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General speaker questions for audio and home theater.

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Luxury item vs. commodity marketing

Posted by caspian@peak.org on July 25, 2012 at 11:58:27:
In addition to the other factors already mentioned -- Made in England with associated costs, relatively limited quantity production, distributor and dealer markups -- an element of "prestige pricing" certainly comes into play. Harbeth is not marketing their products to your average headbanger: they aim at a "discerning" clientele with "refined" musical tastes, which is to say an "upscale" clientele ready and willing to pay the higher price associated with the perceived "exclusive status" of the product. If these sort of customers paid less for exactly the same product, they would presumably feel they were not getting the same level of performance.

And as others have mentioned, Harbeth prices are high but not astronomical like some other brands. Of course, some of those astronomically priced brands (Wilson, Magico, YGA in particular) put great effort into "heroic" cabinet construction, which obviously raises production costs significantly. Harbeths just have thin veneered MDF boxes lined with roofing tar paper -- classic monkey coffins, essentially.