Auditioning headphones (ethically)?

Thank you, Tony. I’ve read brilliant things about STAX "earspeakers" but I can’t imagine a way that I can listen to them at the moment. I’m not aware of any dealers in the Northeast. I’d need a dedicated amp as well. The 009s are beyond my reach but the 007MK2 are a possibility, perhaps with a STAX or Woo electrostatic amp. I’ll ponder!!

Edit: the ZMF headphones are beautiful!! I'm sure they sound sweet....

Thanks all of you. I'm interested that you're all giving more or less the same advice, and it's *not* "order them all and keep what you want." I certainly agree about hifi shows; maybe now they will be happening more frequently. The last one I planned to attend was Montreal ... before the pandemic.

I agree about researching the heck out of it and I'm doing that. What I can't research, though, is how headphones will feel after an hour or two. And of course one man's "bright" is another man's "neutral." Etc.

Thank you again. The responses are not what I was expecting but they're *very* helpful.

Nice, bslon. I don't have such a local dealer. There's one about three hours away that has Focals for home audition, but only for a week and they're grouchy if the customer isn't local. (They're kind of grouchy anyway.) There's a store about four hours away that does sell Focals and Sennheisers and Audeze, and I can ask about their policies. Buying a pair with a 30-day return policy is easy; it's the comparison that I'd like to do. (Obviously, I can compare the weight and comfort one-by-one; it's comparing the sometimes subtle differences in sound that I find difficult that way.)

@bslon, thank you so much. I read in another headphones thread here that the Cable Company had a good policy but I couldn't find it on their website. That's great. I have an account with them and will most likely try that.

@orgillian, thank you. I've had Grados for at least twenty years, the SR-60, SR-80, and now the RS2E. They're incredibly comfortable and I love the Grado sound. Long story short, I want to branch out. 

Again, thank you all. @big_greg, super advice about the ear-ads and the smoking. 

The ethical concern for me is what @crustycoot picked up on. It's not a question of following policies; that's easy. It's about playing fair. I'm especially interested in what that means when I'd like to audition at least three and maybe (after reading this thread) five pairs of headphones--ideally at least some of them at the same time. Is it ethical to buy three pairs of headphones from a website (would we call that a dealer?) knowing that I'm going to return at least two of them? If a dealer carries more than one pair that I'm interested in, is it ethical to sequentially buy headphones, knowing that no matter how much I like one pair I'm going to return it and try another, and another? Is it ethical to buy headphones from three different sources, knowing that two of those sources will never see a penny of my money? Is there a difference between buying from Amazon and buying from a smaller vendor? Etc etc. I can read the policies but would I just be gaming the system? 

To put this a different way, it would be easy for me to buy five pairs of headphones, from one site or from multiple sites, and return at least four of them. I would be within their policies. But is that ethical?

And, yes, good idea about buying used and flipping. That doesn't solve my hope to have more than one at a time, and ... there are obvious risks and costs to that approach.

I'm not looking for problems here! I'm genuinely curious about how people audition multiple headphones. I'll check with the Cable Company. If they're set up to do this, I'm in. (I've emailed with them in the past about auditioning cables from their "library" and, well, it wasn't as straightforward as it sounded.)

Finally, I wonder how dealers would respond to this. If I asked audioadvisor or headphones.com or a store, would they encourage me to buy three pairs, knowing I was returning at least two? What would feel fair to them?

And, yes, amps. Right. That, too.

Okay, so now we have two thoughtfully articulated positions, best voiced by @soix and @ghdprentice . @qjm101 states one side with clarity: "purchasing items KNOWING you are going to return them is unethical." And @soix is compelling as well: as long as someone follows the policies and is committed to a purchase, that's not only playing fair but it's giving the dealer a chance at a sale that he might not otherwise have.

I can see both sides and I truly appreciate the time you all have taken to open all this up. I think I'm going to split the difference and 1) try the Cable Co lending library and 2) make a road trip, I guess, and see how I can do in a physical store. I hope they have a comfortable chair. I'll have make sure they're good with doing returns by mail. I don't want to drive eight hours just to return a pair of headphones...

Thanks, all!