To add to that, the author of this article seemed to forgot (or probably just did not know) that there are more guitar companies, which some of them are better IMO (musicman, suhr, ibanez, etc) than it used to. It "might" be true that guitar sales are declining in general, but IMO more and more guitar players these days are becoming smarter (or practical) than becoming fanboys of these top three makers. More guitar players have access to "very" cheap brands, and not to mention the "chinese clones"