Interest in an interconnect

Well, my immediate reaction is: not a bad idea. I'd be willing to pay a nominal fee to try out expensive interconnects and speaker cables (which you might also want to offer) that I wouldn't buy without trying. I also like the aspect of being able to rent without feeling a sense of obligation to a retail dealer.

I don't see this business venture as a big revenue generator, since the audiophile community isn't very big, and the number of audiophiles that would be interested in your rentals would be a smaller subset of audio hobbyists. From a business perspective, your idea sounds more like a part-time business endeavor, but it might grow enough to keep one guy busy. The cost-to-profit ratio is something you will need to consider: how much do you need to make for this idea to be worthwhile to you, both personally and financially?

From your side of the equation, you will obviously have some start-up costs: buying the interconnects and/or speaker cables; getting an Internet site going; etc. You might want to talk to some other small business owners in the interconnect/cable field, such as BetterCables.com and HomeGrownAudio. They can give you some insight into the practical and business issues.

...Well well Sometimes it's not going to make a sence unless you're guys going to be paying at least for shipping.
If I would pay for shipping + rental price of the cables of $10/weekly then they have to be realy costly cables.

Following up on Sd above, I would also suggest you run this idea by cable manufacturers, both mega and small, with an objective to obtaining the matl for free. The library could be be a one-to-one marketing place for them...

I would certainly love to be able to try out cable without the pressure that a 30-day return policy generates (I always feel like I am really buying it and can only legitamately send it back if there is something actively negative). Your model also has the benefit of encouraging people to try cables they really cannot afford (a good thing in my mind - it helps to know what you are missing).

However, your cost model seems VERY unrealistic unless your membership was large and number of cables small (which has other problems in terms of availability). In pro-audio rental, the base rate for rentals is 1% of MSRP per day. This assumes that units will be in active rental for about 3-5 years and will be rented out for 50 to 75 paying days a year (longer rentals get discounts - e.g. a week rental costs 4 days). At this rate equipment pays for itself during the second year and still has 2 or more years of profitmaking rental. Renting cables would have to be for at least one week at a time with a week being sent back and forth. So with a total of 3 weeks per rental the absolute maximum number of yearly rentals is 17 and realistically even 15 would be difficult (also one week is not very long for evaluating cables). So at 15 rental a year if we want the cable to pay itself off over say 2 years you would need to charge 3.4% without allowing for ANY profit or administrative costs during that period and assuming that the connectors and cables will last through 4 or 5 years of such heavy use - which I doubt). I believe that realistically you would need to charge something close to 10% of MSRP for this rental library to work and since used cables can often be had for 40-50% of MSRP you are asking people to pay 20-25% of what they could buy the cable for, just to rent it for a week or so. And then there is shipping both ways...

Not to be glum, it would be great, but unless some wealthy benefactor of audiophile land is sposoring the venture as a community service (or tax write off), I doubt it could work.

Good luck

If you can get it "off the ground" I would be willing to pay a reasonable fee for auditioning ICs and cables. Why not also add power cords-- much audiophile interest in these.

However, the posters above provide some food for thought re actually getting such a venture started. The last time I got wires from the Cable Co. (3-4 years ago), they were charging a percentage fee to audition wires with the fee(s)to be applied against purchase. If you didn't purchase though, the rental fee was effectively fairly high,in the 5-10% of MSRP range. So it was only a good deal if you actually planned to purchase-- which I did.

Good Luck. Craig