Aug. 4, 2023

Tom Halchak (Blue Moon Harmonicas) interview

Tom Halchak joins me on episode 91.
Tom tells us how he grew his successful company, Blue Moon Harmonicas, started in 2009.
Tom started out selling custom combs, and then covers in different materials and colours. Tom went on to develop his customisation skills to offer fully fledged custom harmonicas using his Blue Moon product lines.
Tom also started offering pre-war Marine Band harmonicas for sale. These hand-crafted harps have stood the test of time and with some improvements by Tom, provide a playing experience which conjures the spirit of the players of the past.
As a result of his pre-war harmonicas trading, Tom now acts on behalf of the estate of Sonny Terry, offering Sonny’s actual harmonicas for sale, complete with the DNA of the great man himself, as well as a range of other memorabilia, such as concert posters and contracts.
Tom also prides himself in providing great service.

Links:

Blue Moon harmonicas:
https://bluemoonharmonicas.com/

Blue Moon Facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/BlueMoonHarmonicas

Sonny Terry harmonica collection:
https://bluemoonharmonicas.com/collections/sonny-terry-estate-llc

Videos:

Blue Moon instrumental by Whitt Smith:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7NGES1uduek

Range of harps available at Blue Moon:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXlrOo9qQKE

CNC Milling GM wood comb:
https://youtu.be/lhVFoRTDMjs

Jason Ricci video on Blue Moon products he uses:
https://youtu.be/PWrKgdGnhZE

Jason Ricci playing ‘Feel Good Funk’:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSAvtxrTbcc

Custom combs for Big River:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XcgQktZ8gDs

Adam Gussow appraisal of 150 of Sonny Terry’s harmonicas:
https://youtu.be/EDT4Xt70Omg

Sonny Terry tribute concert at SPAH 2016:
https://youtu.be/7ycKmefNKfg

Podcast website:
https://www.harmonicahappyhour.com

Donations:
If you want to make a voluntary donation to help support the running costs of the podcast then please use this link (or visit the podcast website link above):
https://paypal.me/harmonicahappyhour?locale.x=en_GB

or sign-up to a monthly subscription to the podcast:
https://www.buzzsprout.com/995536/support

Spotify Playlist:
Also check out the Spotify Playlist, which contains most of the songs discussed in the podcast:
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5QC6RF2VTfs4iPuasJBqwT?si=M-j3IkiISeefhR7ybm9qIQ

Podcast sponsors:
This podcast is sponsored by SEYDEL harmonicas - visit the oldest harmonica factory in the world at www.seydel1847.com or on Facebook or Instagram at SEYDEL HARMONICAS

Support the show

01:30 - Tom is based in Clearwater, Florida, and runs the Blue Moon harmonica company

01:43 - Business started out selling harmonica combs and how he started doing so

02:09 - Discovered the online community of harmonica and people requesting custom combs and experience buying own comb

04:18 - Started making own combs to sell, initially wood ones cut with a laser for Golden Melody, sold via eBay

04:40 - Combs were pre-made, ready to ship e pre-made, ready to ship

05:03 - Demand for the combs was instant and customers helped in the product development

05:27 - Started making the combs for other models besides the Golden Melody

05:51 - Tom’s day job was as a Financial Advisor, now retired, but liked to work with his hands and with wood

06:24 - Why do harmonica players want new combs?

07:27 - How do Blue Moon combs compare to stock combs from manufacturers

08:45 - The equipment Tom uses to make the combs is prohibitive for the harmonica manufacturers

09:15 - Uses a CNC milling machine to make the combs

10:56 - The precise cutting from the CNC milling machine is firstly entered into 3D modelling software

11:43 - The combs follow the same basic design as that from the manufacturers, but with some improvements made

11:57 - The custom comb industry started to replace the unsealed pear wood Marine Band combs

13:18 - Started using CNC Milling machine a year into production of the combs

13:56 - Harmonica players are happy to pay for a quality instrument and to repair their existing harmonicas

16:02 - Offers combs in 5 different materials, four of which are used by the major manufacturers

17:24 - The opinion on what difference comb materials make is divided, with possibly people’s hearing the differentiator

18:31 - Metal combs tend to be brighter, wood warmer, and plastic in the middle

19:40 - Plastic combs look cool as can be designed with different colours and patterns

19:51 - Blue Moon also sell custom covers, which come in various designs

19:59 - Adding own designs to covers is possible, but cost prohibitive

21:03 - What it takes to add a new comb, e.g. Golden Melody, to the Blue Moon product line

22:19 - Didn’t make any profit for the first three years Blue Moon was in business

22:32 - Posts new stock on Facebook page

23:04 - Has mostly retired from day job and focuses now on Blue Moon

23:45 - Tom is a classically trained clarinet player from his youth

23:50 - Initially planned to sell wood combs to replace plastic combs and the demand for different colours to identify keys

25:23 - Demand for different coloured combs gave Tom the idea to sell harmonica covers, using powder coating

25:49 - Started buying used / nearly new harmonicas and selling them in a ‘chop shop’ format

27:20 - Website created to start selling products instead of via eBay

28:00 - Started offering custom harmonicas, no longer selling used harmonicas

28:48 - Sold first batch of custom harmonica’s at a discount price to demonstrate them to his customer base

29:11 - Developed a business relationship with Hohner and Suzuki to start customising their harmonicas

29:29 - Early batches were just harmonicas with custom combs

30:09 - Developed customisation skills to then start offering fully fledged custom harmonicas

31:02 - Has some well known endorsers of Blue Moon products, including Jason Ricci and Rob Papparozzi

31:24 - How Tom developed his working relationship with Jason Ricci

32:07 - Jason approached Tom in 2015, initially for custom covers, and helped Tom develop harps set up for overdraws and overblows

