House of Guitars — Local services in Town of Irondequoit

Ordered Roland FP-80 keyboard, stand, foot pedals and bench PROS: Attentive, One-on-one, low biased customer service, beat online/competitors pricing by about 10%, easy ordering and fast shipping. CONS: Very slight bias toward Yamaha keyboards over Roland, wide delivery window, no shipping to home address option

DETAILS: On January 25th and 27th I visited the House of Guitars around 7:30 PM to test the keyboards they had available. I was given one-on-one attention by one of their employees. They have a huge selection of digital keyboards, with low end boards to higher end boards. The selection is significantly higher than the Guitar Center. Most of the keyboards weren't plugged in, but the employee directed to keyboards in my price range. Most of the keyboards they have lean toward digital mixing and stage performances. I was interested primarily in keyboards that simply felt and sounded like a real piano, but for a lower cost and more portability.

EXPERIENCE:There was trouble getting power to the keyboards, as there are so many up there, but the employee worked very hard to get power to all of the keyboards I played. The area with the keyboards was also very cluttered with drums and other musical equipment. (Later when I picked up my keyboard, they significantly ordered everything in the area and appeared improve the area). However, the real thing that matters is the music. ;) I found a Roland keyboard that I was liked quite a bit and a comparable Yamaha (CP-40 and CP-50). I was able to play different keyboards to get a feel for them and returned two days later to revisit my options. They only had a Roland keyboard with the ivory feel-g key weighting, which many people online consider a bit sluggish. I ended up ordering a Roland with an ivory feel-s key weighting. I can only perceptibly notice the difference. I wish I could have played them side-by-side to get a better comparison. However, I couldn't notice much sluggishness and felt that I would be happy with the model higher up.

The employee who worked with me gave relatively non-biased comparisons between the two (such as how one keyboard had slightly better bass sound) and tried to gauge what I was feeling. They were extremely chill and gave me ample time to test the keyboards; they actually encouraged me to think about the decision before I went through with a purchase. They had me test a couple different Yamaha keyboards, I feel in part because (1) they had more Yamaha keyboards in stock (which makes financial sense), (2) in most cases it is good to test an expensive instrument before you order it, and (3) it could be partially from my internal concern that they are biased when I see more of one brand than another. The recommendations were what I was looking for and never pushed hard. In the end, they quoted me a price of the FP-80 that was about 10% less than an online price. Roland would take roughly 5-10 business days to ship the keyboard, potentially up to a month, and couldn't be shipped to my address. House of Guitars received the keyboard in 5 business days, which might have been luck or good shipping on Roland's part. When I picked up the keyboard, an employee helped me load the keyboard and accessories into my vehicle. I was a bit concerned that it might not come with a music rest, and an employee empathetically said to call them if I needed a music rest.

CONCLUSION: I am extremely happy with my experience at the House of Guitars and couldn't recommend any music store better than them. The employees were all extremely kind, helpful, and knowledgeable. I sensed a very small amount of bias toward the Yamaha keyboards they stocked; just always remember to order what you want, and keep in mind you want to order something fun! They were able to get my the Roland FP-80 at a fantastic price (better than any online price) and a quick ship time (although maybe not as fast as some online sites would be capable). I strongly recommend House of Guitars for any music purchase because of the great customer service...

As an Irondequoit local this has become my favorite store in town. There's a wide selection of musical stuff, not just guitars but other instruments too. In fact this place could double as a museum as I've found things here I didn't even know existed (like a giant bass mandolin or a bass ukulele). All the male employees upstairs are really cool and helpful, they seem to really love their job and want to go the extra mile for people looking at guitars (with the exception of the older female who works there sometimes who isn't friendly at all lol so I stay away from her). Recently I was talking to the guys about a guitar there that I kept coming in to see and had been saving up for and didn't want anyone else to buy. They said that they did layaway for 90 days, and I said I needed more time than that because my vehicle had just broken down and I kept getting hit with expenses for repairs and such and didn't want to put it on layaway and then lose the money I'd put down because I couldn't come up with the rest in time...So what did they do? They said they would set it aside for me anyway and let me come in with the money when I had it! It's such a weight off my mind because I'm already married to that guitar emotionally lol. These guys are some of the best salesmen I've ever met. I love how they have such a low pressure, customer is always right attitude. They don't give you any sales pitches or anything like that, they just act like they will bend over backwards for you like no salesman ever does. And they make you feel right at home in the store and don't treat you like an interloper if you are just coming in to window shop and play guitars to see how they sound. My two favorite employees to deal with there are Gavin and Mikey, make sure you ask for them they are really great guys to talk to about music.

The owner of the record store downstairs is also really cool to talk to and is like an encyclopedia of musical knowledge and stories and I look forward to seeing him anytime I pass through, and recommend you do as well - his name is Armand and he's the one wearing the sport coat.

Lastly, there's the custom shop up on the top floor which does really great work at a competitive price. You can bring them any kind of guitar in any kind of condition and they can help. Be it fixing just a slight fret buzz or a garbled sounding humbucker, or fixing a guitar that's totally busted, or building a custom guitar from scratch (they have helped me with all of these things before and more). They really know the guitar inside out. And they are very personable too and I look forward to seeing them...

We visit here from Michigan about once or twice a year. The positives: the instruments are super cool. The store seems to be famous and has a lot of overall clout. So there’s a presence of nostalgia and historical Easter eggs all over, like the wall with famous band signatures and many framed pictures with signatures on them. Employees are really relaxed and helpful. I also like that they have a treasure trove of records. The negatives: The records in the basement are suuuuuuper chaotic and disorganized to a point of being a bite of a hazard. We come here to look at records and buy but we aren’t buying things that aren’t treated right. It immediately drains me when I see such an amazing collection of records getting flat out trashed. There are records all over the floor, in broken boxes, in rickety stands, buried in actual trash(empty boxes and packing material), records sitting on top of each other instead of upright, like they are supposed to be, or buried in completely inaccessible places. I am short so reaching records is very hard and I tripped on several records and boxes on the floor. I think anyone with a physical disability will not be able to access this place at all, which is a shame to exclude anyone from the treasure here. I get frustrated and disoriented and forget what I was even looking for. Idk maybe I’m imagining things but just thinking if people don’t have to dig and go through this amount of time wasting trouble to find things; they would buy more. I know I would probably buy loads of records if I can easily access them. I’d rather spend my time sifting through nice organized records than spending hours literally diving 🤿in piles of poorly taken care of records to maybe find something. Part of the ritual is sifting through nicely organized records hearing the swoosh of the sleeves as you flick through calmly knowing that your time is spent looking in a box you know. The reassurance that the records were treated right by the store would go a VERY long way. Stroke the...