Buying saxes online

This is the question I get asked most. Should I buy this sax? - Mostly something found online on a non music website, and often abroad.

I'm going to try and answer this so that it may help interested saxophone players in future. I am also going to try to answer this in a way that can be helpful to anyone, whether they know about saxophones or not.

Firstly there is an easy way to answer this without having to delve into models and technical issues.

Imagine you were buying a car:

Would you buy a car online without having seen it, let alone tested or driven it?

Would you buy a car not knowing the person selling it?

Would you buy a car not knowing the correct price to pay?

Would you buy a car that was an an unknown model or company to you?

Would you buy a car from a website that doesn't specialize in cars?

I think you can see where I am going here!

Ask your self those questions and put sax instead of car and you have the answer pretty quickly. One doesn't even need to start thinking of saxophone brands let alone looking at details such as specific models and other issues.

I hope that has helped.