34:03 - Jason Ricci played at Tom’s daughter’s wedding, with Tom jamming with him during the gig

35:02 - Blue Moon also sells pre-war Marine Bands, lovingly restored by Tom

36:16 - The mystique of the pre-war harmonicas sent Tom on the hunt for them and found them in plentiful supply

37:11 - The quality of the pre-war Marine Bands is high, as they were hand-made and they use softer brass

37:39 - Can see what sort of music was played on the pre-wars by how they are tarnished

38:12 - Get a sense of reverence playing the pre-wars

38:18 - Modifications Tom makes to pre-wars are generally to seal comb and replace nails with screws

38:48 - Reedwork carried out on the pre-wars

39:42 - Very selective on which pre-wars he buys now, to ensure he gets the quality ones

40:25 - How Tom came to hold the Sonny Terry estate to sell harmonicas from Sonny’s personal collection of harmonicas

42:22 - It was thought Tom could fix-up the Sonny Terry harmonicas a little before making them available for sale, but Tom didn’t want to amend them at all

42:48 - Also didn’t want to buy the estate, but just sell on behalf of the estate

43:43 - Arranged for a number of the harmonicas to be gifted to people who have supported Sonny’s music

44:00 - There’s an exhibit on Sonny Terry at the museum in Trossingen

44:16 - The Sonny Terry harmonicas are available to buy via the Blue Moon website

44:37 - People who buy them often share their stories of how they met or knew Sonny

45:01 - Sold in a presentation case, but you can access them to hold and play

46:02 - Provided with a certificate of authenticity

46:18 - The harps come with Sonny’s DNA!

46:28 - There was a Sonny Terry tribute concert at SPAH 2016, where some of the harmonicas from the estate were played

46:38 - Some of the estate harmonicas have been used extensively, some hardly played at all

47:54 - How many harmonicas were in the estate, how many sold and how many remain

48:20 - What kind of condition are the harmonicas in, especially the ones Sonny used a lot

50:29 - One person asked Tom to customise some of Sonny’s harps before purchasing

50:50 - Doesn’t know what songs or concerts Sonny used any of the harps on

51:45 - Also sells other memorabilia from the Sonny Terry estate, as Sonny’s wife collected lots of material from all the concerts, including contracts, clothing, cases, etc.

53:29 - Sonny toured extensively

54:05 - Tom’s own harmonica of choice: likes to try a range to check out his own wares, but Marine Band is probably the favourite

54:53 - Offers Blue Moon harmonics in different tunings, and the ones Tom uses

55:21 - Only sells 10 hole diatonics, not chromatics

55:39 - The different tunings available via Blue Moon website

56:02 - Tom offers great customer service

57:14 - The online harmonica community is very supportive

57:26 - Tom can help people with their GAS

WEBVTT

00:00:00.417 --> 00:00:02.475
Tom Halchak joins me on episode 91.

00:00:02.946 --> 00:00:07.849
Tom tells us how he grew successful company Blue Moon Harmonicas started in 2009.

00:00:08.551 --> 00:00:12.974
Tom started out selling custom comms and then covers in different materials and colours.

00:00:13.695 --> 00:00:20.080
Tom went on to develop his customisation skills to offer fully fledged custom harmonicas using his Blue Moon product lines.

00:00:20.681 --> 00:00:24.304
Tom also started offering pre-war marine band harmonicas for sale.

00:00:24.725 --> 00:00:49.051
These handcrafted harps have stood the test of time and with some improvements by Tom provide a playing experience which conjures the spirit of the players of the past As a result of his pre-war Harmonicas trading, Tom now acts on behalf of the estate of Sonny Terry, offering Sonny's actual Harmonicas for sale, complete with the DNA of the great man himself, as well as a range of other memorabilia, such as concert posters and contracts.

00:00:49.651 --> 00:00:52.935
Tom also prides himself in providing great customer service.

00:00:53.615 --> 00:00:56.079
This podcast is sponsored by Zeidel Harmonicas.

00:00:56.499 --> 00:01:05.822
Visit the oldest harmonica factory in the world, at www.zidel1847.com or on Facebook or Instagram at Zidel Harmonicas.

00:01:12.191 --> 00:01:26.209
Hello, Tom Halczak, and welcome to the podcast.

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Hello, Neil.

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Pleasure to be with you.

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Great to speak to you.

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So you are talking to us from Clearwater, Florida.

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That's correct.

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Great, and you run the Blue Moon Harmonica Company, which is why you're here with us today.

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So, Blue Moon, I remember, were you originally releasing combs?

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Is that how it all started?

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That's how it

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all started, yes.

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I started the business at the end of 2009, and I only

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made custom combs.

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And what got you into making custom combs?

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I've been playing the harmonica since 1972, never played with a band, never really was very serious about it, just recreational player.

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And somewhere along the lines of about 2006, maybe seven, I went onto the internet to do a search.

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I was trying to figure out what we now call second position.

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I had heard of this cross harp and I went onto the internet to look up a cross harp chart so I could figure out which harmonica to play when I wanted to jam with guitar players.

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And I discovered this whole world of the online harmonica community and I was immediately sucked into the vortex.

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I think the first website that I really started to frequent was heartbell.org.

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At that time, There seemed to be a lot of people who were looking for custom combs.

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Every couple of months, somebody would post a question and they would get some responses.

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You could buy them from this person or that person.

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And then things would come full circle and the original poster would report back to the group what their experience was.

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And it was almost always negative.

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Either the quality wasn't any good or the price was too high or the delivery time took longer than expected.

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Something along those lines.

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But then a couple of months later, the same question would appear again and it would start the whole cycle all over again.

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So in the back of my mind, I kept thinking that there was an opportunity there for somebody who might want to step in and fill that need.

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And so one day out of curiosity, I decided to see what the whole, what the big deal was about custom combs.

