In the past, I was always very happy when dealing with Sweetwater and I will continue to do business with them in the future. However, my recent purchase of a guitar was a bit of a disappointment. The Eastman E10SS guitar I ordered had finish defects in the top on the most visible part of the guitar. I was surprised that not only did Eastman ship a guitar in that condition since they are known for their quality and craftsmanship but even more surprised that the defect made it through Sweetwater's final inspection since they boast how they carefully inspect finish under two frequencies of light. My salesman contacted me to seee how I liked the guitar and I told him about the finish defects. However, he didn't offer any resolution to the problem. If fairness, I could have asked to exchange the guitar but I expected him to offer an exchange but he didn't. I hate returning things and almost never return anything but an expensive guitar should not have finish defects. Everyone who saw the guitar said they would consider the finish flaws unacceptable. After some going back and forth, Sweetwater agreed to exchange the guitar for an identical one when it came into their stock. To their credit, as an alternative, they offered to give me a 10% refund if I decided to keep the guitar. Just before making the decision, the guitar opened up - apparently acclimating to my environment while out of the case and it sounded so sweet that I decided to live with the finish defect and take the refund. So that was settled but a couple odd things happened that makes me wonder about their system. First, I received a message from customer service that the 10% refund would be credited to my credit card. Then I received a message from my salesman that the 10% would be held as a Sweetwater credit in my account. I got that straightened out. But then I received an email thanking me for a new order even though I had not placed a new order. The order was billed in my name but to be shipped to someone in another state 800 miles away. There was no charge in the order for some piece of equipment but it made me lose a bit of confidence on how such a thing could happen. The bottom line for me is that I will continue to do business with Sweetwater. They are an incredible company. For anyone who hasn't seen them, check out the YouTube tours of Sweetwater. It's amazing. That said, if I order another guitar, I'm going to zoom in as far as possible on the photographs Sweetwater provides and carefully inspect every inch of the guitar. I have lost faith in their inspection process.

