HEA, in general, has NOT delivered on its reason for being defined as - providing the means for enjoying our music fully and with complete contentment. HEA delivers on some well recorded stuff, but in general has not delivered what we want and desire. Couple that with the silly high pricing we see today and you have the reason for HEA collapsing. The shrinking market has brought on accelerated price increases as manufacturers milk what they can from the shrinking market. This is the classic sign of a product category in the decline phase of the product life cycle. We are now living in this decline phase.
The good news is innovation is bringing new home audio products to the market that are right priced and frankly better than what HEA has delivered in the past.
I am talking about the core market of audiophiles here. We are not as interested in turning and churning through gear anymore. We have been there and done that enough now and realize all these traditional HEA products don’t and won’t satisfy long term. No way we are spending big money on it now. We are not buying used gear like we used to. This is why stuff is selling so darn slow if at all. If we decide to try one more piece it better be at a steal, I mean steal of a price. This is driving the prices down. We are a small group we Core Aphiles and we are causing this to happen. We are the market.
