Understand what your customer needs are and focus on it. I for one want ultimate transparency in speakers but something I'd be happy to look at every day in my living room
EchoChamber -
Thanks for your thoughts as you obviously took some time to formulate them. I appreciate your perspective. Obviously a company could adopt that business model and be successful. But our business model is a bit different. Let me explain...
Do we have too many models? Yes. Is it sometimes confusing for a potential customer to sort them out. Yes. But we view this as a strength. Why would I say that?
Most potential customers trying to sort this out will either call or email and start a conversation. This is very valuable for us as it provides an opportunity to ascertain important information about what that individual customer wants and/or needs.
How large is their room? What would they be driving the speakers with? What type of music do they listen to? How important is deep bass? The list goes on... This gives us an opportunity to point them toward speakers that best fit their needs and taste. In the process, we get to know each customer on a personal basis - something no large speaker manufacturer has the opportunity to do.
To illustrate, let's look at our various Song3 models of which there are five (only four shown on our web site). I don't know enough to make a recommendation at this point, but based on your comments about ultimate transparency, I would point you toward the Song3-A's. But if a potential customer tells me he or she listens mostly to classic rock, this is probably the last speaker I would recommend. It is extremely detailed in the midrange and would expose every flaw in the recording or mastering process. Many of these recordings were mastered for play in an automobile and have a boosted high end. An extremely detailed speaker will make some of these recordings relatively unlistenable.
The basic Song3 is a great starting place for someone on a more limited budget. The drivers are good but not terribly expensive. The Song3-BeAT's feature a custom AudioTechnology (founded by the same family that founded ScanSpeak and Dynadio) midrange that is not quite as detailed as the Accuton in the Song3-A's, but is very smooth and musical. And if you'd like deeper bass than these speakers produce, the Song3 Encores dig quite a bit deeper.
I would be happy to eliminate products from our offerings if for no other reason than to make our lives simpler. But what you see on our web site is the culmination of listening very carefully to our customers. The way we look at it, we are building their speakers - not ours. So they should be able to get what they want. We often get customers who want to upgrade everything in a design, often doubling the cost. That is no problem for us.
In the end, I am not aware of a single speaker design that will please everyone and doubt there is one. Having a range of models and understanding an individual customers wants and desires, we can be confident that what we recommend will work out well in a particular case.
A number of posters commented on the quality of our cabinets. I'll take this as a compliment since I had never touched a power saw or any other wood-working tool prior to building speakers. Over the years, we have built thousands of cabinets and made every mistake in the book. A great woodworker I know once told me to forget about building the perfect cabinet. "It will never happen," he said. "The difference between a pro woodworker and an amateur is that the pro knows how to cover his mistakes." I always tell my guys the day that we build perfect cabinets is the day we will close our doors as no further improvement is possible.
So when I hear positive comments about our cabinetry, I kind of have to laugh. But the takeaway is that I guess we're doing OK in that department.
We have never turned down a request for a given finish. I am reminded of a customer who wanted a pair of speakers in brushed aluminum to match his refrigerator. Of course, we said yes. But I never took picture of them because I never wanted to undertake something like that again.
The bottom line is that what you see on our site in terms of models, finishes, etc. is the result of what our customers have wanted. We continue to get orders for every model currently on our web site. If that were not the case, I would certainly archive them.
When we design a speaker, we select drivers from the best the world has to offer for a given application. Dennis Murphy does a stellar job in terms of crossover design. And our customers can request any upgrades they desire (we don't "sell" upgrades but are willing to upgrade by request). The same with finishes. No large company can offer that type of flexibility...especially if they sell at retail. And our prices about half of any comparable product sold at retail. We think this business model puts us a in a unique position in the industry. I have watched many speaker companies go out of business since we began ours. But we're still here. So our business model seems to be working for us.
I'd be interested in buying one pair.
We'd be happy to build you a pair and if for any reason you are not happy with the results, we'll take care of you as well.
- Jim