Fender Company History
For more than 40 years, Fender electric guitars and amplifiers have had a huge impact on the way the world creates, plays, and listens to music. In the early part of the last century, when guitarists were playing country, folk, or box guitar blues, in the 1930s, when jazz musicians tried to amplify the volume of traditional hollow guitars to achieve the same volume as other instruments, they encountered the same problem. , that is, the pickup and speaker will produce feedback when playing at a high volume.
In the 1940s, a California inventor named Leo Fender began making custom guitars and amplifiers in his radio shop. Finally, Leo decided to build the world's first instrument-specific amplifier with tone control. However, more important is Leo's pursuit of better guitars. Using existing technology, he knew he could improve the sound amplification capabilities of contemporaneous hollow-body instruments...and surpass them, and he did. In 1951 he introduced the Broadcaster, the prototype of the legendary Telecaster series of solid-body guitars. As we all know, the Tele was the first commercial Spanish-style solid-body electric guitar. Soon after, the Precision Bass was introduced in 1951, and in 1954 the great Stratocaster guitar was introduced.
In 1965, due to deteriorating health, Leo Fender sold the company to CBS Corporation. Over the next 20 years, Fender Musical Instruments Company experienced tremendous growth. But at the same time, CBS's lack of understanding and responsibility for music and musicians has become increasingly apparent.
In 1981, CBS created a new management team to "reinvent" Fender. William Schultz was named president shortly thereafter, assisted by William Mendello and Kurt Hemrich. They formulated a five-year business plan and prepared to significantly improve Fender's position in the musical instrument market through significant improvements in quality and vigorous innovation. Their partnership ended when CBS decided to spin off its non-broadcast media businesses.
In 1985, a group of employees and investors led by William Schultz purchased Fender from CBS Corporation. Thus Fender became a great company formed by a small team of musicians who were determined to make the best guitars and amplifiers in the world.
They had to face a dilemma first - the plant and equipment were not included in the purchase contract. They only have trademarks, patent rights and equity. At this time, Fender was supported by employees, dealers, and suppliers, some of whom had worked with Fender since Leo Fender began building guitars and amplifiers. Among them, Bill Schultz and his colleagues began to rebuild an American icon. Brand work.
Initially, Fender purchased guitars from manufacturers that produced reasonably priced instruments. But as Fender's pursuit of quality control increased day by day, they established the flagship of the Fender family - the factory in Corona, California. Later, Fender established a modern factory in Ensenada, Baja, California, Mexico to meet the requirements for manufacturing high-quality musical instruments.
In 1987, Fender acquired Sunn, a famous speaker line favored by The Who, Jimi Hendrix and The Rolling Stones. In this way, Fender acquired Sunn's factory in Oswego, Oregon, and re-entered the field of speaker manufacturing. But this period was still the early days of the "new" Fender, so Schultz shelved the Sunn brand and used the Fender trademark until it became the best amp brand in the world.
Fender also recognizes the importance of an open-door policy for professional musicians. When artists began to demand different characteristics from their guitars, Fender gave them what they wanted. This collaboration led to the start of Fender's custom service in 1987.
Today, the world's greatest guitar artists work with the famed Fender Custom Shop in Corona, California, to create the instruments of their dreams. Recently, Fender began producing customized speakers in the Custom Shop.
In 1991, Fender headquarters moved to Scottsdale, Arizona. There, the operations, marketing, advertising, sales and exports of satellite companies around the world are managed. Fender's production now covers the United States, Mexico, the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Belgium, Japan, South Korea and China.
Also brought to Scottsdale was Fender’s speaker and audio equipment research and development department. When it comes to guitar amplifiers, Fender sets the standard for tone and value. Its R&D department has made many technical improvements that meet the requirements of performing musicians. In late 1992, speaker customization was launched in Scottsdale, providing customized and limited edition speaker products for professional musicians.
Fender expanded its acoustic guitar product line with country music and the weak acoustic guitar in mind. Producing high-quality acoustic guitars through partnerships with respected manufacturers in Japan, Korea, and China, the company is the only manufacturer in North America to sell the Manuel Rodriguez line of nylon-string guitars that the Rodriguez family began handmaking in Spain in 1905. These measures to enrich the product line have enabled Fender to achieve outstanding results in the acoustic guitar market.
Guild Guitar Company, founded in a small loft in New York in 1952, is famous for its high-quality instruments and expensive prices. Due to internal financial difficulties in the early 1990s, Guild leadership decided to sell the company. Fender purchased Guild in 1995, enriching its owners with a group of people determined to produce the highest value American-made wood and electric guitars. Today Guild still produces their time-honored products in a 60,000-square-meter factory in Westerly, Rhode Island.
1998 was a landmark year in Fender’s history. With Fender speakers occupying a strong leading position in the market, the Sunn brand series of speaker products have once again seen the light of day. Over the past 3 years, the R&D department has focused on the original Sunn series, creating prototypes that faithfully restore Sunn's signature sound. When the time came, Fender launched the new Sunn speaker product, which immediately won acclaim from the industry.
As for Guild, in 1998, it expanded its custom-made factory in Nashville, Tennessee. The new Guild built in 1996 has an 8,000 square meter, climate-controlled factory with plenty of extra space to produce and store high-quality, high-grade raw materials.
Guild also launched the DeArmond series of guitars in 1998. Fender purchased the DeArmond musical instrument pickup brand in 1997 and subsequently integrated the company with Guild into a line of high-quality, affordable guitar and bass products based on Guild's design styles. The guitar itself was assembled and manufactured in Korea and then sent back to Cornona, USA, where American-made DeArmond pickups were installed. After being tested in the European and Asian markets, the DeArmond guitar series immediately won widespread praise for its high cost performance after its launch in the United States and Canada.
The most important thing for Fender in 1998 was the establishment of a new factory in Corona. The factory covers an area of ??19 acres, with an area of ??177,000 square meters, and more than half of it has been reserved for future development. At that time, it was a long-term plan that was simply unimaginable. The entire line of Fender products made in the United States is produced in Corona, with a daily output of 350. In the Corona factory, the UVOXÔ system, ultraviolet rays, special cleaning systems and activated carbon filtration systems ensure that the air purity in the factory reaches 95%. This new factory is not only the centerpiece of the art of making, but also a platform for breakthroughs for those determined to devote themselves to musical instrument making.
The custom-made department has also been moved to the new factory.
More than 50 craftsmen now work in the Custom Shop, providing professional players with the world's finest custom instruments while replicating completely handmade Fender classics. In order to improve Corona, the speaker customization department also opened a new factory and merged with the customization department.
At the same time, a new 70,000-square-meter factory was built in Ensenada to supplement speaker manufacturing, and the speaker manufacturing business other than custom-made speakers was integrated.
Over the past decade, Fender has experienced dramatic growth in sales and scale. The company's products cover almost everything a guitarist needs to perform, from guitars, strings and accessories to audio equipment including speakers and mixing consoles. Today, under Schultz's direction, Fender Musical Instruments Company is the world leader in manufacturing and selling guitars and amplifiers.
Fender has become the standard that defines the tone we hear, meets the needs of musicians, manufactures high-quality products and provides impeccable after-sales service. Just as it did in the 1990s and into the 21st century, Fender management will use excellent business management and a love of music to maintain Fender's leading position.