Recommended but sadly not perfect on this occasion.
This was my second order with TFOA. The first order was PERFECT and the staff went above and beyond what I would normally expect. They took pictures of the exact guitar I made enquiries about and sent them to me within minutes. They also reserved the guitar for me until I made up my mind. I even got a nice goody bag with a coffee mug and some other stuff! Definitely a five star experience.
Now, for my second order with TFOA... Still good but unfortunately there were a couple of glitches along the way:
I had actually contacted them about this particular guitar a couple of months ago when it was out of stock. They promised me they would reserve it for me and notify me as soon as it came back in stock. I never heard from them which is a bit disappointing. I just happened to notice that the guitar was back in stock.
The box came with a sticker saying the guitar had been set up by one of their professional luthiers. I guess that person must have had a bad day. Don't get me wrong, I totally understand why it makes sense to ship guitars with slightly higher action than many players would want. That's perfectly fine but in this case the nut slot for the B-string was also WAY higher than the rest. I'm sorry but this is not acceptable when a guitar is said to have been set up by a pro luthier. Fortunately this was no big deal to me as I work at a guitar workshop and do setups like these on an almost daily basis but most guitarists don't have the necessary tools (or skills) for this.
Apart from these two complaints I'm very happy and to be fair, even a flawed setup is better than no setup at all which is what most online guitar stores offer.
Fast shipping, excellent packaging and a wonderful guitar! I will have no reservations about ordering from TFOA again but to be perfectly honest, if this had been my first experience with them I'm not sure I would come back.
