Re the point about asymmetry in market presence between European & US brands: I live in Scotland and spent the last several months trying to audition (and hopefully buy) an ARC amplifier. I approached all the listed dealers within several hours drive - few responded, and all who did simply tried to sell me other brands.
I approached the UK distributor directly - no response. I’ve no bought an Octave (German) and am very pleased with it. The self-inflicted idiocy of Brexit shouldn’t have impacted shipping from the US, so I’m going to just guess at a combo of the factory being unable to ship product, plus the lazy arrogance of much of the UK’s ‘high end’ dealers and distributors.