Anyone hear the Caravelle speaker and not like it?

I heard these speakers at CES. I was most surprised by them. It's a lot of quality jammed into a small package. I have a hard time believing that people who are so down on them have ever heard them. Everything Tom and Barry have said is accurate. I don't know all the technical aspects of the speakers, but they sound good. I stood in the outer room and heard them play for quite a while before going in to the room where they were playing.

Nothing I heard from the outer room prepared me for what I saw when I entered the listening room. I had heard all kinds of systems with all kinds of componants throughout the day. I expected to see a big floor standing monster in the room where I found a smallish pair of monitors. I didn't think to ask how much the drivers cost, because I didn't think it was relevant. The cabinets were substantial, and solid. The stands looked more like a sculpture, and the music was beautiful.

Based on what I heard these speakers are well worth the relatively low cost of admission. Everything worked together very well, from the binding posts to the drivers.

While I was at CES I visited more rooms than I was really interested in seeing. The Bright Star Audio room was one of the best sounding rooms at THE show! Probably in the top three, but at worst, the fourth best room I heard. That's a heck of a commentary on their speaker, and the things working with it.

Hi Nrchy,

Thank you for your comments. I would like to clarify that the speakers heard at CES in our rooms at Alexis Park and at St Tropez were not Bright Star speakers. We stopped manufacturing speakers about three years ago.

Best,

Barry

Oh forget it. If anyone is SERIOUSLY thinking about these speakers email me. I don't have to respond to people who attack something they have never heard. BTW, I have only compared these to speakers I have owned or directly compared them with.

Every man has a little ego, the bigger the ego the smaller the man....

Tvad, at this time the price of the Caravelles includes the pair of dedicated "latticework" Sistrum-design platforms(stands) that come with the Caravelles at the $5k price. They are designed as a package, and the stands are included in the price, as part of the package.

However, I must advise that these stands went really far over budget, and it is quite possible in the near future that we will be forced to raise the price because of this. We are contemplating a less-costly pair of Sistrum-designed stands as an alternative. The purchaser could then select which stands he wishes to purchase along with the speakers, depending upon how much he wishes to spend.

At this time, we are "eating" the difference in price, just to hold our predetermined price point for introduction. But I don't think we can do this for long. At this time, there is very little profit margin in these speakers/stands, and if we used "normal" pricing structures that included "normal" dealer markups, the Caravelles/stands would have a retail cost of nearly double what we are selling them for now.

Truthfully, the early purchasers of the Caravelles are getting a fantastic deal for the price, because of this unusual low profit/high manufacturing cost ratio. As I said, I'm not sure how long we can go on at this price point. We're trying everything possible to streamline the production to keep the cost down. Right now, with the low production and complexity and cost of manufacture, these Caravelles are essentially "custom hand made" speakers. That's why we are perpetually behind schedule on these.

If we get enough orders in, perhaps we can take better advantages of "economies of scale" in manufacturing larger numbers. This would help us to hold the price.

However, they can still be had for the $5k price including the stands. We will announce any upcoming price increases, but I'm giving a fair "heads-up" advisement about it right now. We'll keep the $5k price, but it may be with the less costly stands for that amount in the future. The fancier "latticework" stands that we have now, will likely be an option at added expense at some relatively early point down the road.