How about "designer cues" instead of custom cues?

RRfireblade said:

I'm not sure why the term 'custom' is so confusing at all.

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Shawn Armstrong said:

This is too simple, yet no one can see the forest for the trees.

There are a number of cuemakers that make cues without a particular customer in mind. They build the cue to THEIR specs, in terms of shaft taper and butt dimensions. They weight it to 19 ounces, but allow bolts to be taken out or added to change the weight. They sell it to a dealer, who sells the cue as "custom". There is absolutely nothing custom about it. It's the exact same thing as a production cue. It was made with the maker's specs, and has gone out onto someone's shelf. If I order the cue from a cuemaker to my specs, such as taper, balance point, wrap and wood choice, etc, that cue is custom made for me. If I sell it to Bob, a guy who really likes the way the cue hits, that cue is not longer a custom cue - it's just a brand name. The cue was never made with his specific inputs, it was made with mine. I bought the XX CUSTOM cue. When he got it from me, it's now an XX cue. Custom gets removed, as the cue wasn't made for Bob. Custom implies tailored, or made to specific order, or designed for a particular end user.

So, you decide to hop on a cuemaker's website, and find a cue under their "Current Inventory" tab. You look at the cues, and one really jumps out at you. You call up the maker, and say "what are the specs on that cue?". You then tell him you want a different wrap, retaper, tip choice, whatever. This is how most custom cues are bought today. Now, let's say I want to buy a Viking. I look at their website, and see a cue that really jumps out at me. I call Viking. I ask for a different wrap, different tip, different weight, etc. They fill the order the exact same way as the other guy. Here's the difference - one guy's is "custom", the other is "production". WHY?

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Shawn Armstrong said:

If you bought the Bill Schick because you thought it was pretty, then it's not custom. Bill makes one hell of a cue. Bill makes cues. He doesn't make custom cues. He makes pool cues. Same as Joss. Same as J&J. Same as Dufferin.

If you want to resort to name calling, that's your business. Little rocks, big rocks, whatever. The point is that custom implies tailored. It doesn't mean produced in small batches, otherwise I drink custom beer. It doesn't imply high resale value, otherwise Titleists, which were a house cue, are custom. The big names demand big pricetags for their cues, and deservedly so. However, would you pay less for a Bill Schick cue than a Bill Schick custom cue? The "custom" adds nothing to the statement. "Custom" somehow implies a higher reputation, and that's wrong. If you mention anyone by name, I know my impression of them. Remove the word "custom" from Dennis Searing's cues, they are still a sought after commodity. The man's integrity and attention to detail make the cue. The title "custom" is thrown around by every cue maker and cue assembler under the sun these days. I guess I can go buy some parts from Prather, slap a cue together, and call myself a custom cuemaker? NOT ON YOUR LIFE, yet there are a lot of individuals who do this very thing.

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Shawn Armstrong said:

Totally agree. However, our industry tosses it around like a badge of honour. "For $500, you should consider a custom cue instead of production". Then, the guy goes on the F/S section, buys a house cue with a joint installed by the local whiz-kid who tears up the board with his fancy J/B cues, and he got a custom? Uh huh - he got a refinished Dufferin with a Schmelke/Dominiak/Prather/Atlas shaft. REALLY custom cue.

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Shawn Armstrong said:

I've been having numerous discussions with people on the board, and I think I have come up with a way to describe cues, without tagging them as "custom" or "production". I, for the life of me, cannot see ANY difference between a custom cuemaker and a production cuemaker, so I propose the following. Custom cuemakers should call themselves "Designer Cuemakers", and the production cuemakers should call themselves "Line Cuemakers". By the definition I've been given by everyone on this board, it comes down to pure volume of production as to if you are custom or not. If Schon made 100 cues per year, they'd be a custom house. Seeing as they make over 1000 cues, now they're a production cuemaker. Could someone tell me the magical number where this all changes? 499? 512? 613? I'd love to know.

So, let's go with the fashion industry's choice of terms. If it's off the rack, it's a line of cues. If it's made by a limited production operation, it's designer wear. I love it - "(insert name here) Designer Cues". It has a ring to it.

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megatron69 said:

"Custom" to me implies tailor made; something you can't just walk into a store or go online and buy.

"Production" is a product made similar to other manufacturer's products with cost in mind.

Years ago I tied flies for money. Fly fishing flies. I had two lines. One was production. Flies that were carbon copies of the flies that every fly shop had in stock. Things like BWOs, San Juan worms, Elk Hair Caddis, etc. They were exact copies of the flies that everyone made. Now, I might add a bit of flash or colored wire here and there to a production fly but essentially they were exact copies.

My custom flies were flies that no one else tied, at least on a commercial level. Some were variations on commercially available flies, such as BWOs with a weaved dubbing body,and others were completely invented by your truly, like my MOAB streamer fly or my Googly-eyed Monster, or my Purple Terminator. And many of them were flies that I tied at the request of specific customers. Purple pheasant tail nymphs with articulated legs, mating damselflies and what-nots. Now if my whole business at the time was just those custom flies, I'd consider myself a custom fly-tier. But I tied plenty of production-type flies, so I always considered myself a contract fly-tier that had a side business tying custom flies.

Getting back to pool cues . . .

Of course, some production cue makers also make custom cues so there is some cross-over. But if most of your cues are production cues, then you're probably in the same boat I was in. You're a production cue maker that has a side business making custom cues. If most of your cues are one-offs, then you're a custom cue maker.

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HawaiianEye said:

Any maker can make a custom cue.

I'm not saying they are always going to be the same quality.

Custom means something other than their "standard".

People on here seem to think only a "one man" shop can make custom cues and that is because he doesn't have 40 other workers. That is irrelevant. Custom is custom, whether one guy touches it or a 1000.

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