word to say about Doug Cowher. Founded in 2007 by Kaur Guitars, the Sacramento-based manufacturer has a well-known product. Fans and musicians know that anything bearing the Cowher name will have a certain level of quality, personality, and functionality in one (often brilliant) package.
But before Kauer became the biggest name in independent guitar on the West Coast, he was a kid tinkering with his dad's CNC cabinet-making machine (the simple but expensive piece of equipment guitar makers use to cut and machining materials). He worked in his father's shop from an early age - both father and son enjoyed playing the guitar - so outside of the family business it seemed natural to him to use the production equipment as a hobby.
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He started building the guitar and then spent months perfecting it. Then it became one less guitar and several guitars, and after Cowher began to build relationships at trade shows and trade events, he quit working for his father.
These days, Kaur's unique guitar models like the Corona, Banshee, and Starliner occupy a niche in the market for those who want to build and build by hand (around $3,500 to $6,500, depending on the model) . and specifications). Customizable quality is usually not available from major brands. It's only because so many guitar enthusiasts are willing and wealthy enough to spend a mortgage payment (more depending on where you live) on a new axe, that Kauer today introduced one of the most practical in the world of the instrument.
DRS Rack is Kaur's line of guitar racks, and it's one of the best answers for those who think their husbands have too many guitars. While other options include everything from hashed IKEA cabinets to rows of wall hangings and thousand-dollar display cases, DRS offers several different solutions in various sizes that can hold 4 to 14 guitars. big
We spoke with Kaur via Zoom to learn more about his revolving guitar journey, what makes Kaur guitars different, and the functional beauty of the DRS coil.
Spin : Do you remember what went through your mind when you started building your first guitar in the early 2000s?
Doug Kauer: Yeah, my dad was one of the first in our area to have a CNC machine, and it became my job to program it because I took an AutoCAD course my senior year of high school because that it was considered a math class. The $100,000 machine was a game to play on my Nintendo, and I made some comments to my dad, "Wouldn't it be cool to make a guitar out of it?" Then a piece of maple came along that I knew we could use on the guitar and I told my boyfriend at the time, now my wife, about it because his dad used to fix guitars in the 70s and 80s and he was always doing his own thing. . I got a bunch of guitar parts for my birthday, so I programmed a copy of the PRS body into the machine and accidentally kept learning until I had it assembled and played.
When did you realize that your hobby of building guitars on CNC machines could become a full-time job?
I didn't start thinking about it until a few years later because the [2007-2009] recession hit, so there was nothing to do at the firm. I started devoting more time to guitar building, then I went to NAMM as a participant and started doing it more seriously for a living. I really didn't know there was a boutique guitar market or anything before that. Six months later I attended my first guitar show - probably Montreal '09 - saw everyone I met at NAMM, sold the guitar and told my wife I wanted to do this full time.
When I remember that first show in Montreal, there were two venues. One of them was this big room with acoustic guitars and archtops and everything was sleek and beautiful and well lit. Then there was the dark and dirty electric side, which was only given for the first time. They were a cheeky bunch and we were the Hells Angels who got them changed at their annual party to change the "free booze" rule.
Have you noticed how much the boutique guitar scene has changed over the past 14 years?
When I walked in, there were a few businesses that I knew and then there were a bunch of people who arrived at the same time as me. Now I think social media is very easy to get started. I don't mess with social media, because I've worked a lot on Facebook sending a "thank you" message every morning to every new follower - where 1 in 100 can open a conversation and sell a guitar. But I think there's a difference now that somebody can build three guitars in their garage and call it a business, and they think they can take $600 worth of parts and sell them for $1,500 and be rich , but they do not act like them . Not yet. . We tried to do things that way, but it's really hard to do it in a sustainable way.
I always try to encourage people to create original works. There are a lot of people copying Strats and Teles, but it works until the next one comes along. If you create an original piece, it will stand out in no time. It will always be difficult. But if you're dumb enough to stick with it for 15 years or more, your stuff will still be there when whoever stole it is gone. If you make it unique enough, you can download what you need to survive long term and people will take you seriously...
Speaking of this uniqueness, what do you think sets Kauer Guitars apart from some other boutique makers?
