LeftyBassist.com

From the latest Sadowsky email. I want, I want, I want!

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FRETLESS AND LEFTY METROS!
We will accept orders for FRETLESS (lines or no lines) and LEFTY METROS
through AUGUST 29. Please contact us for pricing or more information.

As with any Metro order, we require a deposit of $500 and the build time
is 4-5 months.
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Uh oh.

That's really cool, but given we only got about 6 weeks to order before the window closes I can't see them getting many orders. I'm not even sure I'll be able to order one with that little time to do so.

Has anyone placed an order for a Metro yet?

I've certainly thought about it, that's just a lot of money though.

The deadline is Friday....any takers? I'm having thoughts.....wish Lakland made a lefty Skyline JO5, I'd be done.

What ARE the possibilties if you're looking for a lefty, 5-string, Jazz-like bass with 19mm string spacing and 60's PU locations?

USA Lakland JO5
Sadowsky
KSD-605 (didn't like it)
Alleva-Coppolo?
Mike Lull?
Nordstrand?
__________?

Thanks, Alan

Just got an email from Kevin@Sadowsky, due to insufficient numbers the Lefty Metro deal is off.

Man, that's lame. I hope this isn't Sadowsky's cop out way of being able to say "we don't make Metro basses lefty. We tried once and no one was interested". The order window was small, there was no promotion about the fact that they were even offering them. I bet most guys didn't even know they were going to be available. Did anyone see mention of these lefty Metro basses on any other board?

I exchanged a couple emails with Kevin at Sadowsky and offered to help promote the lefty Metro as best I can if they decide to try offering it again in the future, but I never heard back from him about it.

Arni mentioned it on his site, but he said "Lakland Metros."

It's just the sad reality that very few companies will go out of their way and make an investment on inventory that will sell slow. If the don't have certain guarantee that they basses will sell, they won't do it.

I never understood why Lakland wouldn't take the chance and build 30 Skylines, which is the minimum the factory required.

Are you gonna tell me that you cannot sell 30 lefties Lakland Skylines worldwide? 10 in the US, 10 in Europe and 10 in Japan. . . C'mon.

I bet you that if Sadowsky took the chance and built, say 15-20 Metros and place them right, they would sell.

I would not place an order for a Metro, but I would surely try one if they had them in stock.


Anyhow, this ain't news. Blame the creator for making us abnormal.

Unfortuneatly, they are not doing the lefty metros. I spoke with Kevin at Sadowsky this morning and he said that there was not enough of a demand for lefty Metros so they abandoned the project....
I wish Lakland would do lefty Skylines...I'd buy 3 of them right off the bat!!!!

Hi Tom, welcome to the board. We tried to generate interest in a lefty Skyline a few times on the pit before and could never get the 30 orders necessary to have them build it. It's not something I'm opposed to trying to pursue on here at some point, but with just a tad more than 100 members here right now we probably don't have enough interested parties that could agree on one particular model.

I was drooling over the DPLE 2 today, the Skyline Glaub with the darkstar pickup/tort guard/white finish/bound+blocked neck. That is one sexy bass... and not available lefty, of course.

Thanks Andrew. Glad I found you guys.
Was Lakland actually thinking about doing lefty skylines but declined due to not enough takers?
I had a bit of good natured argument with Sadowsky at one time about the $400 "lefty penalty" fee when I bought my NYC bass. He said, if I remember correctly that Metros would never be available left handed due to the demand factor. He said it was not worth it. This was about a year ago. I wonder if that's the deal with Lakland?
Anyway, I'd kill to get a lefty Skyline. If they do one, put me down for two!!!

Hey Tom,
I think Sadowsky's offer to do a lefty Metro was just lip service. There was no promotion, the order window was really short, and then they cancelled the offer before their original deadline to order even passed.

Lakland said straight up if we can get 30 orders for any one particular bass they'd do a lefty skyline version. We tried actively twice to get people interested in the idea but couldn't get 30 people to agree on one model or even 30 people willing to order the bass period. The third time around we talked about it passively but never even took it to the point of trying to organize for it, the response was so minimal.

