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
DCM Time frame speakers oh yes the best .You just made my day . I paid 550 for mine . Hope not getting any dealers in trouble ? Their all dead or in a Nursing Home .by now.
I’m not sure my comments fit this discussion as it has morphed into other areas. But I’d like to say that a good design is a good design. Many are timeless. Hence the market for vintage audio. I still remember living above the Opus One audio shop in Indiana PA while I was at college and wandering down to hear the large advent loudspeakers. I flipped a lot of burgers to do it, but still was able to afford a pair. Later on; when I was in the USAF, I met John Dahlquist at the Overture audio store in Wilmington DE and later when stationed in Japan was able to afford a pair on a sergeant’s salary (luckily the base exchange shipped them for free). Those speakers are still sought out today and people spend a great amount of time and effort to keep them working. There are still some surprising designs out there that should stand the test of time, the Paradigm Atoms come to mind. There are also those one and done companies that had a hit, but couldn’t continue like Spica and either failed or were absorbed by others. I loved the SC-50 the first time I heard them. Back to the discussion and no more reminiscing. I believe that a good design will win out. Tough though the market is. One current problem for the newby speaker manufacturer is the lack of small audio stores out there to demo your stuff. If you can’t convince the large stores to carry a new product, and no one can hear your stuff on Amazon, how do you get people to know you. Some have gotten around this by offering in home demo time periods with free return shipping, but that is costly to the new manufacturer. But I’m always out looking for the next great thing I cannot live without. As far as the cable argument goes, I’m for good quality, large conductor, and no funny stuff. I got a bunch of AudioQuest interconnects when a local audio store went out of business, they work fine. Digital cables aside, there is no reason to spend a lot of money on those as a one can be no better a one than a one can be, and zero is a zero. And, I build my own speaker cables. Currently I run B&W 802s3 and Matrix 1s in my TV room, B&W 805s in my office, Dynaudio Contour S3.4s in the livingroom, DQ10s in the bedroom, Dynaudio Excite X18s in the guestroom, and a bose lifestyle 20 in my woodshop in the basement. Oh, and there is a pair of Paradigm Atom v5s sitting and waiting to go with my folks when they sell their house and move into the retirement facility.
John Darko’s latest podcast gets to many of the issues raised on this thread in his  fascinating conversation with Andrew Jones. 
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Oh not so bad kosst, it appears you chose not to look very far.

There are 2 forums. They are slowly being integrated together, the TuneLand has 1092496 members and TuneLand technozone has 521. There are currently 71 people at this moment reading the forums.

If you would like I could give a running tally weekly on Agon for you. I make up about 5% of the posting on both forums. I wish I had time to post more but one has to do what they can in these short 24/7s we are given.

On the speakers, it appears you have never designed a tunable speaker.

Michael Green

http://www.michaelgreenaudio.net/