Guitar retailers striking melodious chord with girls

ANAHEIM, CALIF.

“I want it” squealed 13-year-old Hiiaka Kaneao, pointing to a sparkly, hot pink, star-shaped bass guitar hanging inside a pink fur-lined booth.

Her high-pitched voice is music to the ears of the guitar’s maker, Daisy Rock Guitars.

The Los Angeles retailer’s colorful and smaller-sized guitars for girls and women have gained worldwide popularity in the last several years and signaled a growing trend within the traditionally male-dominated guitar industry.

“The industry is looking for growth opportunities given the overall slump in guitar sales. Guitars catering to women is one area that we understand is showing some signs of strength,” says Wall Street analyst Rick Nelson, who covers the industry.

The country’s two top guitar retailers, Gibson Guitar Corp. and Fender Musical Instruments Corp., have each debuted lines with a girl/woman-friendly focus over the past few years.

Gibson has the thinner-necked, lighter-weight Les Paul Vixen and Les Paul Goddess guitars.

Fender has its own Hello Kitty guitars, with the iconic cat splashed across the bodies.

Women playing guitar is nothing new or unusual. Joan Jett, Bonnie Raitt and Sheryl Crow have been fierce players for years, Courtney Love pounded out rock riffs in her popular ‘90s band Hole, India.Arie’s acoustic guitar has become her trademark, and even Madonna has strummed the strings. But for the most part, revered guitar gods have been men, from Jimi Hendrix to Eric Clapton.

Why the surge of girl guitars now?

“Ten years ago, statistics showed that 96 percent of the instruments purchased were for men,” says Gibson Chairman and CEO Henry Juszkiewicz over the phone. “The guitar is now becoming more a part of society in general.”

There have been guitars aimed at youngsters before: Fender, via its Squier imprint, offers a kid pack, and Epiphone offers a smaller-sized child’s guitar around the holidays that’s more like a toy, according to a guitar seller at the music retailer Guitar Center in Hollywood.

But Daisy Rock says its low-cost, lean and light line of electric and acoustic instruments jump-started the push specifically for girls. Guitars range from girly butterfly- heart- and daisy-shaped gear for younger girls to glossy red, black, purple and pink standard guitars for women.

Daisy Rock reported 2006 sales of $2.4 million — a feat for the business, which Tish Ciravolo, herself a bassist, started in 2000 after sketching with her then-baby daughter, Nicole.

“She drew this daisy, and then I drew a neck on it, and then a leafy headstock on it, and I thought, ‘This might change the industry,’ ” Mrs. Ciravolo says.

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