Have you ever wondered why speaker manufactures do not consign speakers to dealers?

My guess is that there’s rarely any capital at risk with regard to getting what a dealer has IN a stock item OUT of it, so I’m not sure what the purpose of a consignment would actually be except to entice undercapitalized dealers to carry lines they shouldn’t. To keep the doors open dealers have to find something to sell that they can make a decent profit on so when a dealer goes belly up the causes are usually complicated and rarely have much to do with not being to get cleanly out of particular purchases of demo items.  Manufacturers are sometimes MORE on the hook because bad accounts go bad gradually, then THEY are the ones who can't get back their money from a bankrupt dealer.

My go-to dealer is 1500 miles from my home.  I recently was interested in some $12,000 speakers he sells and he shipped them to my home.  My only obligation was to pay for shipping if I didn't buy them. I ended up not buying and it cost me a few hundred dollars.  I really like to hear speakers in my home, not a dealer's room, so this worked well.

One reason you'll rarely see a high-end two channel system in an open house or virtual tour is realtors. They will strongly advise getting the system out of the house so it "shows" better. Dedicated theaters are the exception, although still rare. 

There are only about three retailers in Colorado who have a significant amount of gear on their floor to listen to.  However, most of the retailers work out of their homes and are lucky to have two pairs from a speaker manufacturer to listen to.  The ones they have on their floor are the least expensive models.  What if you wanted to listen to a pair of Paradigm Prestige 85F and 95F speakers and they only had a pair of the 85F's to listen to?  You certainly aren't going to buy the 95F's without listening to them first are you?  Also, what if while you were at the Paradigm dealer you wanted to listen to the Paradigm Persona 5, 7 & 9 and they didn't have any Persona's to listen to?  Do you think you would buy any of the Persona models before you listened to them first?  So then, how is Paradigm ever going to sell their Persona line speakers unless they consign them to the retailer so they can be heard?  Here is a case where Paradigm is their own worst enemy.  You would think they would prefer to sell their higher end line over their lesser expensive models wouldn't you?  In this case, how does Paradigm ever sell a pair of their Persona's if they are not on a retailers floor to listen to.  A manufacturer could consign speakers to a retailer for 3 to 6 months and then charge the retailer after that consignment period to motivate them to sell them.

I think this is why Hi-Fi sales are so slow throughout the country and why this hobby has been stagnant for so many years.  The industry needs to change in order to attract more people into this hobby.  How many of the people you know have a pair of speakers set up in their living room or family room to listen to?  The Hi-Fi industry needs to learn how to market themselves and to educate the public so they can become aware of how nice it is to listen to music in their homes the way it deserves to be listened to.  This is an untapped industry and you can't just wait for business to walk through your door without doing something to motivate people to explore this incredible entertainment platform.

Larry do you read the reviews in Stereophile and The Absolute Sound and any others?