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HELP Electrocompaniet stole Christmas

What a mess:
After finally deciding that spending money on the latest EMC-1 parts mod, I contacted Electrocompaniet's distributor back in October to arrange to bring my EMC-1 MkII to him directly in PA so as to avoid RT shipping risks and expense for this 50 pounder. All was set for a Christmas week mod, as I was to be in NJ visiting my relatives that last week.
I called on Christmas eve to arrange a drop-off time, and was told that Christmas Day noon would be fine, but that I had to arrange the deal through a dealer! Yikes! So I remembered Fathers & Sons and called them, arranging for the paperwork and profit to be credited through/to them. Fine. So I drove 2 hours through a nasty winter storm to arrive at Warshaw's house, where he said he'd NOT perform the mod if my EMC-1 didn't have a serial number on it, as there was a grey-market guy in New York who sold a few of these this year. I assured him that mine indeed had a serial number, was produced in spring '01, and bought used by me in summer '01. He said OK, and lugged the player into his house, saying he'd call me in a couple of days to pick it up. Great!..............
I returned to NJ and watched the storm intensify....
Two days later I called to arrange a pick-up hour, and Alan told me that he did NOT perform the mod because the player had been originally sold by a Danish dealer, and NOT through him, so he had made a decision to NOT support any players not originally sold thorough him. No warranty repars, parts, nor mods!..............
I was stunned, couldn't convince him to make an exception since he had never asked me to provide a serial number beforehand, and I went through a total of a half-day of driving through a storm to accomplish this mod.
He just told me to come pick it up at my convenience. I glumly arrived on Saturday and retrieved my untouched puppy, where Alan said that unfortunately I had to share the victimization of the gray-market. I asked if I should contact a Danish dealer to see if a board-swap could be done (of course thinking he didn't really know the answer), but he thought that Electrocompaniet wouldn't support my player either! I asked with some incredulity what was going to happen with all the players that people have when they move from one country to another (!), but he said that this policy was the only way they have of penalyzing the gray market.... I suggested that in THIS CASE he should have installed the mod because of his lack of due diligence in assessing the production/sales history of this particular CDP, ESPECIALLY given my enormous effort in delivering it to his doorstep on Christmas Day.... I left sadly but gracefully.
WHAT SHOULD I DO? I contacted the Danish dealer but he's not responded. Should I contact Electrocompaniet directly and try to arrange a board swap or purchase the parts mod "kit" and instakllation directions (I'm pretty familiar with boards and soldering)? Should Alan have acted differently? Isn't the world getting small enough so that internationally-sold products should have protected lives independent of sales point?
PLEASE HELP!
A Happy and safe New Year to all!
Ernie
subaruguru
budrew
467 posts
 
First, I have an EMC-1 CD player, the latest version, and it's a great player. I also purchased it from a dealer I really trust and I know he can take care of any problems. Try to seperate the player from the distributor.

I agree that the distributor should have gone ahead and made the modification. It's just how good business is done. If you're not absolutely clear up front (and the guy drove out of his way to deliver it), you should just cut the loss (rather than lose a customer). But I've had a bad experience buying a used product and was shunned by the manufacturer when it needed a repair. In a similar analogy, just imagine a world where used cars were not accepted or supported! Get real and take pride in your products. Doesn't companies like Lexus and BMW proudly market their own used cars!
84audio
175 posts
 
It would be interesting to hear from some dealers about this. Also, I don't know that there is another side to this story. Alan told Ernie he would do the upgrade and did not ask about serial numbers or anything else. Ernie went out of his way to get it to Alan. If things happened as Ernie described the only reasonable thing to do is to follow through with installing the upgrade. I'm sure Alan wants to protect himself but think of the fall out from this. The high end audio community is small enough so that something like this can really hurt. I have an EC dac which sounds great but I get real concerned about anything less than great service. If I had read this thread a few months ago I would have probably purchased something else.
zaikesman
3,017 posts
 
The distributor is mainly at fault here; EC only provisionally and by extension until Ernie contacts them and gets some sort of response. The distributor blatantly reneged on his stated arrangement with the customer, much to Ernie's inconvenience and expense. A distributor in a foreign country ought to function as a local representative of the manufacturer as far as possible. To US EC customers, this importer/distributor should *be* EC, to the extent of his and their capabilities to function in that capacity, and this upgrade is clearly within those capabilities.

This distributor has no real way of knowing whether Ernie's unit was gray-market or not, and it shouldn't matter anyway. Ernie is a second-hand owner, and is not responsible for the unit's prior history. For all anyone knows, the piece was originally bought at retail by the first owner in Scandinavia, and later sold used overseas via Audiogon. So what? Unless the thing was stolen off some loading dock while awaiting shipment from the factory, EC and one of their resellers have made their money on this unit. The US distributor now needs to function as EC's local representative, and earn some more money for the both of them by performing the paid upgrade. If EC needs to kick a little more back the distributor's way to get it done when he wasn't the original importer, then this is what they have to do, rather than leave owners in the lurch or make them ship their gear to Norway for updates. If they can't present a unified US front to *all* their owners and potential customers here - used and new - then EC either needs to pack it up or find a distributor who can get it done for and with them.

The distributor has already let his end down, but EC needs to take the lead and the ultimate responsibility for issues like this. Particularly if the US distributor is charging the high mark-up alluded to above, failing to support the second-hand market will obviously have serious consequences for EC's primary market US sales in the long run. This distributor apparently needs to ask himself whether it is his pricing policies, and not his service policies, which need to be more conservative if he is suffering from a gray-market problem as implied. Deflating EC's US used market desirability by refusing to perform upgrades on many second-hand units will only serve to further increase his vulnerability to current-spec product brought in through other channels at lower prices. None of this is good for EC, and they should do what it takes to keep Ernie the happy owner he wants and deserves to be. In his case, that would now begin with comping him the shipping expenses to get done the work he should already have been enjoying for his efforts.
brulee
564 posts
 
I hope Stewart from SOS will respond to this thread. One of the truly great audio dealers. His word is good as gold. i think he could shed as much light on this subject with truth more than anyone else. Hope things work out for you Ernie. I won't forget your kindness.
jcbtubes
400 posts
 
With all due respect Brulee, I think this is one topic that Stewart or any other Electro dealer would want to avoid. It is the position of the Electro importer that is of concern, and quite possible that no dealer is going to sway the importers decision. As FS Audio stated correctly, they were unfortunately caught in the middle. I doubt that any dealer(s) would want to try to defend Alan's policy, let alone his actions in this particular situation, and risk the ire of the audio public, or publicly conflict with Alan's policy and risk his potential anger. It is no mean feat for a dealer to develope a positive product line image and recognition. It isn't really fair to ask a dealer to risk a poor relationship with the importer at this point. It would be best if EC and the importer were to develope a cogent policy to include situations like this (and it will happen again given the current dogmatic approach that the importer has adopted), rather than ask a dealer to "fall on his sword," so to speak. Then again, I've certainly been wrong in the past, and this could simply be another instance. Ciao.
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