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So I was able to identify who at that time was reported to be the top guy in in the industry and I ordered a comb from him, my buying experience, to put it mildly, was just horrific.

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When I finally did get the product, which itself was not a bad product, but the service was so poor, I just looked at this comb that I'd gotten in the mail and I thought to myself, how much could it cost to make this?

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And I'd spent$50 for a custom-made comb and it took more than two months to arrive and I was not treated very nicely by the proprietor.

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And I just said, I think I can compete with this guy.

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And so I started to look for somebody who could help me make them.

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And in the summer of 2009, I found a guy who could cut them out of wood for me with a laser.

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I had some combs made.

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They were made out of maple and cherry, and they were only for the Golden Melody.

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And I put them on eBay.

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And my business plan was pretty simple.

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Instead of taking the order and then making the product after the order had come in, I thought that if I made them first and then offered them for sale, then I could at least ship them out the next day.

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And if I said, please and thank you, like my mom taught me, and I offered them at fair prices, I might be able to get some traction.

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And so I started selling on eBay.

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And I was immediately swarmed by Harmonica Player.

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It just absolutely blew me away.

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And they were very supportive of what I was doing.

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They all knew more than I did about custom combs.

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They were more educated on the subject than I was.

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So they actually called me on the phone, told me what I was doing wrong, told me what I was doing right, and I fixed what I was doing wrong.

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And then they asked me if I could make them for other models, the Marine Band, Special 20, Blues Harp, that sort of thing.

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And so I went from making two products to about 45 products within three months.

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to over 300 products within the first year and was 100%

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market-driven.

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Wow, so you got a lot of customer feedback and that really helped you develop your products as well.

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Yeah, I'd seen that elsewhere, yeah.

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Yeah.

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And so at this point, I mean, what did you do as your day job at that point?

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I'm a financial advisor.

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Right, so nothing to do with making combs or harmonicas or anything like that.

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You didn't have any particular skills in that area.

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You know, I've

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always been handy.

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I like to work with wood, building things.

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Yeah.

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I think that pretty much describes a lot of guys who like to tinker with the harmonicas.

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They may not have any specific skills relating to the harmonica, but they're not afraid to take something apart and put it back together.

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Sure, like you said, you had woodworking interests.

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So that was where you kind of came from, right?

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Like you say, you were swamped by inquiries and sales.

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So what do you think the great interest was in replacing the combs you get with your stock harmonicas?

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Well, a good

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question.

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I'm a capitalist, meaning that if you drive by a restaurant and there's a long line of people every day waiting to go inside, you have to conclude they probably have some pretty good food.

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Otherwise, it wouldn't be that many people who are supporting that business.

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The demand for custom combs is evidence in and of itself that a custom comb can improve the quality of the way the harmonica plays, the responsiveness, the airtight, the tone, whatever you want to say.

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So that demand was what kind of fueled everything, and I just tapped into it.

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It wasn't like I invented a better mousetrap and tried to convince people that what I was offering was superior to what they were already using.

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The demand was there.

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All I did was get in front of it.

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Yeah.

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I mean, I suppose to some extent, it's like people like to tinker, right?

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And they think they want to change it.

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But it's great.

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I mean, I think, you know, I've talked many times on here about the quality of harmonicas has gone up a lot over the last sort of 20 years of manufacturers doing a good job.

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So...

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It's interesting, again, that your combs, what advantage might you have over the stock ones?

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you've just said there right you don't necessarily think they're better but i do think they're better yeah

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but i can't give you any scientific evidence that would support that my only evidence that i have is that people keep buying them from

00:07:51.923 --> 00:08:11.922
me well i guess you are well we'll get into uh what you what you do exactly with your combs and then we'll we'll understand that closely but i guess you're spending more time making the combs right and they're more precise and they're probably flatter because in a factory produced comb from the harmonica manufacturers they they don't spend so much time right because it's expensive for them and you know takes time.

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I've done some workshops and here's how

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I put it to people.

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This is no disrespect to any of the manufacturers because they're in a different ball game that I am in.

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Their mission is not to make the very best product that they can possibly be made, because then they would price themselves out of the market.

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They have to find that happy medium between quality and low cost.

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So when you look at, say, for example, a Hohner Special 20, and you look at the comb, it's an injection molded plastic comb.

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How much does Hohner spend to make that comb?

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Maybe a dime?

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And so what I ask people is, look, if I gave you access to state-of-the-art 3D modeling software that would cost you$25,000 just to purchase the software, and then access to a CNC milling machine that they're making parts for the space industry, and a machinist with 40 years of experience running this piece of equipment, could you take advantage of that technology and come up with something that would be an improvement over what Homer spends a

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nickel on?

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I mean, could you?

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You use a CNC milling machine to do this, and CNC, I've been researching, Tom, stands for Computer Numerical Control Milling Machine.

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Correct.

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You've got a a video on your website which shows how this thing works.

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And I was pretty blown away by this.

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It's amazing, this machine, right?

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Explain a little bit about this machine.

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Well, it's computer technology.

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I mean, it's not leaving anything to chance where it's done by hand and it's subject to human inaccuracies.

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The machine is programmed to move.

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You've got an end mill, which is the cutting tool that moves in a very precise fashion, and it makes the parts My combs are all milled out of a solid block of material.

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So they're solid all through and through.

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There's no cavities in there, no skeleton structure like you see with the injection molded combs.

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I'm as fascinated by it as you are.

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I have a local machine shop that I have make all of my custom combs.

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I don't make them myself in my shop or in my garage.

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I don't have the skills.

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I don't have the technology.

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I leave that to the

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experts.

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So this machine that you use, and again, I'll put a link onto this video of this machine.

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It's incredible.

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It shows the accuracy.

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It's like to like two one thousandth of an inch and like one one thousandth of an inch in accuracy.

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So it's like really the margins on the combs that you make are incredible, right?

