The only Taylor I own - a 414ce - has no bear claw in the top. I have two Martins, an HD28 and a D16 "knock around," neither has any bear claw. I have 4 different Spanish-made flamenco guitars, the most expensive one, a Hermones Conde negra, does have bear claw, none of the others, (Ramierez, Bellido, Marzal) do. When I was at the Conde shop in Madrid some years back where I bought the guitar, I looked at probably 15 different Conde flamencos, some blanca, some negra. Some had bear claw, some did not; there was no association re bear claw/price. IOW, the price was the same for whatever model guitar whether it had bear claw or not. I picked my negra based on the fact that it sounded great and it was the only negra they had in the shop that they had made with Brazilian rosewood as opposed to EI so it had a different look from their standard negra.
The bear claw thing is, IMO, totally a matter of visual taste. Some folks like the look and some don't. I do think that if someone custom orders a guitar, so that he/she won't see it until it arrives, it would seem an appropriate "customer service" for a guitar shop/company to have an option re that so the purchaser isn't surprised. Either an ordering option or a notation in the order form, or whatever, that a top may or may not have bear claw. I would be upset to discover that a special-order guitar had bear claw in the top if I didn't say I wanted it. However, if you just ordered "regular" guitars on line - not custom orders - then you pretty much get what you get. That is, of course, one of the disadvantages of buying on-line, you don't see beforehand exactly what you are buying so there can be an element of surprise.