After several interactions with Sweetwater, I can calmly say that they have not managed to ascertain my loyalty or confidence. I am about a month away from my last interaction allowing the last burn marks to fade away. If I take just a short trip down memory lane when I purchased a very high-end Taylor acoustic guitar it reaffirms this gloomy feeling. My acoustic arrived with a very unusual button strap mount located at the neck area. I assumed that this is just where Tayor placed the button on this model but after some time the button stopped holding because the wood pulled through. My luthier explained that the strap button should never have been located where it was. The button on my Taylor had not been installed in the neck. It had been installed in the backing too whereas the guitar did not fit right/properly in the fitted case that came with it. The wood finally gave way and I had to have a repair done My guitar luthier moved the strap button to where it should have been (all along) and because of this oversight the once pristine finish on my top tier guitar was altered in a way that seriously decreased the value and the lavish appeal of what this prestigious model once offered. Did Taylor install this button or did someone at Sweetwater? I feel like this is a moot point. Sweetwater proudly announces and boosts a fifty something points inspection/process that comes with every instrument purchase. This is where the realization or best chance for correction could have occurred. I do not believe that Sweetwater provides a breakdown to exactly what their inspection protects the consumer from (if anything) but I absolutely had been left wondering how my issue was missed and how other consumers in the future could be protected from this as well. Fast forward to my Epiphone Greeny edition.
Epiphone Greeny edition~ This guitar arrived with notable imperfections on the binding that pulled me into taking a deeper look into what else was out of place or misaligned. Both of the Greeny pickups were offset from the strings even plane and lay crooked within the guitar cavities. They were also unstable and not anchored well. I plugged this into my amp and realized immediately that the volume knobs were not behaving sensibly. Based on the pickup switch position one of the volume knobs would completely cut out when turned up from level 8.5 to 10 (max). The volume knobs would alternate in this behavior. If you set both volume knobs to 5 or 7 and played the same riff on all three variations of the pickup selections it was painfully obvious that the same or a reasonably similar volume level was impossible to maintain. You got from Loud to medium voicing or even Medium to no voicing. I brought my guitar to my luthier who is a Gibson certified repair specialist validating my opinions to be inline with his in that this guitar was operating defectively. He was very aware of the how the Greeny "out of phase" pickups were installed and how the volume knobs should have been working. I called Sweetwater and had them speak to my luthier. They offered to have it repaired and or to have it replaced. At first, I just had regret buying the Epiphone brand and wanted a return, but after sleeping on it I opted for a replacement with the caveat that it would be validated to be 100% operational before my replacement was sent. When I received the replacement, it was missing the knob on the pickup switch. Moving past this I plugged the guitar in and experienced the same unplayable experience. I spoke with a handful of other teammates at Sweetwater explaining my experience and most people were understanding but answerless as to what was going on. Lastly, I spoke with a customer service representative who was said to be experienced in bridging any gaps in my now broken experience. It took a few days for this expediter to call me back and walk me through Sweetwater's level of understanding. This gentleman was not gentle nor did come off as understanding. He instead delivered no apologies, purposely avoided any acceptance of mishandling and sprinkled my experience with an extra heaping of our sh*t does not stink condescension. He schooled me in a way that a nun would strike your hands with a large ruler when a line of contention was crossed. Some people try to have conversions and some people simply need to inform you of their position. I was given the latter. I was told that there was nothing wrong with either of the Greeny guitars I had been sent and that their behavior was unique to the Greeny model. It was explained that the volume was supposed to cut out when turned all the way up. After this statement was fed to me, I could no longer take this guy seriously. So many things began swirling around in my mind at this stage. I was confused as to why nobody at Sweetwater before him knew how the Greeny volume controls were different from every other Les Paul in production. Why did Sweetwater agree with my luthier that the Greeny had a fault and wanted to repair or replace it? Why did I receive a replacement Greeny that did the same defective thing after explaining my experience to several teammates? Why did I have to pay to have my Greeny guitar pickups centered, leveled, and properly anchored after it passed a Sweetwater inspection? I then refocused and asked this liaison If he would like the name of my guitar shop and luthier so he could provide this information in order alleviate future misunderstandings. He promptly declined this invitation and further declined to confirm any fault in the guitars that had been shipped to me, reaffirming his stance. It became clear that this man was not looking to educate everyone and even to close the circle of misinformation between all those involved at this point. This man only wanted to state his case to the one that was in his way now. There are some things that did have a positive impact on my experience which I will go over. I did get reimbursed on the setup fee that I paid to have the pickups corrected. I did get sent a jar of candy. I did receive three or four call backs from Sweetwater's teammates trying to keep the "hot potato in the air." I was sent return labels for both guitars and reimbursed fully. Now the downside to one of these leg ups was that Sweetwater would only reimburse me for my setup fees under the acknowledgement that this was a one-time exception that they would not honor in the future. It was kind that they covered my setup cost, but I am left begging the question as to what is and is not included in the Sweetwater inspection process and why it's acceptable to ship and to sell subpar and or improperly constructed instruments.

This was the first time I ever ordered from Sweetwater. I usually order from Guitar Center and have never had any issues with them. But my Sweetwater experiences were horrible!
I ordered Fishman Fluence pickups and one of the pickups was faulty. Then when I needed an exchange, I couldn't get it done because Sweetwater was now out of stock, only a couple days after I received my order! So they told me it would take two weeks to get the replacements back in stock. They also said I would be kept up to date. After not hearing back after a month, I called and they apologized for not keeping me updated and said it would be another month before they are back in stock and promised to keep me updated. After another two months, I had to contact Sweetwater once again since I'd heard nothing from them! They again told me another month! That they had supply issues.
After all these issues it ended up taking 6 months to get my working pickups!
They told me they'd send me a set of guitar strings for my troubles. That never happened.

And my second order, this happened. I ordered a boss guitar pedal. Needed the pedal for a gig I had coming up. Well, the sales engineer sent the pedal to the wrong address! He apologized and said it was 100% his fault(of course it was) I still have the text conversation from him. Then says he will try to re route the order and said it will only be one day late. I told him theirs no way, that's not how it works and that it will be delayed by many days. He said otherwise.
He assured me that if it wasn't here the next day that he'd overnight another one to me and I can just send the other one back when it arrives.
Well, it did not arrive the next day and ended up taking multiple days to arrive just like I said it would and the sales engineer did not overnight me a pedal like he said he would. I kept in contact with him every single day, so no excuse.
I ended up having to do the gig without the pedal which really sucked!
So then I decide to give them one last chance to right things and ask them what's the best they can do for a certain pedal I needed. I figured with all the headaches they caused me that they would at least try to make things right. They offered me a few dollars off the sale price. Woopy doo! I decided against it, called guitar center and got the same pedal for much cheaper than the so called discount I was offered from Sweetwater.
So yup, Sweetwater acts like they have great customer service, but my experience was anything but great. It was a huge headache that screwed me out of the music experience I chose to rely on them for.
Guitar Center never did this to me, and I've ordered more than I could ever keep track of and not once have they done me wrong!
I've only ordered a couple times from Sweetwater and was screwed both times!

