Eric,
Back in the late 70's, early 80's I worked in high end audio, back when Yamaha was a "more exclusive" brand. One week, some folks from Yamaha corporate visited and one of their chief engineers said that, to put a model into production, it had to have a retail price that was 10x their cost of the components and assembly costs. On the surface, that sounds like a HUGE markup, but you'd need to add the costs for R&D, packaging, shipping, promotion, service support, and of course, some profit for the local distributor and dealer. At the time, Yamaha had "44 points" in it (if you paid your bills promptly), for the dealer, an item with a $100 retail price cost the store $56 (plus shipping). Speakers typically had at least "50 points" in them, some even more.
Back in the late 70's, early 80's I worked in high end audio, back when Yamaha was a "more exclusive" brand. One week, some folks from Yamaha corporate visited and one of their chief engineers said that, to put a model into production, it had to have a retail price that was 10x their cost of the components and assembly costs. On the surface, that sounds like a HUGE markup, but you'd need to add the costs for R&D, packaging, shipping, promotion, service support, and of course, some profit for the local distributor and dealer. At the time, Yamaha had "44 points" in it (if you paid your bills promptly), for the dealer, an item with a $100 retail price cost the store $56 (plus shipping). Speakers typically had at least "50 points" in them, some even more.