I'm sure that if we could get 30 lefties for any one Skyline that Lakland would make it, but that's a tall order. If you want to start a new thread on it and see if there's any response give it a shot, but it might be an idea that needs to wait until we at least double the members here to be feasible.

Realistically a Daryl Jones or JO has the best chance of getting the most interest, but I'd love a Dunn or Decade personally.

Well,
at least Lakland would consider it if they had the basses pre-ordered. I agree that the Sadowsky Metro thing was lip service. I did'nt know that they cancelled it before the 29th deadline. How many "orders" did you guys get the last time? Is the 30 bass order set in stone with Lakland? Maybe if just those of us who are ready to buy contact Lakland at the same time (or even one of us calls in a large lefty Skyline order on everyones behalf)) Lakland would OK it. What do you think? Even if it's not 30 or 100 basses, it should still be worth Laklands time to put the order through.
I'm gonna give it a shot. Maybe we can get enough buyers together.
Be well man.
Tom

By the way Andrew,
New Jersey Guitar and Bass Center has a lefty Lakland Bob Glaub model for $1699.00
Don't know if you're interested, but I figured I'd let you know in case you were and had'nt seen it.
http://www.newjerseyguitarandbasscenter ... anded.html
The owners name is Jay.

Yeah, Sadowsky cancelled the offer 2 or 3 days before the 29th, which seems weird to me, because for the sake of seeing what a few more days might turn up for interest why not just wait until the 29th? Another issue that no one seemed to know about with the Metros was you could order any model, but they'd only fill orders for any particular model if they got 3 orders for that exact model. So even if they'd gotten enough orders to merit making the basses, a lot of the orders would've gotten cancelled by the 3 piece minimum requirement. I wanted the Hybrid P, but I doubt anyone else ordered one, so I would've been out of luck regardless.

We weren't taking orders for the Skyline ourselves. This was on one of the older incarnations of the dudepit bass board where we basically just put the idea out there and gauged interest from the participants, but no money would exchange hands until the 30 people were found, which never happened. I think we got about half way the first time, less so the second and barely a blip on the radar the third. Some of the other guys here were around for it too, maybe someone else will chime in on the response we got to the idea of a Skyline Lakland who better remembers it than I do. One caveat to the original attempts is it had to be done through a Lakland dealer, in that case of course it was Vintage Bass Trading Company because it was on Steve Barr's board, and I know some of the guys weren't interested in doing business with Steve at the time, so that may have soured a few players on ordering a bass too.

If it were to be tried again it'd still need to be done through a Lakland dealer. Juan and (until recently Jim) at Bass And Beyond might be a good dealer to go through. Awesome guys and solid people.

Lakland were firm about the 30 orders, which was frustrating too, because they weren't putting the idea out there to all their dealers, just the one and leaving it on us to find 30 orders. I think if Lakland had sent an email to all their dealers saying they're offering a lefty Skyline we easily could've reached 30 orders the first time, but the idea was to have it be a Dudepit Limited Edition bass, which tied our hands to reach out to other dealers unfortunately.

Yep, we've talked about that bass before on here somewhere. I actually have a Glaub that looks just like the one at NJ G+B. Someone here played that bass at the store and commented on it here.

They've had that bass for years and won't flex enough on the price even after all this time they've been tryingf to sell it to make it worth it to me.

I just got a reply from Dan at Lakland in re to doing the lefty Skyline 30 bass order. He pretty much just cut me off and said not enough orders from overseas to warrant it. Pretty much said there's no way a lefty Skyline will ever be made. As for the bass at NJ B&G, if it were a Daryl Jones or Osbourne, I would have gotten it. But you're right, I do remember seeing it on their website well over a year ago.
Oh well, so much for Lakland.

I don't know what Dan is referring to with not enough orders from overseas. There were no orders from overseas to my memory because you could only order it from one USA dealer when the idea was on the table. Lame, I guess Lakland is no longer an option either.