I had been interested in a fender stratocaster for a while, but was waiting for something special in my price range to pop up. Sweetwater then released a saphire blue stratocaster with roasted maple neck. Beautiful guitar. Loved that you could see the wood grain through the blue. I was minutes away from checking out, was just comparing other color strats one last time, and when I was ready to add it to my cart, I couldn't find it. Was sold out! Messaged my sales engineer, Lucas, who got back to me promptly the next day. (I was browsing in the early am) He told me he could work some magic and to not freak out. There were several "demos" available in that model. They weren't played, but failed inspection for tiny flaws. He told me what was off with each of them as well as provided photos of the actual guitars. The one I landed on had maybe a mm "dent" on one of the ears of the headstock, and "finish chip" on the neck just passed the nut of the guitar where my fingers had no business being. You would have to look really hard to see either of these issues. I got the guitar at a discounted price, which I think I'm actually more pleased with as worse things could happen to this guitar from simply owning it for a period of time.

I had been just getting back into guitar, and had some really old strings on my les paul. Didn't remember guage or brand, and I admitted I was pretty ignorant to different string types and what guage worked best for me. I took Lucas' suggestion, and opted for a guitar set up from sweetwater. A few days passed before my guitar was set up. (I ordered just before the weekend), and I started to educate myself on strings. This lead me to change my mind about string type, and guage, so I reached out to sweetwater, and was relieved that my guitar hadn't been set up yet. Lucas got back to me on Monday, and told me he got the message and it would be taken care of.

Here is the hiccup. That message didn't make it to the tech doing the setup. My guitar arrived setup with 12 gauge flats, when I had decided to go with 10 gauge rounds. This was upsetting cause they are vastly different strings. I knew I would need at least a light setup when getting my new strings put on. I contacted Lucas, and he assured me that I would be covered for my new setup.

I gave a couple weeks to demo the strings put on. I had never tried 12 gauge or flats so why not. Guitar was already set up for them. It must have been a decent set up, because I was able to play somewhat cleanly, and those strings were in another ballpark of tension. It did however require a lot more effort, more than I wanted to give, not to mention this was my first stratocaster. I needed to know what it sounded like with rounds on them. So I did take it to a local music store, Mt. Pleasant Music, where they have received fantastic reviews. They set up my strat with 10 g, and it plays beautifully.

I contacted Lucas, and he was easily able to refund most of the cost of the setup, minus labor. I voiced that it didn't really seem right that I would have to pay for labor for work that had to be undone. I got back the labor portion too, plus a few extra dollars to go towards the local setup. More assistance than anyone can ask for really.

At the end of the day I was more than taken care of. I will continue to buy from Sweetwater as the customer service is worthy of its hype. Thank you Sweetwater and thank you Lucas!

My email to customer service: I ordered speakers yesterday but I was told by Manuel in customer service that they were out of stock. I told him I was going to order from another retailer since I couldn't wait. He said he would call me when they came in. A few minutes later he shipped the goods without my permission EVEN THOUGH I TOLD HIM NOT TO. AND HE CHARGED MY CARD. I spoke to someone named Latrice after I spoke with your CEO's office this morning who told me they were trying to re-rout the shipment. I got it anyway. When I told Latrice told me that although I didn't order, accept or sign for these speakers it was my responsibility to make sure that these speakers weren't stolen. OTHERWISE SHE WOULD RECHARGE MY DEBIT CARD! ONCE I cancelled the order I was under no obligation to do ANYTHING. In fact it then became an unsolicited order. This is from the Fed trade commission website: "By law, companies can't send unordered merchandise to you, then demand payment. That means you never have to pay for things you get but didn't order. You also don't need to return unordered merchandise. You're legally entitled to keep it as a free gift." I am going to return them even though I don't have to. If these speakers are stolen from the common area of my apartment building, I serve notice that I am not responsible for them. Latrice said I MUST make sure that these speakers aren't stolen, like she expected me to sleep on the patio. Further, IF these packages are stolen and you charge back my credit card, I WILL file a complaint with the state's Attorneys General of Indiana and Pennsylvania. Further, I have already put Wayne Bank on notice of a fraud filing should I not get a credit by Friday 7/21/23. I will also report this to VISA that a supposedly trusted retailer uses them to steal from their customers. Latrice is very, very nasty. She and Manuel should be fired. I am through with Sweetwater. SHAME ON YOU! Send me back my money and pick up the speakers.

