What's A Name Worth?

HawaiianEye

HawaiianEye

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Let's say a person had 3 Titlist butts of equal quality and wanted a cue maker to make them a simple cue with a stainless steel joint, delrin butt cap, black collars, and Irish linen wrap. The cue maker could supply the shaft, ferrule, and tip of his choice.

Let's also say all of the cues were to be made to the same dimensions...weight, length, balance point, shaft diameter, etc.

So we farm these orders out to 3 cue makers...one top tier, one well known-but not top tier, and the other to a lesser known person who makes quality cues.

Other than the "name" attached to the person converting the cue, what would make one cue be worth more than the others? Using the exact same materials, would one cue maker be able to make a cue that "really stood out" compared to the others? I would have to assume that allowing the cue maker to provide his own shaft, and choice of ferrule and tip would make the cues play differently.

I see all kinds of cues for sale on here (especially conversions) that I can't begin to comprehend how one that is almost "identical" to the others is quadruple the price of the others.

I can see cues that have a lot of inlays and fancy stuff costing lots of money, but when I see a simple Dufferin conversion with no inlays with an outrageous asking price I wonder exactly "what a name is worth". I can see if the cue maker is no longer around (Balabushka, Szamboti, Rambow...), but I can't understand what one cue maker could do to a simple conversion over another cue maker that would justify the enormous price differences between them.
 
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I agree with you ...

Some of these guys ask outrageous prices on the simpliest of cues.
I mean $1,000-1,100 for a plain wood cue - give me a break, it isn't worth more than $700 tops (used to be $500). A Sneaky Pete - same thing.

A Merry Widow (one with points and/or veneers - plain butt sleeve) $1,500 is the tops for them, IMHO. And I see some with minimal inlays in them wanting 6-7,000 dollars for them.

There are a lot of up and coming cuemakers that will give you a lot more for your money. I guess I am just a bargain shopper (my Mom taught me to be), and I want the most bang for my buck.

I will not buy any cue off the internet mainly because balance of the cue is one of the most important attributes to me, and if I don't like the balance, I won't play with it. I like a cue to be forward balanced where the weight is felt mostly between your bridge hand and your grip hand.

Back to your question though, I think you would be hard pressed to find any differences in the 3 cues you were having made except for the tip.
 
Snapshot9 said:
Some of these guys ask outrageous prices on the simpliest of cues.
I mean $1,000-1,100 for a plain wood cue - give me a break, it isn't worth more than $700 tops (used to be $500). A Sneaky Pete - same thing.

A Merry Widow (one with points and/or veneers - plain butt sleeve) $1,500 is the tops for them, IMHO. And I see some with minimal inlays in them wanting 6-7,000 dollars for them.

There are a lot of up and coming cuemakers that will give you a lot more for your money. I guess I am just a bargain shopper (my Mom taught me to be), and I want the most bang for my buck.

I will not buy any cue off the internet mainly because balance of the cue is one of the most important attributes to me, and if I don't like the balance, I won't play with it. I like a cue to be forward balanced where the weight is felt mostly between your bridge hand and your grip hand.

Back to your question though, I think you would be hard pressed to find any differences in the 3 cues you were having made except for the tip.
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Why would a cuemaker ask for $700 if he continually sees his cues flipped in the used market for $1100 to $2000 ?
 
There is quite a bit of irony in your question.....honestly.

You can have the same cue for substantially less money from a lesser known builder and yet complain about how more well know cuemakers command more....

Are you upset that you can't get a Tad or a Southwest(a better example) for 800.00 bucks?
 
People spend many years honing their craft and build up a reputation for delivering a quality product. They develop a following and have work lined up for a few years. They put in the time and effort and earned the price they command....if they didn't, the market would correct them and they would be forced to drop their prices.

You want this same guy to essentially charge the same as a guy new to the biz or with just a year or two under his belt? Is that how it works at your job? The new guy shows and "almost" as good of a job as you for 40% less. Hey it's just labor right?

Next time I have surgery I'll pick the guy just out of med school that will do it 25% cheaper.
I'll hire the the lowest bidder to build my house, how hard can carpentry be anyway?

Patrick
 
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Like most professions, you pay more to the journeyman than the apprentice.

In your scenario you're paying for the knowledge that the cuemaker has gained commensurate with his experience. A quality builder will have experimented with a multitude of suppliers to find good ferrules, phenolics, shaftwood, leather/linen wraps and finish. He's got a shop full of equipment to do the job tapering, cutting wrap grooves, wrapping, sanding, finishing, etc. He'll have developed turning schedules for the shaftwood and modified a taper specific to his cues. All of those costs and construction times remain the same whether it is a conversion or a scratch-built cue.

Many cuebuilders refuse to even build conversions because some people don't see the forest for the trees. The cuemakers would rather build more elaborate cues from scratch and have the prices reflect that. If you've found a top-tier cuemaker to make a conversion for you, count your blessings and get an entry level cue from the guy.
 
Pick three of us and let us build the cues for you. Play with each for a couple of months and ask around for what someone will give you for each and let us know the results. My guess is the top tier cue and the bottom tier cue will get you back the largest percentage of what you paid.
 
Patrick said:
You want this same guy to essentially charge the same as a guy new to the biz or with just a year or two under his belt? Is that how it works at your job? The new guy shows and "almost" as good of a job as you for 40% less. Hey it's just labor right?


Patrick
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That's what Bombardier thought, when they laid off 121 people in '96 with more than 15 years experience. I had 18 years there myself, but that was with the original Learjet.
 
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