The most successful direct retail companies seem to be the ones that go for high value. Examples are Emotiva, Shiit, and Tekton. It will be interesting to see how PS Audio approaches this because they are somewhere in the middle. Their gear is fairly expensive but it is also high quality.
There has been a fair amount of PSA discounted new gear on the market. I own a PerfectWave II DAC and a PerfectWave transport that I bought for about 50% of retail. I also see quite a few PSA pieces that are fairly new on the used market going for around 50% to 60% of MSRP. I don't know how many people actually paid the full retail price for new PSA gear. Paul is really good at marketing so I'm sure he's got this figured out but it's hard to imagine that he's going to be able to hold firm on the current MSRPs if he goes to a direct market mode.
There has been a fair amount of PSA discounted new gear on the market. I own a PerfectWave II DAC and a PerfectWave transport that I bought for about 50% of retail. I also see quite a few PSA pieces that are fairly new on the used market going for around 50% to 60% of MSRP. I don't know how many people actually paid the full retail price for new PSA gear. Paul is really good at marketing so I'm sure he's got this figured out but it's hard to imagine that he's going to be able to hold firm on the current MSRPs if he goes to a direct market mode.