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And also it's all like very flat.

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So yeah, the machine is incredible.

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And so you program that in for each different type of comb, I take it.

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So you've got all, you know, sort of programs.

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Right.

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You set for the different ones, yeah.

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So did you come up with those programs or did the operators of the machine do that or...?

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The operators of the machine does that.

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He designs everything in a 3D modeling software.

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So we take precise measurements.

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We might do some 3D scanning.

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So first, you know, it's done in the virtual world and I'll sit with him and we're able to spin this comb around and look at it from every angle and make any changes that we want on the 3D modeling software first.

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And then we export that to what's called a G-code.

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Then the G-code is plugged into the CNC machine, you have to program the sequence.

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If you've You watch the video, you've seen that there's a very specific sequence, step by step by step.

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And then we pop out a prototype and slap it on a set of reed plates and see how it works.

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And if it doesn't, we go back to the drawing board and try again.

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You know, a lot of it is, for all intents and purposes, mimicking, you know, what the manufacturer's already made, but with some refinements that are designed to make the combs more comfortable to hold, more comfortable to play, more rounded.

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You know, the whole custom comb industry started with the Marine Band.

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And we all know, if you've been playing the harmonica for any period of time, that prior to 2011, the Marine Band pairwood combs were not sealed.

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And so when you would play them, they would absorb the moisture from your breath and they would expand.

00:12:14.572 --> 00:12:21.120
The tips of the tines of the combs would stick out and expose your lips and your tongue to sharp edges.

00:12:21.139 --> 00:12:26.245
Many a harmonica player had a bloody mouth at the end of the night after they got done playing.

00:12:26.765 --> 00:13:00.221
And that's what created the whole industry was that we'll call it a manufacturer's defect whether that meant taking apart the marine band and and sealing that comb with people would use beeswax or butcher block oil or shellac or whatever and then reassembling the harmonica with the original pearwood comb that's how it started yeah but then guys started you know making them with uh out of other types of wood and other types of material and the quality of those combs at that time was kind of limited by what type of technology they had available.

00:13:00.261 --> 00:13:11.793
If you're cutting something with a coping saw in your garage and you compare that to CNC milling, you know, you might be able to make a couple of them by hand in your garage that would be suitable.

00:13:11.933 --> 00:13:18.561
But if you want to decide offering them to other harmonica players as a commercial entity, it's tough to keep up with the quality.

00:13:18.922 --> 00:13:21.845
At what point did you start using the CMC machine?

00:13:22.044 --> 00:13:23.706
Well, probably about a year.

00:13:23.726 --> 00:13:26.950
Initially, the first combs that I made were all laser cut.

00:13:27.250 --> 00:13:37.201
And then the guy who was doing my laser cutting introduced me to a friend of his that owned a CNC machine shop and he made some combs for me out of aluminum.

00:13:37.601 --> 00:13:44.349
And I could see immediately that the aluminum combs were much more precise than the laser cut.

00:13:44.509 --> 00:13:51.096
So it wasn't long thereafter that I started having everything done with CNC and I abandoned the laser cutting.

00:13:51.316 --> 00:13:52.817
And I think it's, you know, it's great what you did.

00:13:52.837 --> 00:14:10.173
We talked about, you know, the quality of these compared to the manufacturers, but I think all us harmonica players, we know it's not the most expensive instrument generally but I think you know people are serious about it they're happy to pay the money to get a good quality instrument right so it's well worth paying for that yeah and that's why a lot of people for sure you know are happy to do so

00:14:10.552 --> 00:14:20.043
I agree with that I mean listen I charge$50 for a special 20 comb And to buy a brand new Special 20 costs you less than$50.

00:14:20.104 --> 00:14:27.854
So nobody is more surprised than I am that people are willing to pay$50 for a comb that goes on a$45 harmonica, but they do.

00:14:28.195 --> 00:14:41.932
But what has happened, I think, in the harmonica world is that the trend or the accepted practice was to buy inexpensive harps, blow them out, throw them away, and buy more harps.

00:14:42.332 --> 00:14:45.437
And as harmonicas got more expensive, then...

00:14:45.889 --> 00:14:49.232
it made more sense to start trying to fix them and repair them.

00:14:49.533 --> 00:14:57.519
And then now when you get into customization, if only one reed blows out, well, then you can just replace one reed and the other 19 reeds are still fine.

00:14:57.779 --> 00:15:02.063
The trend has become to invest in quality and then maintain it.

00:15:02.464 --> 00:15:22.062
You know, we've all been through the crapshoot of buying a harmonica and it doesn't play well, but we put up with it because you spent your$20 or$30 on it and you might have three or four A harps or three or four C harps and this This one's your favorite, and the next one's your second favorite, and the last two are only ones you'll play in the case of emergency.

00:15:22.363 --> 00:15:31.653
So you're spending money anyway, and you're putting up with oftentimes harps that are either just either not made very well or just not set up very well for that particular player.

00:15:31.793 --> 00:15:43.264
So when you either take the time to adjust your own harp or install a custom comb or buy a custom harmonica, then you're always playing something that plays well and should last longer because you don't have to play it as hard.

00:15:43.806 --> 00:15:48.990
And when it breaks, since you've got so much money invested in it, then it pays to repair it.

00:15:49.471 --> 00:15:54.037
Even if you just have a custom comb on it, you might throw away the reed plate, but you wouldn't throw away a comb.

00:15:54.076 --> 00:15:56.278
You can just install that comb on another set of reed

00:15:56.298 --> 00:15:56.519
plates.

00:15:56.759 --> 00:16:01.884
We'll just finish off talking about combs, but you have moved into other areas, which we'll get into in this.

00:16:02.546 --> 00:16:04.168
But yeah, just finish off about combs then.

00:16:04.227 --> 00:16:08.351
So you do offer them now in five different materials.

