Stam Audio SA-76ADG

I have two pieces on order and they'll be the last things I order from Stam. This experience is starting to feel like a couple of others I've been through in the past.

The first time was back in 2008 when I participated in a pretty big "group buy" under the product name "TNC." I think it took around 9 months (longer than originally promised) for the gear to come in and at the end there was a problem that almost caused the entire thing to blow up when Paypal deemed it a scam and wouldn't process the final payment to the manufacturer in China. The guy running it was having no luck convincing Paypal that it was a legit business transaction. Luckily, I had a cousin who was a VP at Ebay back then and he did me a favor and helped move things along. Without my cousin's help though, I think we all would have lost our deposits and the gear would never have shipped. During the long wait, my patience grew short and I wound up buying better gear than I'd ordered through the group buy so I never even wound up using that gear when it finally got to me.

The second time was around 2014 when I was shopping for a resonator guitar. I came across a selling what they called Hot Rod Steel Guitars. They looked good and they had some YouTube videos which sounded good. The owner, a guy named Lenny Gerthoffer who runs a site called "VintageNationals.com", said he was taking delivery of these guitars from a factory in China and then doing finishing work on them in his shop in California. I ordered one plus a case. Despite being told the guitar was "in stock," it took months before a guitar showed up at my door. And it turned out to be the wrong guitar. Lots of attempts to contact Lenny, leaving messages by phone and email, were unsuccessful but after many weeks of persistence, I finally got hold of him and he promised to ship out the correct guitar and a mailing label to return the mistake. The guitar came, the mailing label did not, but the setup was so bad on the guitar that arrived that it was unplayable. Many more weeks of attempted contacts. I finally get through and Lenny promises to fix it all. He eventually shipped me a third guitar.

Third time's the charm. The guitar arrived and it was the one I ordered and it was set up well. Now I have three of his guitars and have only paid for one, plus I'm still missing the hard case I paid for. More weeks of trying to contact Lenny and he finally sent me a shipping label for one guitar. I sent back the one with the terrible setup and waited for another shipping label to show up. By that time, the horror stories were starting to show up in various forums. People were complaining about orders not be delivered, vintage guitars being sold on consignment and the money never getting back to the owners, vintage guitars being double-sold, etc. A lot of people lost a lot of money with Lenny. In the end I just kept the second guitar. I had been asking for the hard case he owed me for months and it never showed up. I may have been the last person to come out of a deal with Lenny with something positive to show for it because from the comments I was reading back then, it only got worse for people after that.

This situation feels just like those others. In both of those cases I don't think it was the intent of the either person involved to create a mess. I think both were well-intentioned, and I have no reason to believe Josh (despite his terrible interpersonal skills) has bad intentions. But I do worry that Josh has created a business model that is unsustainable in it's current state. It's certainly not meeting the needs of the customers since it's very clear we can put no faith at all in the shipping estimates we're given. Buying a piece of new gear should be a positive experience. Unfortunately, for many Stam customers the experience becomes one of regret and I'd bet money it's not going to improve any time soon.

Thanks for your advice

I certainly do understand the frustration but nobody is obligated to wait, nobody.
If you don't want too you can cancel and get a refund. If you choose too then great, I appreciate the patience and even sent a discount of 25% on any future order, if there is one, not to mention there is already a 200 USD discount for reserving.

Unfortunately I can't go any lower on the Pultec, most got it for 799 which is close to operation cost and parts or I would give a further discount on these units.

I was being honest and transparent when I said: "Trust me, this is emotionally much more frustrating and draining than it is for any client", I meant just that, that I am frustrated as well, I was not looking for empathy nor sympathy but portraying that I understand the frustration and that I am frustrated as well.

I am working as hard and fast as I can to get units out. If you guys don't like me or my business model you don't have to buy anything and we can part ways in a friendly manner, there is no need for all this drama. I have apologized to everybody over email, more than once, I have offered discounts and given the latest timeline based on my suppliers. If that is not enough then I am out of resources.

If you need to reach me email me, I don't think me posting here will help the situation

Peace out

Happy Thanksgiving everyone,
Stam- hang in there man! Things will get better.
Everyone else- production ramping is hell and torture! He's probably going through a zillion emotions every minute of every hour, and when those emotions take over it's better to say nothing at all than anything. I get it. I'm sending all you guys some positivity today! For Josh, I'm sure he's feeling he's in groundshog day where everyday repeats and there's no way out. Just try and survive until he's out of the tunnel. I wish I could help, seriously. I'd offer to help setup Stam USA and act as customer service if it made sense financially, but I get the impression it's just not a possibility right now. Things have to work through the pipes. Stay positive and healthy! Get sleep, don't drown sorrows in booze. Negativity will make production that much more unbearable, eventually it will start to be fun again. Hang in there folks! ....I'm sure when the mic is in your locker you'll all be happy.

