Build It Like a Legend:
The Fender Mod Shop
AND THE AMERICAN DESIGN EXPERIENCE
From their modular designs to their interchangeable pickups, Stratocasters are built for personalization. After all, Leo Fender believed a guitar should be something the player wants to play—something that suits them perfectly. His dedication to both form and function helped him create some of the most successful and beloved instruments of the 20th century. That same philosophy led to the Stratocaster’s unique modular design, allowing players to modify various elements quickly and easily.
This was the philosophy behind the Fender American Design Experience, which began in 2011 at the Fender Visitor Center in Corona, adjacent to Fender’s factory. There, players could hand-select instrument bodies and necks and personally design their own unique guitar—built to their specs and delivered within a matter of months.
“We live in an era of personalization, and few things make a greater statement about people than the music they listen to – your music and how it represents your individual identity.
Fender’s entire existence embodies that very concept, because its instruments have always been modular in construction, which has always made them ideal for individual personalization. And the American Design Experience is the next level of that whole concept – built to an individual player’s specs straight from the factory floor.”Justin Norvell,
Vice President of Marketing for Fender
Since March 2014, Fender has offered this program exclusively to customers in the United States through an innovative guitar builder interface on its website.
Users could choose body and neck styles, materials, hardware, finishes, pickup and electronics configurations, and more—leading to over a million possible design combinations. It was easy to swap out bodies, necks, and hardware and instantly see the results. When it came to sound, each pickup and wood option included a description of its unique sonic characteristics.
“In many ways the American Design Experience fulfills an ideal held by Leo Fender himself when he started experimenting in the ’40s and ’50s, laying the foundation of what would soon become iconic musical instruments,” said Justin Norvell. “Essentially, modularity was built into Fender guitars and basses from the very beginning. As the company grew, we’ve tried to stay close to these roots. The Internet affords the opportunity to increase that scale for more people. But every customization has always been nothing more than a couple of screws away. This further levels the playing field where you can build a signature instrument to your specs.”
Once a user designed their dream guitar, they could save their creation, download a high-resolution desktop wallpaper, and purchase it.
Each guitar came with Fender’s limited lifetime warranty, a hardshell case, a certificate of authenticity with a dedicated serial number, an official Fender product manual, a collectible American Design Experience booklet, a strap, polishing cloth, instrument cable, and adjustment wrenches.
The Mod Shop
However, according to Fender CEO Andy Mooney, 1.3 million options proved to be overwhelming for consumers. So, in June 2016, Fender reimagined the concept as the Mod Shop, initially narrowing the choices down to 70,000—later expanding to 110,000 by 2019.
“The big changes that we made are that we made the consumer interface much easier to navigate, and we cut the delivery time down from 90 days to 30 days. Because even though you personalize it, you can wait for so long, but not 90 days,” said Andy.
With the new Mod Shop, each instrument underwent six points of hands-on inspection to ensure it matched the customer’s exact specifications—before and after buffing, during body and neck assembly, and throughout the wiring and setup process.
Every Mod Shop order also included a personalized spec sheet, so the customer knew they were getting exactly what they ordered.