00:16:08.913 --> 00:16:09.413
That's correct.

00:16:09.833 --> 00:16:17.024
Yeah, DuPont, Corian, Fancy Acrylic, Aircraft Grade, Anodized Aluminium Brass, and phenolic resin.

00:16:17.083 --> 00:16:18.548
So, you know, what's the difference with these?

00:16:18.629 --> 00:16:21.359
Is it a case of, you know, how they sound and feel?

00:16:21.759 --> 00:16:23.807
Oh, you're opening up another can of worms,

00:16:23.886 --> 00:16:24.107
Neil.

00:16:24.990 --> 00:16:36.900
Again, I will tell you that I make no claims about on my website or any of my comments that I post on Facebook about, you know, one material sounding better than the other.

00:16:37.081 --> 00:16:38.121
It's all market demand.

00:16:38.142 --> 00:16:45.408
If you look at the major manufacturers, all of them make combs out of pretty much the same materials that I make.

00:16:45.849 --> 00:16:46.970
They all make wood combs.

00:16:47.149 --> 00:16:48.471
They all make aluminum combs.

00:16:48.510 --> 00:16:50.413
Suzuki makes a ProMaster comb.

00:16:50.732 --> 00:16:53.316
Hohner makes a Meister Class out of an aluminum comb.

00:16:53.576 --> 00:16:55.557
They all make a brass combed instrument.

00:16:55.758 --> 00:16:59.000
Suzuki makes an instrument with a chrome-plated brass comb.

00:16:59.461 --> 00:17:03.806
Hohner has an Amadeus chromatic that has a brass comb.

00:17:04.046 --> 00:17:06.628
There are plenty of brass combed harmonicas out there.

00:17:07.249 --> 00:17:09.111
They make some sort of a composite.

00:17:09.211 --> 00:17:11.193
Suzuki Manji is a composite comb.

00:17:11.493 --> 00:17:14.317
And they make them out of plastic, which acrylic is basically a plastic.

00:17:14.396 --> 00:17:20.784
So I'm not really reinventing the wheel in terms of introducing materials, maybe other than DuPont, Corian.

00:17:21.084 --> 00:17:24.688
So people buy combs for their own reasons.

00:17:24.948 --> 00:17:34.959
The harmonica world is pretty evenly divided between between those who say that comb material makes no difference whatsoever in the tone and those who say it does.

00:17:35.298 --> 00:17:38.962
And I've been in the middle of those conversations for the past 13 years.

00:17:39.304 --> 00:17:42.988
My conclusion is that some people have better hearing than others.

00:17:43.647 --> 00:17:47.612
You know, there are people who are tone deaf and there are people who have perfect pitch.

00:17:48.093 --> 00:17:50.516
So it's black and white and you have various shades of gray.

00:17:50.576 --> 00:17:52.037
Most people live in the gray space.

00:17:52.557 --> 00:18:05.039
I have a pretty good ear, but it really should come as no surprise that somebody who earns their living as a professional musician would have a better ear than I do and would be able to hear subtle overtones that perhaps I can't hear.

00:18:05.180 --> 00:18:28.941
So the people who say that there is no difference, well, as far as I'm concerned, they're telling the truth because they don't hear the difference yeah people who were saying that there is a difference they're also telling the truth because they can hear a difference and it's an argument that will never be satisfied but it doesn't really matter to me because you know if you prefer brass versus wood or uh aluminum versus corian

00:18:29.461 --> 00:18:29.521
it

00:18:29.561 --> 00:18:29.801
doesn't

00:18:29.842 --> 00:18:53.483
matter to me i make them all well i mean certainly for my years you know i've used metal combs and you know your brass one i think that those ones to me sound brighter i mean i think that yeah that that seems to be and then the wooden ones obviously traditionally was in the marine bands and people kind of like it for that reason probably does sound a little bit warmer so i think generally you could say that couldn't you i mean that the plastics You know, what about the plastics between the wood and metal?

00:18:53.503 --> 00:18:57.347
Because I think there are clear differences between the wood and metal that maybe the plastics sit in the middle.

00:18:57.667 --> 00:18:59.489
Yep, I would agree with that entirely.

00:19:00.210 --> 00:19:07.175
And bear in mind that when you say a metal comb like a brass comb sounds brighter, that doesn't mean it's better or worse.

00:19:07.276 --> 00:19:08.257
It's just different.

00:19:08.497 --> 00:19:11.839
If you prefer a brighter tone, well, then it'll sound better to you.

00:19:12.079 --> 00:19:16.144
If you don't like a brighter tone, well, then it won't sound as good to you.

00:19:16.344 --> 00:19:17.565
So it's a subjective thing.

00:19:17.585 --> 00:19:19.026
It's according to your taste.

00:19:19.105 --> 00:19:20.847
So it's not a better or worse situation.

00:19:20.847 --> 00:19:21.949
but it is a difference.

00:19:22.169 --> 00:19:31.819
When you take into consideration the many thousands of emails and conversations I've had with people, that what you have described has become the consensus.

00:19:31.960 --> 00:19:33.020
Metal combs are brighter.

00:19:33.040 --> 00:19:35.182
Wood combs have a warmer tone.

00:19:35.222 --> 00:19:39.968
The acrylic and the Corian are a little brighter than the wood, but not as bright as

00:19:40.008 --> 00:19:40.348
the metal.

00:19:40.669 --> 00:19:50.539
So on the other thing that they do, which you also do, is that they also look very cool, particularly the plastic ones, because you can sort of make them different colors and different patterns and all that kind of cool stuff.

00:19:50.579 --> 00:19:50.799
Yes.

00:19:50.799 --> 00:19:51.099
Yeah.

00:19:51.520 --> 00:19:54.284
Which brings me on to you also make custom covers.

