Price compare USA v Our Handmade cues

[platt]

How can they charge so much for these American Pool cue, after looking at them been made on youtube everything is machine cut (inlays and so on) i hope you understand were i'm coming from, But with a handmade snooker cue, the maker put in hours of work, skill and feel to get the finished product.
Whats yours veiws, whats the better value ?

[KeithinFrance]

Difficult to compare them, as it's like comparing apples and oranges, isn't it? I know where you're coming from with the handmade argument, but don't forget that the yanks probably spend just as much time when making one of their top of the line cues and they've got very expensive machinery to write off on top of it all.

[MattCash]

IMO americans seem to be attracted to the technological side of cues, using new materials, how ergonomic they are etc instead of how the cues are crafted by hand with minimal use of machines in a traditional method. As for the price, i don't see why US pool cues are the price they are, as it seems machinery is a big part in production for them.

[KeithinFrance]

IMO americans seem to be attracted to the technological side of cues, using new materials, how ergonomic they are etc instead of how the cues are crafted by hand with minimal use of machines in a traditional method. As for the price, i don't see why US pool cues are the price they are, as it seems machinery is a big part in production for them.

That's part of the reason they're so expensive, Matt, they've got to write off the cost of the machines, so the price gets bumped up.

[MattCash]

but what i'm saying is US cues IMO can't be better quality than a handmade cue if they are all produced aided by machines. I understand that the costs of using the machinery will affect the price of the cues, but in relation of quality to price they cant be that good.

[KeithinFrance]

Even our "handmade" cues are made with the help of machines to some extent or another, and I'm pretty sure that it's not to make a worse cue! Lol. I'm also pretty sure that using machines, run by people's knowledge, can help to make a better cue; more precise, more consistent and "calculated" to be perfect.

The Yanks are really into the machine side of things and if they think that'll help them have a better cue then more power to their cueing arms!

Over this side of the pond, we think that having a wee guy shut away in a workshop with some tools and bits of wood, and no machines, will give us the perfect cue! It's a myth. It's not the reality any more. As far as I know, only one cuemaker doesn't use machines at all in his cuemaking process, but he sure does use tools.

At the end of the day, I think that the price of the cue reflects the time and costs of the maker as he judges fit and as the customer judges fit, too. If there was no market for expensive US cues, then nobody'd make them, but cuemakers do and lots of people buy them. That proves something, alright.

[MattCash]

Even our "handmade" cues are made with the help of machines to some extent or another, and I'm pretty sure that it's not to make a worse cue! Lol.

Yeah i know, but what i meant was, most of the cues on this side of the pond aren't assisted by machines at the same extent as US cues. And i do see the use of machinery as an advantage, but hand crafting cues requires skill, knowledge, experience etc. Whereas these aren't the exact same requirements of using machinery.

[KeithinFrance]

hand crafting cues requires skill, knowledge, experience etc. Whereas these aren't the exact same requirements of using machinery

I think you still need skill, knowledge, experience to programme the machines, otherwise really anybody could do it! However, once the machines are correctly programmed, then anybody could do it, I guess.

I believe that somewhere along the line the expert's input will be invaluable but in the UK it's all along the line, whereas in the USA, perhaps after a certain point the expert could become redundant.

[eaoin11]

I play both 9 ball and snooker in Japan and have wondered about the same thing.

I agree that comparing snooker cues to 9 ball cues is like chalk and cheese, but I think the 9 ball cues should be more expensive. The butt, joint, ferrule and shaft need to be of high quality due to the demands of hitting a much heavier cue ball.

Surprisingly a lot of the players I've met here say they paid around 400,000 yen (2900 gbp with the yen being very strong right now) for their custom pool cues.

I thought that was outlandish, until when I recently found a snooker hall in Kokura, I learned that two of my 3 playing partners had paid the same amount for snooker cues made by Adam cues in japan. The third guy has a Parris (good example) which cost him less than half that amount.

The two Adam cues have very nice shafts, good taper and finish, but not a single decorative splice. The Adam craftsman apparently emigrated from europe but I don't know his name.

One of the Adam cues is ash, the other a peice of maple the like of which I have never seen before. It has about 20 very even and straight 'chevrons' when most maple shafts have no distinctive pattern at all. Perhaps it's old growth maple from the bottom of lake michigan but I don't know.

[KeithinFrance]

Wow! £2900 for pool cues seems a lot, even from a master craftsman making a custom pool cue with ivory etc, but the same amount for a plain butt Adam cue, that's insane! Even if he has found maple with chevrons ( ) I can't see how he can ask that amount for a simple snooker cue! He's definitely found the right marketplace!

Having said that, even if your 3rd playing partner has a good Parris, he paid upwards of £1000 for it, which is also way over the odds, unless it's a full snakewood butt with snakewood splicing over ebony veneers with an ivory badge!!

Someone is making a huge amount of money out of your friends!

[Jonny]

Wow! £2900 for pool cues seems a lot,

typo, 290 lol

[ChatLag]

For hip joint prosthesis I am happy that they are not done by hand but with machines.
I think it is the same like with watches: Highly industrial products like quartz watches are obviousely better than mechanical watches (though they are in most of the cases machine made or unpayable).
But the watches and the cues do not have that soul like you find it in handmade products.
From the technical side the machined cues might be better and more consistent in terms of quality.
But the handmade ones do have this blood sweat and tears appeal of their maker.
Or in some cases marketing people play that piano and try to sell us that.

[eaoin11]

typo, 290 lol

Not a typo, 100yen is about 75p. I used the currency converter website. The cost of the Parris cue was probably less than 1000 at the time because the pound was much stronger until last year. Customs was probably expensive in Japan.

Someone did make a lot of money out of those two. I originally suspected that Adam outsourced the snooker cues and put their own badge on them, then wacked on a healthy agent's fee.

To be fair the custom cues made by Adam in Japan probably shouldn't be compared to their cheaper mass produced stuff made elsewhere. The Japanese pay a lot but they expect quality.

It would be a lucrative market for UK makers if the market weren't so small (about 40 tables in the whole country) and players weren't willing to pay huge amounts to 'buy japan'.