@kenjit
No one is forcing you or anyone to buy speakers if they think they are overpriced. And of course, there is arguably overpriced gear out there, and buying used often yields bargains as monied buyers scratch their itches often and sell like-new gear at a deep discount.
Some hi-fi makers are "overnight" successes after 10, 20 years of hard work for low wages. Some are better marketers (the hype) than manufacturers, but that bubble often bursts.
A good case study is Richard Vandersteen. He did design a bit better mousetrap with the 2CE (though not the first to do phase alignment, iirc) and has sold over 100k of the Model 2’s because they sound great and are a very good value. The profits--with the economy of scale building many of them--from the Model 2 have been plowed into his constantly evolving lineup, and now his Model 7 is considered one of the great very high end speakers. He hasn’t rested on his laurels, and in the meantime he’s employed many people and made dealers money. He has a speaker for almost every budget. I had my last pair of Model 2’s for 20 years, so they cost me $85 per year for pure pleasure. If you bought a pair of Quatro CTs today and kept them for 20 years they would cost you about $850 a year and still be worth a few grand. If your bought a $40k car and kept it for 20 years, it would cost you $2000 a year (before gas, insurance and maintenance, so really $4-5000 per year or more) and be worth almost nothing in many cases. If you ride the bus, "you" maybe could afford Vandersteen 7’s. ONE example.
Is there overpriced hi-fi gear? A very respected designer I know personally makes a world-class preamp that he couldn’t sell directly for $8000, and at that price, relative to the quality and the competition and the level of system it rates, it is not overpriced. He got a distributor who DOUBLED the price to $16,000 and now he can’t build them fast enough at twice the price. Rich people are strange. They want bragging rights so some equipment doesn’t appeal because it’s not expensive enough (which makes them ripe for fleecing)! Bling sells in the Asia market, and sonics may take a backseat to that.
We all get to make our own choices how to allocate discretionary income. I see guys with fishing boats that are $75-100k, who get to use them maybe 30 days a year and *maybe* catch some salmon or halibut, and I can go to Costco and buy it for <$20 a pound. My modest $10,000 audio system (an amount that friends, who think their Bluetooth speaker is fine, think is insane) is a bargain in comparison. Theirs sounds like crap and my good sounding system gives me 100X the pleasure, for me. It’s a bargain, and a much more reasonable indulgence than cars, horses, gambling, multiple wives, or any number of other vices!
re High end speakers are priced far higher than they cost to make. This is greediness.You seem to think that profit is a dirty word. There is often a large amount of work, R&D, startup costs and risk to bring a product to market. The reward is profit if it succeeds. The risk is financial loss or even catastrophe.
No one is forcing you or anyone to buy speakers if they think they are overpriced. And of course, there is arguably overpriced gear out there, and buying used often yields bargains as monied buyers scratch their itches often and sell like-new gear at a deep discount.
Some hi-fi makers are "overnight" successes after 10, 20 years of hard work for low wages. Some are better marketers (the hype) than manufacturers, but that bubble often bursts.
A good case study is Richard Vandersteen. He did design a bit better mousetrap with the 2CE (though not the first to do phase alignment, iirc) and has sold over 100k of the Model 2’s because they sound great and are a very good value. The profits--with the economy of scale building many of them--from the Model 2 have been plowed into his constantly evolving lineup, and now his Model 7 is considered one of the great very high end speakers. He hasn’t rested on his laurels, and in the meantime he’s employed many people and made dealers money. He has a speaker for almost every budget. I had my last pair of Model 2’s for 20 years, so they cost me $85 per year for pure pleasure. If you bought a pair of Quatro CTs today and kept them for 20 years they would cost you about $850 a year and still be worth a few grand. If your bought a $40k car and kept it for 20 years, it would cost you $2000 a year (before gas, insurance and maintenance, so really $4-5000 per year or more) and be worth almost nothing in many cases. If you ride the bus, "you" maybe could afford Vandersteen 7’s. ONE example.
Is there overpriced hi-fi gear? A very respected designer I know personally makes a world-class preamp that he couldn’t sell directly for $8000, and at that price, relative to the quality and the competition and the level of system it rates, it is not overpriced. He got a distributor who DOUBLED the price to $16,000 and now he can’t build them fast enough at twice the price. Rich people are strange. They want bragging rights so some equipment doesn’t appeal because it’s not expensive enough (which makes them ripe for fleecing)! Bling sells in the Asia market, and sonics may take a backseat to that.
We all get to make our own choices how to allocate discretionary income. I see guys with fishing boats that are $75-100k, who get to use them maybe 30 days a year and *maybe* catch some salmon or halibut, and I can go to Costco and buy it for <$20 a pound. My modest $10,000 audio system (an amount that friends, who think their Bluetooth speaker is fine, think is insane) is a bargain in comparison. Theirs sounds like crap and my good sounding system gives me 100X the pleasure, for me. It’s a bargain, and a much more reasonable indulgence than cars, horses, gambling, multiple wives, or any number of other vices!