00:19:54.545 --> 00:19:54.724
Right.

00:19:54.924 --> 00:19:57.228
You know, you can have these colored in any sort of way.

00:19:57.268 --> 00:20:00.612
You've got ones obviously with American flags, but basically anything, right?

00:20:00.632 --> 00:20:04.215
If someone sends you a picture, can you have that kind of put onto the comb?

00:20:04.576 --> 00:20:15.089
Well, it's possible to do it, but it's cost prohibitive because to make one-off items, you have to go through the expense of having the film made.

00:20:15.362 --> 00:20:18.444
just to produce one item, it would be impractical.

00:20:18.724 --> 00:20:18.865
But

00:20:19.246 --> 00:20:20.067
theoretically, yes.

00:20:20.626 --> 00:20:22.189
But generally, they're stock.

00:20:22.229 --> 00:20:24.651
Like you say, you make stock ones which work.

00:20:24.851 --> 00:20:25.152
Right.

00:20:25.211 --> 00:20:29.234
Well, I have to make a best guess about what people will like and what will sell.

00:20:29.655 --> 00:20:31.837
My business, I'm often amazed.

00:20:32.358 --> 00:20:44.190
I do business all over the world, and I'll get an order for a custom aluminum comb for a marine band from Germany or from England or from France.

00:20:44.354 --> 00:21:15.862
canada and i'm thinking there's nobody else in germany who can make a cnc milled aluminum comb for a marine van not as good as yours tom well honestly i don't think that's the issue i mean i'd like to think that that what i make is very high quality but the reality is it's an economical limitation because if i was to design a new comb today for example the the hunter just came out with a new version of the golden melody yeah which i'm sure that at some point in time i will make kind for that harmonica.

00:21:16.102 --> 00:21:19.365
It's completely different from the old version, so it requires a new design.

00:21:19.665 --> 00:21:39.807
But for me to step up and make that comb, I'm going to have to pay my machinist for his work to do the designing, and then I have to pay for the prototyping, and then once I've got that in place, machine shops are not very fond of making five or ten of whatever it is they're producing.

00:21:40.087 --> 00:21:46.454
There's a cost factor involved in setting up a CNC machine to cut any anything, including harmonica combs.

00:21:46.575 --> 00:21:50.840
And so once they said, look, they want to run 100 or 200 or 300 of these things.

00:21:51.161 --> 00:21:56.428
So when you add up all of that, say, well, okay, that only cost, you know, pick a number.

00:21:56.468 --> 00:21:59.712
Maybe it costs$20 to make a comb, but you got to make 200 of them.

00:21:59.893 --> 00:22:00.232
Yeah.

00:22:00.252 --> 00:22:05.599
So now you're spending$4,000, not including the design costs and the prototyping costs.

00:22:06.020 --> 00:22:14.728
And so when other people look at that, they say, Do I want to spend$4,000 or do I just want to buy one from Blue Moon for$40?

00:22:14.827 --> 00:22:15.931
That's why people come to me.

00:22:16.191 --> 00:22:19.759
And obviously you've got to pay that cost up front confident that you're going to sell them, right?

00:22:19.878 --> 00:22:22.002
Well, the first three years that I was

00:22:22.063 --> 00:22:24.548
in business, I didn't take a penny out of my business.

00:22:24.828 --> 00:22:30.246
I just kept reinvesting what I made back into more inventory and expanding my line.

00:22:30.546 --> 00:22:46.986
You know, if you've been to my Facebook page, whenever I get a fresh batch of combs, I'll post it on my Facebook page to let people know that I've restocked because people are looking for, you know, whether it's an aluminum comb or a brass comb or an acrylic comb, I'll let them know that, okay, I've got them.

00:22:47.567 --> 00:22:54.898
But every time I post a picture of a box of of harmonica combs, there's at least two or three or$4,000 in that box.

00:22:55.179 --> 00:22:57.546
And the reality is not everybody can do that.

00:22:57.645 --> 00:23:00.093
And that's why I have enjoyed

00:23:00.133 --> 00:23:01.738
the success that I have.

00:23:02.210 --> 00:23:02.650
Definitely.

00:23:02.690 --> 00:23:02.971
Yeah.

00:23:03.010 --> 00:23:03.490
No, absolutely.

00:23:03.510 --> 00:23:04.612
You built it up well.

00:23:04.652 --> 00:23:05.712
You still got your day job.

00:23:06.113 --> 00:23:07.795
I have pretty much retired

00:23:07.914 --> 00:23:09.977
from my day job about two years ago.

00:23:10.277 --> 00:23:16.702
My wife and I own our practice and my son graduated from college with a finance degree.

00:23:17.022 --> 00:23:20.586
And so he joined the practice a couple of years ago and I backed away.

00:23:20.645 --> 00:23:22.827
And so now I spend my time in my

00:23:22.887 --> 00:23:23.648
harmonica shop.

00:23:24.189 --> 00:23:24.409
Great.

00:23:24.429 --> 00:23:26.151
Devoting yourself to the harmonica.

00:23:26.171 --> 00:23:26.770
So that's great.

00:23:27.152 --> 00:23:27.612
So, okay.

00:23:27.632 --> 00:23:29.894
So you do these covers and they come in various materials.

00:23:29.913 --> 00:23:38.462
And I guess it's the same answer that, you know, Do they make you sound better or is it the case that they play well and maybe they move nicely under your lips?

00:23:38.742 --> 00:23:41.286
I'll tell you how it all came about going

00:23:41.346 --> 00:23:43.268
back to the colorful combs.

00:23:43.969 --> 00:23:46.751
I grew up playing the clarinet.

00:23:46.791 --> 00:23:48.894
I'm a classically trained clarinet player.

00:23:49.875 --> 00:23:57.663
And my observation, my initial plan when I got into the comb business was that I thought that wood combs would sound better than plastic combs.

