Our coverage has started:
http://www.soundstageglobal.com/ind...ent&view=section&layout=blog&id=17&Itemid=314
http://www.soundstageglobal.com/ind...ent&view=section&layout=blog&id=17&Itemid=314
Guys, our coverage has concluded. There are four days of product coverage with captions; two extra photo galleries with various shots around the show; and seven articles including the last one just posted, "The Growing Disconnect Between High Fidelity and the High End." (...).
I go with peter if there is a market why not , but i see jeffs point also , luckily there is enough quality also , you just need to know where to spend what .
I personally rather see a distributor /dealer sticking all this cable/accesorie money in a decent tapemachine or something like that , to give a nice show expirience.
Tape is not demonstrated with overhere , i would drag me to go to a show .
These oversmoothed audiophile music /cd/ streamersystems dont encourage me to visit a show , if i put on some real world music i dont know where it leaves them
I think most reviewers understand the importance of the dealer/distributor. I think Jeff was taking a different direction in his op-ed article. He paints a far from rosy picture of our industry, one that Jack English similarly op-ed'd some 25 years ago... that it's over priced, under valued, over hyped, and full of charlatans and is thus dieing on the vine. I disagreed then and I do as well now. The industry is pure supply and demand. If a $20,000 power cord (in Jeff's belief) is ruining the market why then is the market so very vibrant (with more shows and more products than ever)? Why? Easy... someone is buying these products. We are in the midst of a great transfer of wealth in the world economy. You don't have to be a Wharton or Harvard Business School grad to figure that out. Than man who loves audio and can afford an unknown maker's $20K cord now has an alternative to the established brands. He can have something very unique and if he enjoys it... great. We have a an economic multiplier. The man who makes and sells the cord can now either spend the money on consumables or invest the money in factors of production to make more cables to sell to more high net philes. What is so wrong with that? How does that "hurt" or damage the industry? Audio is a luxury product. You can opt out at anytime, buy some Bozaks and forget about all this. There is nothing wrong with the industry's current direction in my view. I think it's great for the global consumption economy.
Seems to me that the industry's growth and awareness is robust. I'd call it very vibrant.
Peter, it is a fairly common belief in the industry at present that the regional audio shows are a result of disappearing high-end dealers and that they provide a vehicle for manufacturers to reach the consumers that they cannot without a robust dealer network -- the kind that does not exist in NA any longer. I just spent four days talking to hundreds in the industry.
I'll let my article speak for itself but you are drawing a false conclusion here.
Or is it a result of manufacturers not being able to break into markets? It boggles my brain that cj and Martin-Logan don't have a dealer in Manhattan and Rowland only recently after being closed out for years And Boulder and Rockport only recently took on a Manhattan dealer.
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