I feel bad for speaker manufacturers


Think about it. If you were going to start a company that manufactures audio components, which would you pick? Arguably the worst business to get into would be the speaker business. Right? First, it’s painstakingly hard to market a new speaker that can break through in today’s ultra-competitive environment. Second, the development costs are relatively high because you have to invest in expensive cabinetry (at least on the high end) , electronic components, and drivers. And except for bookshelves, you have to absorb or charge so much more to get your product to your customers because of the relatively large size and heavy weight of the product. Third, and again especially if you have any floor standing speakers of any size, which, let’s be honest, any speaker company that wants to make money will have to have, you have to pay to hump these things to shows around the country and likely internationally as well.

Now let’s compare the life of a cable manufacturer. Let me state up front that I am a big believer that cables, interconnects, digital cables, and power cords can make a big difference in the ultimate sound of an overall system. Tires on a car, right? And yes, they also have several variables to deal with: silver, copper, tinned, dielectric, shielding, connectors, cryogenic, etc. But they’re all small, light, and relatively cheap. You can ship your product for next to nothing with almost no risk of damage, and you can travel to audio shows carrying all of your wares pretty much in a medium-sized backpack. Oh, and then there’s this. While speaker manufacturers are lucky if they can retail their products for four to six times their cost of production, cable manufacturers get to retail their wares for ten, twenty, or even fifty times or more of their manufacturing cost. There’s the well-worn tale of speaker manufacturers coming to shows in a rented minivan while cable manufacturers show up in Ferraris. It’s sad but funny because there’s some truth to it. I credit @erik_squires with generating this thread because in his recent thread he made me think about how hard it is to successfully create and market a truly successful speaker today. Anyway, it almost seems unfair, especially since speakers contribute so much to the ultimate sound of our systems while cables, while crucial, contribute RELATIVELY much less. What say you?
soix
Last, the Snell Type A shook up the speaker world when it appeared in 1977 at a price of $1390/pr! 
Yeah the DCM time windows look a lot like the vandersteen model 2s and 3's. Not surprising since I believe they were built on the same principal -time/phase correctness...
soix,

I sort of half agree.

It’s clear that at least some portion of audiophiles don’t really grasp the difficulties and costs associated with running a speaker company.

And that what seem like some high prices are actually justified when you understand the economics involved.

BUT....

My problem has been....how *far* can this be taken?

Does this mean that any speaker product out there is fairly priced, or priced along the same justification? It seems to me we can’t just do away with the idea of being "price-gouged" or "taken to the cleaners" or just outright scammed. Surely some speaker prices are more justifiable in terms of manufacturing costs.
So for instance in the Joseph Speaker threads, the cost of the Joseph speakers are argued to be a "fair" and reasonable extrapolation given material/production/design/business concerns.


That’s a different form of justification than, for instance, ’X is worth whatever I can get someone to pay for it.’
Because if we go with that latter form of justification than ANY speaker price can be justified if *someone* pays for it.   It could conceivably include scams because...well...someone paid for X so X is worth that much. If we appeal to this type of value only - worth whatever someone will pay - then we have taken leave of the type of justification offered for Joseph or other speakers being "fairly priced based on X, Y, Z calculations."
So if we are sticking to the type of fair-price extrapolations in the Joseph thread, it seems to me not all speaker prices are going to survive that justification.

And frankly, there is something like those calculations going on when I find myself rolling my eyes at the prices for many high end speakers ESPECIALLY the upper end of many high end brands. Statement products and some below the statement.

The prices seem just ludicrously beyond what both the materials and engineering/manufacturing expenditure could justify. The only justification seems to be "someone will buy this at this price."

And I’ve seen numerous insiders mention how a number of speaker manufacturers - who may for instance be also trying to sell to the lucrative Asian market - have been told "this speaker will not sell unless you price it much higher." So they must raise the price - arbitrarily as it’s related to actual costs - and the speakers sell.

So, if we accept speaker value as "whatever someone is willing to pay"...well...almost any price becomes justified.

But if we talk of speaker value in terms of what seems reasonable pricing given the overall costs of that speaker manufacturer, then it seems there are all sorts of rip-off level pricing, related only to ideas like "If I price it much higher someone will figure it must be that much better."


gee.... Vandersteen since 1977... still here and innovating
most models do not even keep pace with inflation...
DCM, DQ, Snell, And many others dead sadly...

time windows w matching subs were darn good but no match for a pair of Vandy 3... time moves on....time to play some Tull on the Treo CT..

Living in the Past....
and I might add cabinets made here in USA starting at $1,400 the pair for VLR or 1 ci thru a retail shop where you can hear them....

before ya buy...