00:23:57.722 --> 00:24:03.630
So I, okay, I'll make a golden melody comb out of wood, we'll replace the plastic, it'll improve the tone.

00:24:03.670 --> 00:24:05.792
That was my original business plan.

00:24:05.953 --> 00:24:15.827
The guy who was cutting my combs with the laser equipment, one day I went to his shop to pick up a batch of combs and he presented me with some combs he had cut out of pieces of acrylic.

00:24:16.648 --> 00:24:17.770
I was very skeptical.

00:24:18.191 --> 00:24:22.057
Who would replace the original plastic gold melty comb with another piece of plastic?

00:24:22.336 --> 00:24:28.266
And he had cut them out of four colors, black, white, crystal clear, and this hideous fluorescent green.

00:24:28.577 --> 00:24:30.862
And I said, who's going to buy these?

00:24:31.222 --> 00:24:32.945
And at that time, I was selling on eBay.

00:24:32.965 --> 00:24:36.231
It costs maybe a dollar to put up a listing.

00:24:36.432 --> 00:24:37.734
He said, well, what do you got to lose?

00:24:37.835 --> 00:24:38.556
Put them up on eBay.

00:24:38.596 --> 00:24:39.518
If they sell, they sell.

00:24:39.557 --> 00:24:40.640
If they don't sell, they don't sell.

00:24:41.121 --> 00:24:42.502
And so I put them up on eBay.

00:24:42.763 --> 00:24:45.849
And then Hideous Green outsold everything else combined.

00:24:45.910 --> 00:24:47.092
So it shows you how much I know.

00:24:47.112 --> 00:24:52.521
And then I started getting emails from guys asking me if I...

00:24:52.801 --> 00:24:54.064
had more colors available.

00:24:54.124 --> 00:25:00.492
One of the emails came from a fellow named Jamie Gardner, who's a Hohner and Dorsey and very nice guy, very fine player.

00:25:00.613 --> 00:25:03.056
And I was like, well, I make four different colors.

00:25:03.115 --> 00:25:03.876
Isn't four enough?

00:25:04.498 --> 00:25:07.823
No, I want to make a key coding chart for my market.

00:25:07.843 --> 00:25:09.105
There's different color in every key.

00:25:09.125 --> 00:25:10.386
I was like, okay.

00:25:10.747 --> 00:25:14.692
So I went out and bought more acrylic and I started offering 16 different colors.

00:25:15.032 --> 00:25:28.355
And then when I realized that people were buying different colors as a means of identifying their keys, I thought to myself, well, the most visible part of the harmonica is not the comb, it's the cover.

00:25:28.817 --> 00:25:35.723
And so once again, my friend who owned the laser shop introduced me to another friend of his that did powder coating.

00:25:36.045 --> 00:25:41.450
So I took apart a whole bunch of harmonicas that I had, took them down to this powder coater and had them powder coat.

00:25:41.470 --> 00:25:42.290
They'd be different colors.

00:25:42.451 --> 00:25:43.192
See how they turned out?

00:25:43.251 --> 00:25:44.212
And they came out beautifully.

00:25:45.034 --> 00:25:49.211
So I said, okay, I'll expand my offerings.

00:25:49.590 --> 00:26:01.928
Now, if you go to the Hohner C shop, no disrespect to them, but if you want to buy a set of cover plates for a special 20, it'll cost you 20 or$25, something like that.

00:26:01.988 --> 00:26:07.295
Same thing is true for the Golden Melody or the Marine Band or Blues Harp, whatever.

00:26:07.816 --> 00:26:17.868
So it's cost prohibitive for me to buy brand new covers from Hohner, invest the money in powder coating, and then try to resell them and make a profit.

00:26:17.989 --> 00:26:25.997
So I started looking on eBay and I started buying used harmonicas on eBay, thinking I can clean them up and repurpose them.

00:26:26.017 --> 00:26:31.107
And so I started buying bunches and bunches and bunches of harmonicas on eBay.

00:26:31.127 --> 00:26:39.705
And almost all of the harmonicas that I purchased, they were advertised as either used and many of them said for parts only.

00:26:39.938 --> 00:26:42.260
which was perfect because I was just cannibalizing them.

00:26:43.261 --> 00:26:49.451
But then what I found is that most of the harmonicas that I was buying off of V-Bay were new.

00:26:49.871 --> 00:26:54.237
You take the covers off, you could see no staining on the reed plates, no signs of use whatsoever.

00:26:54.277 --> 00:26:59.844
And so I felt perfectly comfortable just kind of cleaning these up with a little soap and water.

00:26:59.864 --> 00:27:04.190
And then in addition to offering the covers, I was offering harmonicas.

00:27:04.385 --> 00:27:05.626
the reed plates to people.

00:27:05.747 --> 00:27:08.670
So in the United States, we have something called a chop shop.

00:27:08.710 --> 00:27:13.074
And that's where you take a car and you cut it up into the pieces and sell it off as parts.

00:27:13.153 --> 00:27:14.634
And it's worth more than the car.

00:27:14.654 --> 00:27:16.375
So I was basically operating a chop shop.

00:27:17.116 --> 00:27:18.557
I was powder coating the covers.

00:27:18.577 --> 00:27:20.599
I was repurposing the reed plates.

00:27:21.019 --> 00:27:25.744
And then I had someone build me a website where it was kind of a build-a-bear.

00:27:25.785 --> 00:27:33.451
You could go onto my website and you could pick out which model, which color comb, which key reed plates, and which color covers.

00:27:33.490 --> 00:27:36.038
And I I would build it for you for$45.

00:27:36.180 --> 00:27:38.047
I knew nothing about reed work.

00:27:38.589 --> 00:27:45.688
I was just taking apart used harmonicas, cleaning them up, getting the covers powder coated, and then putting them back together again.

