[3] The first Guild workshop was located in Manhattan, New York, where Dronge (who soon took over full ownership) focused on electric and acoustic archtop jazz guitars.

Much of the initial workforce consisted of former Epiphone workers who lost their jobs following their 1951 strike and the subsequent relocation of the company from Queens to Philadelphia.

[4] Rapid expansion forced the company to move to much larger quarters, on Newark St. in Hoboken, New Jersey, in the old R. Neumann Leathers building.

[5] The advent of the folk music craze in the early 1960s had shifted the company into production of an important line of acoustic folk and blues guitars, including a dreadnought series (D-40, D-50 and, later, D-55) that competed successfully with Martin's D-18 and D-28 models, and jumbo and Grand Concert "F" models that were particularly popular with blues guitarists such as Dave Van Ronk.

Notable also was the Guild 12-string guitar, which used a Jumbo "F" body and dual truss rods in the neck to produce a workhorse instrument with a deep, rich tone distinctive from the chimier twelve-strings put out by Martin.

The company continued to expand, and was sold to the Avnet Corporation, which moved production to Westerly, Rhode Island, in 1966.

Inspired by seeing Muddy Waters, Ross Hannaford acquired a Thunderbird, which he used extensively in the period that he played in popular Australian 1970s band Daddy Cool.

Guild also successfully manufactured the first dreadnought acoustic guitar with a "cut-away" in its lower shoulder to allow better access to the upper frets, the D40-C.

While instrument specialists generally concede that quality suffered at other American competitors, Guild models from the 1970s and 1980s are considered[by whom?]

In the 1980s, Guild introduced a series of Superstrat solid bodies including models such as the Flyer, Aviator, Liberator and Detonator, the Tele-style T-200 and T-250 (endorsed by Roy Buchanan) and the Pilot Bass, available in fretted, fretless, and 4- and 5-string versions.

These guitars were the first Guild instruments to bear slim pointed headstocks, sometimes called "pointy droopy", "duck foot" and "cake knife" for their distinctive shape.

In 2011, Traditional Series models' were improved by means of a new DTAR pickup system (DTAR-MS, for 'multi-source'), which allows blending between an internal microphone element and an under-saddle transducer.

The DeArmond line also included other less expensive models similar in design to the Guild reissues and manufactured in Indonesia.

These guitars featured poly finishes (as opposed to traditional nitrocellulose lacquer on US models) and nondescript wood grading.

This choice caused confusion for buyers, as it marked the first time that an import had actually donned the Guild brand name, which had previously only been used to describe US-made guitars.

With Cordoba taking over as owners of the Guild brand, as of May, 2015, the GAD line-up was discontinued,[8] but two newly formed lines, Westerly Collection (acoustics) and Newark Street (electrics) were revealed, which also aimed to pay homage Guild's production history that took place at those locations (with the Newark Street address alluding to a link with the Hoboken factory).