The Rose Hill Alehouse down the street went out of business because they didn’t pay their liquor license. A long time employee said no it was because they weren’t paying their unemployment insurance. Ran into one of the owners told me the landlord jacked the lease when it came due. They were doing so much business it was hard to find parking. Another one said the partnership wasn’t working out. This is a place I was in on a regular basis right down the street from where I live. Every single one of the stories I heard had a lot of validity. Take your pick.
All I know, the market has bifurcated. You can see it even just looking at the one example. Definitive Audio used to cater to guys like me looking around trying things out maybe find something worth buying every once in a while. They did some install and sold some big systems but they had "us" covered as well. Gradually they shifted higher and higher until one day I go in and see a system that was $1.3M. Yes, million. And they kicked me out of the room saying they had to get it set up for a customer. Because, to them I am no longer a customer. See how that works?
Magnolia the space was turned into a CityMD where I actually worked for about a year. (Now CityMD is gone.) All that whole time the SpeakerLab store sat vacant, the algae-streaked SpeakerLab awning still advertising what had been. Those two catered to what used to be the great mid-level high end market. So now we have Definitive selling million dollar turnkey systems to Microserfs and Goolagers, and Hawthorne selling used and affordable entry-level gear intended for your typical apartment or corner of a living room type setup. Huge gap between the two which is really sad.
But as to why? Might as well ask the Alehouse bartender, probably has as good a guess as any.