00:27:45.748 --> 00:27:52.718
I knew enough for my playing, you know, if they sounded good or if a reed was broken, I wouldn't use those reed plates.

00:27:52.778 --> 00:27:54.760
If they sounded out of tune, I wouldn't use those.

00:27:54.961 --> 00:27:57.384
But I had hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of harmonicas.

00:27:57.465 --> 00:28:00.369
So I had, you know, plenty to choose from.

00:28:00.710 --> 00:28:04.155
So did these evolve then into your custom harmonica?

00:28:04.175 --> 00:28:04.797
Absolutely.

00:28:05.057 --> 00:28:05.156
Right.

00:28:05.657 --> 00:28:10.144
I did the used harmonica thing for probably a couple of years and sold lots of them.

00:28:10.184 --> 00:28:12.749
Ultimately, it led to a couple of things.

00:28:12.788 --> 00:28:22.994
Number one, it became very difficult for me to replenish my stock because I was literally at the mercy of what I could find on eBay, whether it was the model or the condition or the keys.

00:28:23.075 --> 00:28:24.836
So I was at the mercy of what I could find.

00:28:24.875 --> 00:28:36.326
The other thing was that reed plates, which maybe in the beginning I didn't use because one of the reeds was broken or because it was out of tune, it forced me to learn how to tune reed plates.

00:28:36.366 --> 00:28:41.231
It forced me to learn how to repair them so I could extract the value from them.

00:28:41.551 --> 00:28:52.030
But after a couple of years, I decided that I wanted to get out of the used harmonica business, so I had accumulated a long list of customers.

00:28:52.531 --> 00:28:54.212
And I sent them all an email.

00:28:54.333 --> 00:28:57.816
I took every set of reed plates and covers that I had.

00:28:57.836 --> 00:29:05.123
And I built, oh, I don't know, about 100, 125 harmonicas and sent all my customers an email.

00:29:05.163 --> 00:29:06.384
I thanked them for their support.

00:29:06.683 --> 00:29:09.747
And I sold these hard for$15 or$20 a piece.

00:29:09.807 --> 00:29:11.448
And of course, they flew off the shelves.

00:29:11.688 --> 00:29:13.048
So I drew a line in the sand.

00:29:13.250 --> 00:29:17.073
And then for that point, I managed to secure a relationship with Hohner.

00:29:17.093 --> 00:29:20.655
And then later, I met the people at Suzuki when I went to the Spock convention.

00:29:20.655 --> 00:29:29.449
and became a Hohner dealer and a Suzuki dealer and started building harmonicas using brand new parts instead of the used parts.

00:29:29.788 --> 00:29:31.432
You do the customization yourself then?

00:29:31.832 --> 00:29:32.071
Yes.

00:29:32.353 --> 00:29:36.679
Well, initially, I went from the used harps to new harps.

00:29:37.319 --> 00:29:44.230
And for all intents and purposes, the harmonicas that I was selling were little more than stock harmonicas on custom combs.

00:29:44.410 --> 00:29:45.751
And I advertised them as such.

00:29:45.791 --> 00:29:47.914
I didn't exaggerate what they were.

00:29:47.934 --> 00:29:49.557
I even struggled...

00:29:49.953 --> 00:29:57.440
with what to call them because out of respect for the established customizers, I couldn't call them custom harmonicas.

00:29:57.780 --> 00:29:58.500
But what were they?

00:29:58.540 --> 00:30:00.423
You know, they weren't stock and they weren't custom.

00:30:00.442 --> 00:30:02.003
They were somewhere in between.

00:30:02.023 --> 00:30:09.131
And I got a lot of orders because just through the installation of a custom comb, it did improve the performance.

00:30:09.411 --> 00:30:19.318
But then I learned, you know, to flat sand draw plates and to tune their instruments and to emboss the reed slots and all the other things that we do as customizers.

00:30:19.400 --> 00:30:23.482
So I was getting lots and lots and lots of practice because I was getting lots of orders.

00:30:24.203 --> 00:30:33.632
And my customers were always getting a little more than what they paid for because I wasn't charging them for customization, but I was starting to do customization.

00:30:33.652 --> 00:30:40.538
And over time, my productivity went down because it was taking me longer to build each harp.

00:30:40.877 --> 00:30:44.801
So I had to raise my prices, but nobody objected because the quality was better.

00:30:44.821 --> 00:30:59.521
And so I went through that whole cycle several times over a a few years, where as I learned how to do more, and I got lots and lots of practice, because I was getting a lot of orders, the quality improved, the prices went up,

00:31:00.022 --> 00:31:01.584
and here I am today.

00:31:01.604 --> 00:31:31.016
And you've got some great endorsers of your products, including the great Jason Ritchie, who's very much a user of your harmonicas, and has put a lot, plenty of videos, and you know, showing which ones are used, and I'll put some links up to that, and so yeah, so you've got Jason, and you've all got Rob Paparazzi, and I've interviewed Rob, he talks a how he uses big river harps with your combs and yeah you got ronny shellis so various players so well you know what about jason tells about how you formed that relationship with jason he um he actually played at your uh daughter's wedding didn't he

00:31:31.375 --> 00:31:51.708
that's right that's right jason has been such a wonderful uh experience for me uh he's such a dear friend you know a lot of guys are gearheads i affectionately call them harmonica nerds or harmonica geeks they are We're all searching for the ultimate sound and the ultimate instrument and so on and so forth.

00:31:52.028 --> 00:31:54.089
And Jason had been following me.

00:31:54.109 --> 00:31:58.535
And of course, Jason's been in the industry for much, much longer than I have.

00:31:58.595 --> 00:32:03.559
And he's seen other companies come and go, other people that had tried and failed.

00:32:04.101 --> 00:32:05.561

Tom Halchak (Blue Moon Harmonicas) interview

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