The company expands

However, the purchase did not include the rights to the name American Dream, so the company was initially renamed Westland Music Company. However, due to the size of the logo for the headstocks of the instruments, a shorter name was needed. It was therefore decided to call the company Taylor, especially as Bob Taylor was the actual guitar maker. Kurt Listug took over the financial and commercial aspects, while Bob Taylor was responsible for the design and production.

In 1976, the company decided to expand and made its guitars available to other retailers. Kurt then regularly set out to sell directly to other retailers. Taylor's proximity to Los Angeles, coupled with the influential dealers there, put Taylor guitars in the hands of some notable artists. Fred Walecki, the owner of Westwood Music, sold Taylors to David Crosby, JD Souther and many other artists.

Against the change in music

Taylor's early endeavours to turn instrument making into a successful business were made even more difficult by the changing music trends of the late 70s and early 80s. Acoustic guitars lost their appeal as pop music moved from the singer-songwriter era to disco, punk and new wave, and synthesisers and electric guitars began to play an important role in pop and rock music.
Larger acoustic guitar manufacturers such as Martin, Gibson and Guild suffered the biggest losses, but smaller companies were not immune. Fortunately, Bob's guitars and Kurt's contacts with the dealers helped the company gain a foothold, as Bob recalls. ‘The dealers are guitar lovers at heart, and they loved the shape and feel of our guitar necks, the brilliant and balanced sound, and our craftsmanship. They bought guitars because they wanted to, and fortunately they kept acoustic guitar playing alive during those years, no matter how unpopular it had become.’

The Andy Powers era

Bob Taylor wanted to ensure that guitar design would remain a central theme at Taylor for decades to come. So in 2011, he hired Andy Powers as his successor in the design department. Andy's arrival ushered in a series of tone-enhancing guitar innovations at Taylor. Over the course of the decade, Andy reworked the entire Taylor guitar line to create a wider range of musical personalities. He introduced new body shapes, groundbreaking new intonation architectures such as his patented V-Class bracing, and the Builder's Edition, an ultra-premium guitar class that combines tonal improvements with ergonomic playing characteristics to provide the ultimate playing experience in sound and feel.

When Andy took over responsibility for design, Bob was able to invest more time and energy into environmental initiatives to secure the future of the natural resources we depend on. These included the ebony project in Cameroon, which evolved into a comprehensive ebony planting and reforestation programme, the restoration of native forests in Hawaii, including koa research and reforestation, and a socially responsible partnership with one of California's largest arborists to make guitars from discarded urban trees.

In May 2022, Andy Powers was named President and CEO, while Bob and Kurt formally became Senior Advisors and Co-Chairs of the Taylor Guitars Board. Andy also retains the title of Chief Guitar Designer, so we can continue to expect new, exciting Taylor models and innovations.

Koa reforestation

Hawaiian koa has long been a revered natural resource in Hawaiian culture. Koa grows exclusively in Hawaii and has been used for thousands of years for culturally important items such as canoes and paddles and more recently for fine furniture, art and musical instruments. Koa enjoys a special reputation among lovers of ukuleles and guitars. The beauty of koa, with its rich colours, grains and in some cases glossy finishes, as well as its distinctive sound profile, has made it one of the most popular guitar woods in Taylor's range for several decades.
Over the past two centuries, Hawaii's original forests have gradually dwindled due to a number of factors - primarily the conversion of land to agricultural land for large-scale sugar and pineapple production, grazing land for cattle farming and the introduction of wildlife such as sheep, deer and goats. Without fencing, naturally sprouting young trees are often trampled or eaten by grazing animals.

The good news is that more and more measures such as fencing, tree planting, weed control and firebreaks are being taken to restore Hawaii's native forests. The desire to support these restoration efforts led Taylor and one of his timber suppliers, Pacific Rim Tonewoods, to form a joint venture called Siglo Tonewoods in 2015. Like Bob Taylor, PRT founder Steve McMinn is a thought leader who recognises the value of responsible forest stewardship, and his team has been at the forefront of several research projects aimed at better understanding the genetics and propagation of koa, spruce and maple lines that are coveted by luthiers. Siglo Tonewoods is committed to combining the selective harvesting of koa trees with collaborative forest restoration projects, including the planting of koa trees, to ensure their long-term vitality.

Urban Wood: Giving the city's trees a second life

Traditionally, guitar woods have been sourced from around the world, from natural forests in North, Central and South America, West Africa, India, Europe and Australia, for example. Taylor has now also explored the possibility of sourcing wood from its own backyard in Southern California and is pioneering the use of discarded urban trees. Some species are already familiar to guitar makers, while others are being used for the first time in the music world. All are excellent tonewoods.

After careful consideration, a local arborist, West Coast Arborists, Inc. turned out to be the perfect partner. The company provides professional tree care and management services to nearly 300 public agencies, including cities and counties throughout California and Arizona, and cares for over six million trees. The company had the right combination of tree volume and quality to provide the predictability Taylor needed to make it work. Each year, the WCA plants about 20,000 new trees. Until about the year 2000, most of the trees they removed at the request of a city were sold as firewood or disposed of in a landfill. To reduce disposal costs, the WCA began separating the wood by species at their sorting yard and sealing the ends of large logs to prevent cracking. They also purchased a portable wood-miser sawmill and started their own urban wood recycling initiative called Street Tree Revival. As luck would have it, Taylor and WCA struck up a conversation around this time.

Bob Taylor and Andy Powers visited one of the WCA grading facilities in Ontario, California, where they surveyed the tree population and found several promising species, including Shamel Ash. After cutting and drying some of the wood, Andy built prototypes with great results, so Taylor decided to design a model and add it to the Taylor line.
In early 2020, Taylor introduced the first model with urban wood - the Builder's Edition 324ce with shamel ash back and sides, renamed Urban Ash to draw attention to this new initiative. Since then, further guitar models have been built with Urban Ash and a separate series with another urban wood species, Red Ironbark Eucalyptus, has been introduced.