Need Help finding Speakers Budget 20,000 US

@ Peter: I do see your point. There are certainly advantages to smaller companies such as yours, and you highlighted them, so no need to repeat that.

Not all smaller companies are bad. You guys make killer products from what I can tell. I like other smaller companies such as FM Acoustics in Switzerland. They have been around for 40 years and are financially stable. And I take it a lot of their money goes into R&D, which it should at their prices. And the resale value is very high. The same goes for companies like Pass Labs (22 years,) Accuphase (40 years,) and German companies like Burmester and Symphonic Line.

However, I still stand by what I said here. It's just my preference. Take a company like TAD with unlimited resources from the parent company, Pioneer. They arguably make some of the best equipment on the planet. And it's not too much of a secret as to why that is. It's not cheap, but it is a wise investment, imo. If I had the money, I would strongly consider it.

What are the costs of say a Wilson Speaker. You are paying for an expensive R and D department, a massive marketing budget, distributor and dealers profits. I wonder what percentage of a Sonus Faber or Wilson speaker is actual labour amd material costs, I don't know, but I would be suprised if it is more than 25%

You take the small guy like Daedalus, Fritz. They have both been in the business for decades, no marketing, no dealers, no R and D department. I can also assure you, if and it's a rare if, a Daedalus speaker comes up second hand, it usually sells pretty quickly

@ Pbn,

We too of course have workers, but the owner usually is hands on all the way making sure that the product that goes out the door is A+1 because it has his name on it.

You haven't seen my Vapor speakers have you? Not good!

Dave,

TAD definitely is a very nice product and probably one I would own my self if i did not make my own. Have now for almost 22 years, PBN Audio was founded April 1992.

David,

Manufacturing in the US is very expensive, only surpassed by Northern Europe. It cost a lot of money to run a operation like the typical Loudspeaker / Amplifier producer we are talking about here. Parts cost, if one is to run a profitable operation is typically 20% of retail. Where does the rest go ? If one sells international distributors in foreign countries are typically invoiced with a 60% discount to allow for their costs of distribution. The foreign dealer need to make money too to cover the cost of their operation.

Before the internet with its transparency products could carry a much higher cost abroad to cover the associated costs, but nowadays its very easy for a, lets say Frenchman, to find the retail price of a product in its home land and he typically will not accept to pay a much higher price there. The only way to get around that issue is to make a global price for a product, therefor the product in its homeland becomes more expensive.

Domestic dealers typically are invoiced with a 40 to 50% discount of retail, they too need to cover costs of operations

Jp,

No I have not , but why take that up with me ? Luvs2listen seems to be the one to handle your concerns regarding this.

Good Listening

Peter

Pbn, you said if the owner is involved he will more than likely make sure the product is A1. This was not the case in my pair. Just the opposite actually.