5 Fun Facts About the PRS SE Series

At PRS Guitars we take pride in crafting high quality guitars that both look and sound great, and our factory in Stevensville, Maryland works hard every day to fulfill this mission. This idea doesn't only apply to Maryland-made products, but also our SE Series which provides players of any skill level an affordable guitar without compromise.

This blog highlights just a few ways the SE Series stands out from the pack - from continuously upgrading features, to best practices, and how we are committed to quality.

While SE guitars are manufactured in our Indonesia factory, any instrument meant to be sold in North America is first sent to our headquarters where employees use the same inspection techniques as our Maryland-made products downstairs! The SE inspection team is responsible for ensuring the guitars are up to specifications, checking things like: neck relief, string height, intonation, fit and finish, electronics, and more. We've also worked with our teams at PRS Europe, PRS Japan, and worldwide distributors on the same inspection process, so every SE is playable right out of the gig bag! This is a step we are proud to take in order to deliver you a quality instrument you can rely on and love.

You can learn more about the day-to-day operations of an SE Inspector in this Employee Spotlight!

Before an SE guitar can be inspected, it has to be built! Fortunately over the past 10 years we have cultivated a close relationship with P.T. Cort in Indonesia, the company that handles all manufacturing of SE guitars. Cort has a factory dedicated to building SE guitars, and every instrument they manufacture has not only Paul Reed Smith's name on it but also theirs, a testament to the pride and hard work that goes in to every guitar. The P.T. Cort factory may be an ocean away, but they remain a vital part of our company that we continue to work with because of our mutual dedication to crafting affordable, quality instruments.

Take a look inside our Indonesia factory in this exclusive virtual tour!

While troubleshooting and best practices can be done virtually, there's nothing better than face-to-face time to help improve production processes or solve persisting issues. That's why we value inviting members of the Indonesia-based P.T. Cort team to Stevensville to see our own manufacturing process, and see what sort of idea could be implemented back in their factory to continue elevating the SE Series. We also send employees from our headquarters in Maryland to Indonedsia to get hands-on time training our partners and seeing how improvements have been applied. Cross training in each other's factories is critical in keeping a strong relationship between PRS and our partners at P.T. Cort, as SE guitars would not be possible without the collaboration between our companies.

Take an inside look at two employees' experience with cross training in this blog!

Since the launch of the SE Series in 2001 this line of guitars has evolved to encompass over 20 different models, including electric, acoustic, semi-hollow, and hollowbody offerings! In addition, we also offer 12 SE signature models from 7 PRS Artists, starting with Santana who was one of the pioneers of the SE Series years ago. A variety of body styles isn't the only thing the SE Series offers. We believe quality instruments should be accessible to guitarists at any price point, a key driver in the development and release of the SE CE 24 Standard Satin, our first SE model under $500. We aim to continue expanding the SE Series to offer choices that appeal to beginners and professionals alike.

You can take a deeper look at our SE Signature offerings and learn more about what makes a great first guitar in the following blog!

The goal of the SE Series has always been to give players an affordable option without compromising the quality of the instrument; however, over the years we have been able to take strides to further improve SE instruments without incurring further costs on the product. Changes to the SE Series over the years include adding our iconic bird inlays, changing headstocks to feature the PRS Signature logo, manufacturing guitars with a shallow violin top carve, and most recently swapping our previous controls for lampshade knobs.

In all, the SE Series has grown significantly over the past 20 years. An SE model when we launched the series in 2001 would look, and sound, very different from a model today! We are very proud of every instrument that has our name attached to it, and equally proud of the collaboration with P.T. Cort that goes into making these affordable models a reality for guitar players across the globe.

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PRS Chief Operating Officer Jack Higginbotham guest authored a blog detailing our manifesto behind the scenes of SE production, you can read it here!