{"id":16493,"date":"2019-05-09T05:30:29","date_gmt":"2019-05-09T09:30:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=16493"},"modified":"2019-05-10T08:28:29","modified_gmt":"2019-05-10T12:28:29","slug":"musical-matchmaker-paul-heumiller-of-dream-guitars-part-four","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2019\/05\/09\/musical-matchmaker-paul-heumiller-of-dream-guitars-part-four\/","title":{"rendered":"Musical Matchmaker: Paul Heumiller of Dream Guitars (Part Four)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Continued from Part Three<\/a>…<\/i><\/p>\n

\"\"Service Brings a Smile<\/b>
\nAsked what he enjoys most about his work, Heumiller has a ready answer. \u201cIt gets back to that idea of service,\u201d he says. \u201cBut really, it\u2019s that look when we hand somebody a guitar, and we know that\u2019s going to change their life.\u201d He admits that phenomenon doesn\u2019t happen with every single buyer and guitar. But it does happen a lot. \u201cThe guy is sitting there playing the guitar, and that look comes over his face,\u201d Heumiller says. \u201cAnd I just know: he\u2019s done. I always tell people, \u2018When you get it home and you can\u2019t walk by it without grabbing it and playing it, that\u2019s<\/i> a good guitar.\u2019 The rest of it is all superficial. Will it make you play and make music? Buy it. You\u2019re done.\u201d<\/p>\n

For clients, the experience of choosing a guitar\u2014whether it\u2019s from Heumiller\u2019s small and carefully curated inventory, or the result of a custom build\u2014is a highly personal one. \u201cWhat makes Paul special is his motivation to get the right guitar in a client\u2019s hands,\u201d says Tony Russo, a longtime client. Another client, Henry Welt, echoes that sentiment: \u201cUnlike a conventional relationship between buyer and vendor, I consider my relationship with Paul to be a friendship with a trusted advisor.\u201d<\/p>\n

The service Heumiller provides includes asking the client\u2014via phone, or more often online video chat\u2014a lot of questions. \u201cI\u2019m asking them, \u2018What are you playing? What genre? What guitars do you love? What players do you love? What would you like to play five years from now?\u2019\u201d Paul says. With that information in mind, he can make specific recommendations.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen,\u201d Heumiller continues, \u201cit gets down to start talking practical. \u2018What do we have in stock? Are you willing to wait and order one? I have two in stock.\u2019 So, I\u2019ll play those for them. They\u2019ll say they like the sweet or warmer tone versus brighter, and then I can play those two.\u201d When a final selection is made, Dream Guitars ships the instrument, providing a three-day trial period. \u201cI\u2019d say that 80-plus percent stick,\u201d Heumiller enthuses. \u201cThat\u2019s because I care enough, because we ask a lot of those questions, and we don\u2019t rush it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Not every inquiry leads to a sale, of course. And because Paul doesn\u2019t think of himself as a salesman, he\u2019s okay with that. \u201cThere are some people who are just looking for a deal,\u201d he says. \u201cIf it\u2019s too business-y, I\u2019m not interested. If it feels like a sale\u2014if it feels like I have to try\u2014it doesn\u2019t feel good to me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since the worldwide Great Recession of a decade ago, Heumiller has seen some changes in the rarefied marketplace of handmade acoustic guitars. \u201cThe phone completely stopped ringing in \u201808 and \u201809,\u201d he admits. \u201cEven people who were quite wealthy weren\u2019t spending it.\u201d And since that time, American buyers\u2014Dream Guitars\u2019s primary clientele\u2014have become a bit more fiscally cautious. Fifteen years ago, he wouldn\u2019t be surprised to have a client tell him, \u201cHey, I\u2019m getting a home equity loan. I want to buy a $10,000 guitar,\u201d Heumiller says. \u201cNow they\u2019re more like, \u2018I\u2019ve got to sell one before I buy one.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

One thing that pleasantly surprises Heumiller is the constant reminder he gets regarding just how important music is to people. \u201cThey prioritize music as \u2018soul food\u2019 in their lives,\u201d he says. \u201cMaybe they\u2019re making a lot of other sacrifices everywhere else in their life, but they\u2019re going to have that one guitar that gives them an hour of total peace at night, or whenever they get a chance to play.\u201d<\/p>\n

Heumiller re-emphasizes his main point. \u201cI\u2019m not really selling anything; these guitars sell themselves.\u201d He laughs and says that he considers himself a kind of sherpa. \u201cIf I get you the right one in your hands, you\u2019re going to know, and you\u2019re going to fall in love. And that\u2019s it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Continued from Part Three… Service Brings a Smile Asked what he enjoys most about his work, Heumiller has a ready answer. \u201cIt gets back to that idea of service,\u201d he […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16500,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[41,3668],"tags":[2439,3793],"class_list":["post-16493","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interview","category-music-business","tag-dream-guitars","tag-paul-heumiller","cat-41-id","cat-3668-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16493","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16493"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16493\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16506,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16493\/revisions\/16506"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16500"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16493"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16493"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16493"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}