Gear has gone "Signature-Mania"

[Alndln2]

It seems every peice of gear these days has someones "signature" on it, mostly guitars but it seems to be branching out. Yesterday(Fri.) I walked into both Sam Ash and GC(needed a rack plate) and also noticed not one single bargain guitar in either store, it was all Fenders/Gibsons/PRS etc., in fact the cheapest guitar I saw that day was an Ibanez for around $500.00 and they were all practically "Signature" guitars mostly. A year ago it was mostly $99.00 Mexican or Chineese Fenders or Epiphones with nobody's name on them, and they outnumbered the American made guitars. It seems overnight that they cleared both stores of those and switched to the American made models with higher price tags and "Signatures". I'm wondering if Gibson and Fender are puling a fast one here(), or if they suddenly got disgusted with China and Mexico. Anyway, before I left I picked up a set of strings(GHS) and when I went home I took them out of the bag and noticed...... GHS Heavyweight Boomers, "Slash" "Signature" strings.