Honestly, people buy with their eyes first. I always have to remind the folks at the store that no matter how good a guitar is, we judge it by how it looks before anyone hears or plays it. That's right, as frustrating as struggling to pick up all the white diaper lint. One of the great things about guitar gigs is that I see a lot of things that appeal to other people. When I go to guitar gigs, I can see people at the table next to us walking past the guitar and standing next to us, or walking past me and looking at the guy next to us. On their own, they don't stand out at all, but there are things that either click with you personally or don't, and that's a big deal. You have all these famous guitars – and sometimes they're in my wheelhouse and sometimes they don't play for me – but what do I know if people buy them? We recently had this conversation about the Electroliner because the new guy in the shop really likes it, but it took me a long time to get it where I wanted it to go. But if I had a dollar for every time we made a guitar that I thought was a dunk and then ended up on the shelf of shame, I'd probably want to make more money that way.
Have you decided to engage DRS when shifting? Currently, there are very few companies that produce decent and reasonably affordable racks.
Well, I made the first one because I ran out of storage for the guitars I was building, so I made something for the house. Being a cabinet maker, I didn't want to create something ugly, so I made something beautiful. A lot of guitarists also do repairs, but I hate doing repairs, so I started building racks to fill the gaps between selling guitars for other people. The problem was that I did a lot of versions, shapes and colors and I did a lot of things that weren't ready until then. The first version was a plywood core with a traditional veneer or fabric on top, but I never liked the look. Then you put in hardwood, but it's too much money, and if you get hardwood, you put it in like that, then you take half of it out, it's not very stable. We didn't have a good selection of pants, so my mom sewed a pillow over each one. The chest hurts. Eventually the guitar got busy enough, so we stopped doing it.
A few years later, it was election time – which always slows things down – and I realized bamboo was becoming a thing. By then bamboo had become a thing. It's a bit more expensive than the plywood core, but it looks like hardwood and is environmentally sustainable, so it really opened up some new options for us.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like a mere prop since you already have the woodworking tools and the CNC machine for the guitar.
That's right. We produced just over 250 guitars in 2022, our highest number in a single year. That's not a lot of time for a CNC, so if the CNC is idle half the time, it could be idle for a long time waiting for something else. The biggest problem was shipping them, I don't want to buy more boxes. So everything we design has to fit in a small or large box, but it can't exceed that size. I've learned more about cardboard than I wanted to over the past few years.
Guitars have done more than average over the past few years, but racks still account for about half of our annual sales. We sell a lot of these between Thanksgiving and Christmas, and that's the only time I do paid advertising for anything. I learned a few years ago that if you target [ads] at male guitarists, it's just comments from friends who are crazy about the price. But if you post an ad specifically aimed at women or interior design enthusiasts, it will be the complete opposite experience. I've also considered making just one guitar stand, but it's just not worth the time and effort as you can get a really nice wooden guitar stand for less than me. Instead, I'm working on an encore role and I think it would be nice to get the main unit up and everything.
Does it sound as crazy as it does to me that the only answers to multi-guitar racks are DIY IKEA hacks, super-industrial studio-style sheds, or super-humidity-controlled rooms that cost a fortune?
Yeah, it's a weird place in the industry where there aren't a lot of options. I literally looked at a forum page on DIY stacked guitar racks and it was a bunch of people doing crazy versions of mine - which is good. Sadly, I honestly think that if I didn't start building guitars, I'd probably design something myself and fall into the same trap I see online. Instead, every year I spend my holidays between Christmas and New Years dreading the flood of emails complaining about the shelves. This year someone complained that the studs weren't flush with the wall, but they said, "First of all, you can't wash it very often because most houses have skirting boards. "And that's the other problem. Many racks hold guitars vertically, which works well if you have Telecasters, Strats, and Les Pauls. But if you have a Jazzmaster, Firebird, Flying Vs or something like that, it doesn't work. Doing
Also, DR is the dog rack system because it is very creative. КБ КБ КБ For a while, we said to ourselves: "We have to find a name. That's too much. That's stupid." fool ".fool". stupid" but it's hard work. Despite my best intentions, I'm on the right track with Amibasa…
All the best, best, best, best, best, best, best, best, best, best, best.
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