In Sep 2022 I ordered a $3K Les Paul Modern guitar online. Since the guitar was out of stock, I reserved one and pre-paid in-full in advance (that's what they require). Okay, I've no problem waiting for my guitar when they get the next shipment in a month or two.

However, when I received the guitar a month or so later, it's happens to have the exact same serial number as the product pic of the guitar that has been up on the site and that has been "already sold" at least a month before I even placed my order. I know that because I looked at the guitar product pic and page many, many times before making my decision. Upon opening the case, and seeing the serial number was the exact same one as the product pic, I immediately called my sales rep. He said that he was not sure what happened but it was a brand new guitar so it's all good. When I buy a $3K guitar online and I'm told it's out of stock, and then I receive the guitar that's been posted as the product pic and supposedly sold already, and you cannot tell how that happened, only that it's a new guitar, THAT IS NOT ACCEPTABLE IN ANY WAY. Since the chain of custody of that guitar – why I got a guitar that was supposedly already sold weeks prior – could not be figured out, I should have been given the option to return it for one that you can track. It's called trust, esp. With an online transaction. Also, the guitar has a manufacturing defect that wasn't caught by Sweetwater. I have contacted Gibson about it. My sales rep simply kept repeating the mantra that it was a new guitar so that's all that counts. Again, not acceptable. And this isn't my first instrument purchase from Sweetwater. That experience was horrible, too, and the salesperson I had at the time had to apologize to me for screwing that one up. Doesn't matter to me that it's new. What matters to me, the customer, is that I trust the transaction. What I should have heard was, "Hey, I'm not sure what happened, and this is definitely a new instrument, but if you don't trust this chain of custody, I understand and we'll take it back and ship you one out with a different serial number." It's that simple. Trust me, if I was a famous musician with this complaint, they would have sent me a new guitar ASAP.

I asked my sales rep if he, as a consumer, would have been fine with such a transaction/scenario? He wouldn't answer. I WILL NEVER PURCHASE ANYTHING EVER AGAIN FROM SWEETWATER.

I bought two drumsets on friday, and spoke with a friendly gentleman who was able to sell them to me and inform me of the amazing deals, and shipping available. He said for the free shipping it was going to be here the 1st or the 2nd. On the 28th, the day after getting the order placed on the 25th, I was told that my family had a sales engineer that was dedicated to them and wanted to connect me with him. His name was Gregg, and so i reached out on the 28th and sent him an email. I didnt get any reply at all. So i called them today imagining the professional company Sweetwater would have this under control. The customer rep i spoke with said it hasnt been shipped or packed yet, i let the person know who sold them to me that i am a new band member for being a drummer opening up for The Wailers and needed these sets by the 3rd for the gig. Theres excerpts everywhere when youre buying that say if we cant get it out to you when we say we will, call us and well overnight it for free. So i called today to get it overnighted for tomorrow, however the customer rep said hes gotta get to work and do his due dilligence for me and will have gregg call me back. I told him gregg never answered my email and he said hes been there for years so he shouldnt be dropping the ball. When gregg called I was told the only couple boxes that are shipped out are my sticks, and cymbal polish. This obviously frustrated me and when i asked how they plan to make this right he said, "what, do you want money? Cause i cant pay you, hahaha" to which i told him he was being very unprofessional and said what do you do for other customers that have dealt with this? He said well what we can do is refund it and you can go to guitar center to buy something else. This alone makes me NEVER WANT TO BUY FROM SWEETWATER AGAIN. My first experience taking out a line of credit to purchase something that completes my soul, and this is what i get. #$#*!Sweetwater #GreggsAnEggHead

