Westone is a brand of guitars and basses started in the mid-1970s. The firm Saint Louis Music acquired an interest in the company in 1981 and began importing the brand to the U.S. as a replacement brand-name for the Custom Kraft-brand instruments manufactured by Kay and Valco in the mid-1950s. Electra was also a brand of Saint Louis Music. In 1984, they merged the brands to make the Electra-Westone brand. From 1985 onwards, the guitars were branded as Westone. The majority of the Westone guitars of the 1980s were made by the Matsumoku factory in Japan and imported by Saint Louis Music. After about 1988 production moved to Korea, most of the innovative models disappeared, and the brand name was replaced by Alvarez in 1991.