certin speaker makers harder to get dissounts fro

Cjlcapp.

dont make apologies about wanting to spend your hard earned cash sensibly,there are a lot of guy's here who are hourly paid worker's & yes 11k is alot of cash.

the best advice i could give you is that you need to know exactly what you want & exactly what the going rate is for the same item used,if you approach buying high end gear like a business investment things will become much clearer,dont walk into a dealers store & beg as "lush" says is done just walk in & state what you want & what your willing to pay but also be sure to let him know that you will not be buying on impulse & if he cant meet your price for simply running your credit card thru then somebody else will,nothing personal just business.

Lush

get a handle on reality bro,dealers are not a dying breed they are undergoing a major change & the one's who are too set in their way's to accept & make nessacary change's are being phased out,like it or not audiogon has drasticly changed the way hifi is sold & i personally like the changes.

the day's of dealer's treating every customer like the next big whale are all done my friend,high end audio has been being sold by volume percentage's for a few years now just like everything else.

i dont care what your trying to do there is no experience like hand's on experience & no amount of time spent with any dealer will will beat hand's on experience,i would much rather have my audio know how come from my own experience with different gear in my own home because that is what teaches people how to build great sounding system's & not what was talked about with a dealer,with the exception of one dealer most other brick & mortar dealer's ive met dont even have hifi system's but choose instead to abstain from owning high end gear or have low dollar midfi system's so what's to be learned from them.

also you say that more than 20% off at a high end dealer is mind blowing well get ready to have your mind blown,on many occasion's ive walked into my dealer's store & left with deep discount's on new gear & several time's these discount's have came close to 50% & my dealer is far from being broke or stupid but he is a fantasticly savy businessman.

if you choose to pay top dollar for your gear that's fine but dont try to make other's look like the root of all evil or the grim reaper's of hifi because they chose to approach this hobby just like the dealer's do,business,nothing more.

you can talk shop till your blue in the face with dealer's but in the end all that talk will get anybody is a vocabulary full of useless audiophile phrases & a pile of geat that cost a small fortune.

mike.

As an x-salesman for several high-end audio brands...if the dealer does not discount atleast 10%, go somewhere else. Furthermore don't take no BS from the dealer, be firm, and if he refuses simply leave.

Of the 4-6 different brands that we carried the markup ranged from 42-55% above dealer cost. Furthermore, the supplier gives even better discounts depending on quantity ordered and number of sales.

Personally if I purchase something new I always shoot for around 20%

Cj1capp, "50 to 60% mark up to me is just wrong. I am not aware of any other bussines that dose that except for the medical field."

I think you need to look at other industries before making such comments. The furniture industry is at least 100%. Most computer consulting organizations charge at least 100% over what an individual consultant makes. The overall price of products is more of an issue than just markup.

I also reccommend waiting until what you want surfaces here on Audiogon. Why not get it at 50% off and save your hard earned money.

There is another answer to your dilemma: Buy them used.
In looking here on Audiogon, there are dozens of used Martin Logan speakers. If you can't get the entire package here, you might be able to at least get some or most of them used, and then limit the amount you end up spending at a dealers.

Just my two cents worth.

PS When I bought my ML Sequel IIs, many, many years ago, I got about 10-15% discount without trying to much.