I have received a replacement amp. I will leave the original review posted and describe what happened after receiving the damaged amp. This way people can see everything.
The day after receiving the amp Ispoke to my sales tech. I had already texted him the pictures I posted here. He was able to see them when I called. I described what was wrong with the amp and he agreed it should be replaced. He transferred me to another department. They also had access to the pictures. I told this person I did not want a refund. I wanted a replacement amp. He said no problem and it would ship 2 day FedEx and I would have it on Friday. The Friday he referred to was Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving. I altered my work schedule so as to be able to pick it up at a local FedEx drop off point at a nearby grocery store. I don't have things like this shipped to my house in case of bad weather. On Friday I still had not received a tracking number so I called my sales tech. He looked it up and said "bad news, it won't arrive till Monday". Even though it was sent 2 day it still took 5 days to receive the replacement amp. I had changed work schedule for nothing. I have now picked up the amp and it works perfectly. It was also packed VERY well. The original Fender box containing the amp was placed in a bigger box with 2 inches of high quality bubble wrap on all sides. Inside the Fender box, the amp had been packed properly and is in showroom condition.
A few more notes…
I mentioned an envelope that had been opened and was empty with the original amp. The exact same envelope was with this amp. The power cord had been secured into a loop and was then placed into that envelope. One end of the cord was attached to the amp then the cord went into the envelope. The envelope was then sealed around the cord. The padded envelope prevented the cord from damaging anything inside the amp during transit.
I had been under the impression that the Jensen speaker was an upgrade installed by Sweetwater. This is not the case. On the original box the with the damaged amp and on the box with the replacement amp there was a sticker that reads BLUES JR LTD C12N 120V. The C12N means that the amp ships from Fender with the Jensen speaker.
I had originally thought that someone at Sweetwater opened the box, installed the speaker and then did poor job of repackaging the amp. This is probably not how it happened. I now believe this amp had been shipped to a customer who then returned it with the power cord removed from the protective envelope, the speaker unhooked, the protective plastic bag stuffed into the box beside the amp instead of around the amp and the styrofoam packing blocks damaged.
The 3 Sweetwater people I spoke with about this were all sympathetic and my sales tech and the man who arranged the shipping of the replacement amp were very helpful. I work at a very large company and I'm aware that not everything happens as it should. What really matters is remedying a problem. This has been done.
I have changed my rating to 3 stars. It'll stay at 3 for the following reasons.
Sweetwater definitely had the first box open. They put Sweetwater literature and candy in the box (which was not included with the replacement amp). Whoever had that box open must have seen the condition of the amp and packing materials. It should never have shipped like that.
Sweetwater is a high volume shipper. The man who arranged the shipping of the replacement amp should have known I wouldn't get it till after the Thanksgiving weekend. I changed my work schedule based on incorrect information from him. And he never sent me the tracking number. I had to call my sales tech to get it.
Having written all of that, I must also add this…the American Professional ii Telecaster and the Fender Blues Jr amp with the Jensen speaker are AWESOME! I'm very pleased with this combo. I'm also pleased Sweetwater taking care of the problem.

My order included an American Professional II Telecaster and a Fender Blues Jr with a tweed cabinet and a Jensen speaker.
I have not received the Telecaster yet.
The Fender amp arrived with multiple problems. It had the upgraded Jensen speaker installed. But when the amp was put back into the box for shipping, the plastic bag that should have covered the amp was instead stuffed into the box beside the amp. None of the styrofoam packing blocks were intact. They were all broken and laying loose in the box. The amp was loose in the box and moving around. The white smudges that are visible on the amp in the pictures are from the lack of the plastic bag around the amp during shipping. Those smudges are areas where the styrofoam from the packing blocks has been ground into the tweed cabinet. It won't rub off. The Jensen speaker has not been hooked up. It has been installed, but the cable coming from the speaker is dangling loose in the cabinet. There is a large envelope inside the cabinet that has been torn open. The envelope is empty. I don't know what is supposed to be in the envelope, whatever should in it is missing.
I believe the condition of this amp is entirely the fault of Sweetwater. They definitely had the box open because there was Sweetwater literature and candy in the box. The employee who installed the speaker and repackaged the amp simply doesn't care about the quality of their work. Nor does that employee care if customers receive a product that is in new condition. I spoke with customer service immediately. I told him that I want a rma for this amp and I want another amp sent to me. He told me I'd have to speak to another department to complete the swap. He also said that if he forwarded my problem to them, it would be a few days before they get in touch with me. He said to get prompt service I should call them directly. They were gone for the day when I spoke with customer service.
I am giving Sweetwater a 2 star review at the moment. If and when this situation is resolved, I will adjust my rating up or down accordingly. The customer service agent I spoke to was sympathetic, but did absolutely nothing to help me. I will post more tomorrow after I've spoken to the other department about returning this amp and getting another amp sent to me.
At the moment, my review is simply buyer beware.