Since my questions are about an issue that concerns more than just myself, I'd rather you answered it on this board and saved others the trouble of having to ask the same thing again.

There seem to be 2 constant problems
-delays
-not communicating

The delays would be understood if a line of communication was set in place. However, no matter how many times people say “hey man you need to communicate better”, it just doesn’t happen.

Instead, what the public is given is Joshua complaining about suppliers, or crying that he isn’t making any money on certain products because of the low price he offers on his gear.

Pretty easy to see the price point the gear is sold at leads to an impossible business model. Add in that Josh adds discounts for his delays and then takes preorders to fill the gap, customers that don’t get gear for close to a year, and you can easily see where things are going

Josh, just stop taking orders. Seriously - just stop. Build every piece you owe people, get it out the door, and start over with a new business model, cause your current situation doesn’t seem to be working for you or for your customers. You need to restructure, figure out your supply chain, and get a new game plan.

And I’m not picking on you. If you were a family member I’d tell you the same thing. I can imagine that this all takes on your personal life and I’m sure it sucks. Get it together. Fulfill orders, and start fresh.

Yes, 11 months. I won't make this too personal but I'll share part of my experience. It started to be "ready in one week" around late August. Then I was offered a very nice discount on a SA2A as an apology, which I took. That made me keep my SA67 order for almost three more months until I lost my faith. I was still offered the discounted SA2A, so I decided to go for it. I'm still owed a small refund as well. Arranging for shipping and the refund was supposed to happen more than one week ago, but then it took another 5 emails to get a response.

My last contact was a couple days ago, and I'm sure my piece will get shipped sometime before the end of the year. The refund is very small but it will probably happen as well.

Well, not to trot out excuses, but I believe we were told that there was a real problem with the tubes not failing but proving too noisy during their 2 day burn in and Joshua scrambling to sort that out. I haven’t read any reports of people who have their 67’s, being unhappy, but 11 months is an awfully long wait. Hopefully, you are appreciating the sa2a!

Not entirely certain being overly nice is going to speed up whatever you have on order, but good on for trying! LOL

stam, people will wait for your products, but your total arrogance and complete lack of ability to deal with your frustrated customers are killing your reputation and you don't seem to care enough to do anything about it because you think the quality of your stuff excludes you from having to act like a businessman. It's becoming fairly clear that you actually have no idea how to properly run a business. Your ill-advised summer tour was a bust and probably cost you a lot of money you can't afford to burn. You don't have a Black Friday special this year because I'm guessing you can't afford to do it this year. And your word when it comes to product delivery, is worthless.

I'm guessing you are over-extended, which is why you collect balance payments and still don't ship products for weeks. Lots of folks say you aren't ripping people off, and have no malicious intent, but I see it another way. I think you are taking advantage of all the goodwill all these good people have toward your business because you are drowning in debt and have no choice. I fear that when it all catches up with you, when the deposit money you've taken runs out, when a tax bill comes due that you cannot pay, Stam audio will just fold up silently in the night without warning, followed a few weeks later by a Facebook post in which you blame everyone else other than yourself. And then the folks who lost every cent of their deposits will never see their hard earned money back. What will you do after that? Your name will be mud in this industry.

So, for pete's sake, Stam. Get your sh*t together. Stop whining like a teenage girl. Get your products out the door. Get someone else to handle the customer interactions. Grow up. 

You are entitled to your opinion but I don't appreciate lies so as much as I don't want to carry on this argument I will rectify you.

We have 35 employees from  2 employees 3 years ago. I think we have done quite well and have ran the business just fine.

I am not sure what bust means. The Tour did not cost us any money, in fact, we made quite a bit of money out of it. You might want to grasp an understanding on how touring works.

We have not done a Black Friday sale because it would be disrespectful to offer a lower price on items when people have been waiting for a long time having paid a higher price for it. We did give everybody affected with the delay 25% up to 50% discounts on any order which is far more generous than a 10% discount on a black friday deal. We are talking about up to 1.500 USD on savings.

I agree with you with respect to delivery dates, we have been unable to provide reliable ones in the past and we are working on it.

We have no debt whatsoever, we have always requested installments on hardware units as it has been the business model from day one. If people don't want to and want to pay in full when the product is ready that is fine as well. We have never said they are mandatory but optional.

"I fear that when it all catches up with you, when the deposit money you've taken runs out, when a tax bill comes due that you cannot pay, Stam audio will just fold up silently in the night without warning, followed a few weeks later by a Facebook post in which you blame everyone else other than yourself."

You have quite some imagination .... a growing and booming company with an impeccable six year track record of never failing to deliver a unit or refunding a client does not disappear over night, in fact, we are expanding and continue to grow every month, we will be around for a very very long time.

I don't appreciate your offensive language or remarks but I won't answer in the same way, you can carry on now.

All the best!