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ALD making a Selmer replica doesn't sound like anything special to anticipate and putting a price tag on it at that range is just a money grab. Just to have a Selmer name on the headstock. "It's a piece of history", they'll say. People are so vain and overly concerned with being nostalgic and fashionable.
There's a dozen top notch luthiers making their version of Selmers that are affordable and outstanding. Jerome Duffel's guitars are 5k if I'm not mistaken, absolute mastery. Barault makes Selmer replicas every day of his life and you can still buy his Studio model direct for 2500 euro, plus fees. Insane.
Those Barault listings on Reverb are price gouging hard. You can just email Jean and he's very responsive and will sell you a Brazilian Selmer replica for half the price of those listings, within build time. His prices are clear on his website.
If they're really going to ask for 15K, that's just silly. It makes zero sense.
When I lived in Scotland, I had friends in the whisky industry. One was the 5th or 6th generation in his family. It was considered general knowledge that the crazy old whiskies bottled in Lalique crystal etc that sell for 10s and 20 thousand euro+ were not really consumed by the conoisseurs who would be able to appreciate them but by Russian oligarchs or very wealthy Asian clients for prestige. But, they reasoned that it was the ability to sell those bottles to those folks at those high rates that were part of what kept their lesser expressions at a more reasonable price. So there is that for us plebian folks.
If there is one thing I remember learning from the Brady Bunch, it was caveat emptor, which pairs nicely with "a fool and his money are soon parted."
15k....brand new Martin's sell for that all day long. Different market and I don't want to repeat myself but gypsy guitars are CHEAP.
I wanted to make sure I wasn't crazy.
https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/CSD1445Guat--martin-custom-shop-dreadnought-alpine-spruce-guatemalan-rosewood-acoustic-guitar-natural?mrkgadid=&mrkgcl=28&mrkgen=&mrkgbflag=&mrkgcat=&acctid=21700000001645388&dskeywordid=92700080478108428&lid=92700080478108428&ds_s_kwgid=58700008746021296&ds_s_inventory_feed_id=97700000007215323&dsproductgroupid=2322984097833&product_id=CSD1445Guat&prodctry=US&prodlang=en&channel=online&storeid=&device=m&network=g&matchtype=&adpos=largenumber&locationid=9194747&creative=705548890956&targetid=pla-2322984097833&campaignid=21455990307&awsearchcpc=1&gclsrc=aw.ds&gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=21455990307&gclid=Cj0KCQjw_JzABhC2ARIsAPe3ynoyaERjeLjH1l4DuR7wquDOgSXCdeNYHvJaBx7xNj--FZ8XYUA_e3gaAsyNEALw_wcB
The average dreadnought player is not spending 15k on a guitar, that's rare. The everyday 15k and up market are usually symphonic musicians, violins and such. Dreadnoughts are 1-5k for working class players, just like gypsy guitars. My bandmate plays a Martin that's 1k used and it sings. A used Collings or Bourgeois is 3-4k and is more guitar than you'd ever need. Dreadnoughts are as cheap as gypsy guitars, unless you're buying a Froggy Bottom guitar, or a Hahl or something. No man needs a 15k Martin, total waste of money, just like the ALD Selmer.
Well, that $16k Martin has a "genuine mahogany neck," so no wonder.
I went to the Glenfiddich distillery once where they had a £20K bottle on display in the shop. When I went up to the counter to buy something I said to the sales assistant 'I bet you don't sell too many of those' and she said 'you'd be surprised, there was an American in this morning and he bought 3.'
I know many Dreadnought players and none of them has one over the 5-6k range, most, even the professionals are more in the 3k-ish range.
You can buy this Fender tele for 31k dollars, but that doesn't mean thats the price the regular tele player pays.
The business of people buying expensive guitars and then putting them in a vault - there is probably some truth to this but I have never seen it. Most of the people I knew who had collections of nice/vintage guitars were happy to have people playing them. Some of these guys were modest players, that's true. But you don't have to be Michael Schumacher to enjoy a Ferrari. And nobody really needs a $300k car, either.
Fingerstyle playing is a solitary pursuit. I never cared who played a guitar or if I never heard of them. Because there are people no one ever heard of who can play like you wouldn't believe. I do have personal experience with this both in the USA and in France.
I don't know a whole lot about those expensive flat-tops. I've played guitars by Henderson, Olson, Greven, Laskin, Collings, Bourgeois, Manzer, maybe a few others - they were all terrific guitars, good with a flatpick or fingerpicks. Great guitars are being made today, maybe the best guitars ever.
There are things about guitar collecting/expensive guitars that people don't usually think about. A collector who has, let's say, 2 or 3 Super 400s - OK, he keeps them in his temp controlled den and they don't get played much. But they are being preserved and maybe for a guitar like that that's a good thing. I think it's a good thing. People buy guitars when they have money, but they'll sell them when they need money or when they get bored with it. Happens all the time - there was a guy who used to go to DiJ every year with a car full of Selmers and Busatos who as far as I know sold all of them. Akira Tsumura's entire collection got sold off. It was a guitar collector who commissioned the "blue guitars" project. Wealthy collectors are often the people who give luthiers the freedom to build their best/most advanced guitars. Things are not always simple or obvious.
If you think fingerstyle is cheesy or played with bad tone, meh. Check out a disc called "Pink Guitar", a collection of Henry Mancini tunes elegantly played by a variety of great players. Or this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZW6ahT12-P8 by Antoine Boyer who also dabbles in gypsy jazz...
FWIW, I own exactly two guitars, a 1978 Martin M-38, a Squire Strat, and an open back banjo made by a friend. Total value <$3k.
Guitars definitely scratch that "collecting bug" itch for many people, albeit a very expensive one at that. In my previous life, spent close to 13 years working in various roles for a music store and we had a good 3-5+ "whales" on speed dial whenever a collectible guitar came into stock that fit into their preferences. Most were lawyers/doctors/engineers/etc. who made enough $s to support such an expensive addiction and some owned upwards of 50+ guitars (if not well into triple figures). To that end, I can only imagine the collections we don't even hear about that are owned by the more silent investor/speculator types who have nearly unlimited disposable income requisite to even pursue something like this.
Really appreciate this thread because it does put into perspective the relative QPR (quality-to-price ratio) value of Django boxes in comparison to the high end flat top or electric guitar market - I'll keep that in mind next time I'm selling myself into the idea of spending a few thousand on another Django box (or hating myself for having already done so lol).