UPDATE: Sweetwater has sent me a replacement guitar. Director of CS Justin Dunbar was very helpful and took care of the issue very quickly after contacting him.

I ordered an American Pro II Tele through Sweetwater, but after 2 weeks all I've received from them is headaches.

What a snafu. FedEx falsely claimed my package was delivered. They did not show up at my building or even ring the doorbell. The tracking info says that I signed for it when I did not, and my neighbors also didn't see a FedEx driver or truck that day. I've filed a claim with FedEx on my end, filed a police report and provided a complaint/case # as requested by my sales engineer, and I still feel like I'm in the dark as to what the hell is actually happening. It's been nearly 2 weeks since this guitar was supposed to be delivered.

I chose to buy a guitar from Sweetwater after hearing good things about their customer service from friends and peers. I loved the idea of seeing the actual guitar I would be getting. Their site is probably the most well-designed music e-commerce site out there, and the actual online shopping experience was great. But if I knew that I'd be met with the customer service equivalent of "yep that sucks" and some half-hearted shrugs after FedEx botched the delivery, I would have kept my distance and taken my business elsewhere.

FedEx is the single worst delivery service I have ever dealt with. I've never had this sort of issue with USPS, UPS, DHL or literally any other delivery service, but 3/5 FedEx deliveries I've dealt with have had issues, no exaggeration - this is by far the worst issue I've had with them. The fact that FedEx is their preferred and free shipping option is a huge reason that I won't be giving Sweetwater my business anymore.

The FedEx issues I understand. They're legitimately terrible, and I shouldn't have taken the chance on them even if it meant free shipping - but I'm disappointed in how this has been handled on Sweetwater's end. I feel like they haven't made an effort to make this right other than fumbling around with FedEx. Saying that "the ball is in FedEx's court" for multiple days is not reassuring in the least, and I feel like I'm pulling teeth trying to get any sort of update or info on the situation beyond that.

I am a long time musician of 30+ years and this was my first interaction with Sweetwater Music. I have no complaint about their selection of products, pricing, shipping or anything else, HOWEVER I will be reluctant to ever do business with them again. After making my purchase,@ $3200. 00, I expected that that was it and I only needed to await the arrival of my items. This was not the case. On the following day I received a phone call from an out of state number that wasn't a friend of family member, so I didn't answer it. In my experience nearly all out of state calls are spam of some sort and I try to avoid them. I later discovered that I received and email from Sweetwater stating "I need to speak to you before I can ship this order out to you so please give me a call". I was not expecting this and assuming this was a genuine email, felt lucky that I checked this account. Like many people I use alternate emails for specific purposes. In this case I used an alternate email in anticipation that Sweetwater would send advertisements that I would have to unsubscribe from, and that they may also sell my information, which seems to be common practice in e-commerce. The point being that it was luck that I came across the email. After calling Sweetwater they confirmed that they were not going to ship my order until and/or unless someone spoke to on the phone... it's company policy. My opinions about this policy aside, I was taken back that they would hold back and not ship something I PAID FOR! This information was not stated anywhere in the sales process. I've since read through everything I can find on their website and there's no mention of this policy. What if I missed the email? What if my email became corrupted and unrecoverable (I've had this exact experience)... there are many what if's that could have delayed the shipping of my purchase of an unknown and extended period of time. In and of its self I wouldn't necessarily have minded this policy if only Sweetwater had the foresight to clear identify this additional requirement in the purchasing process. I would at least known to expect it. For this reason I am giving them 3 stars for their odd policy and for failing to realize the potential stress, disappointment and unwelcome surprise this could bring to bear on their customers. I really hope they reconsider this policy.