Herron VTPH-2A discontinued

The VTPH-2 faceplate was also available in a cool graphite color, sort of a very light charcoal.

Wonder which one mine is?  https://systems.audiogon.com/systems/8367

Why doesn’t he sell the rights and designs of his products to another person?

Good question. I don’t know the answer. However, it is pretty easy to imagine.......

Last few years I have had the pleasure to talk with some of these guys. Can’t honestly say I got to know them, but you talk to people and the clues pile up. Eric Alexander knew from the time he was a kid he wanted to be a speaker builder. Dave Thompson is fascinated by and loves music reproduction. Krissy Tetrault pretty much lives to make it sound better than most can even imagine. Keith Herron loves music. To name just a few. They really love what they are doing. You can feel it when they talk about it.

But they aren’t just doing it like we are, buying some stuff to try at home. They are building right at the edge of what can be. They build this and it goes out into the world and we love it and they built it. With Herron the connection is obvious, he puts his name on it. But even Tekton, Raven, Soundsmith, these are really Eric, Dave, Peter. Has to be. They put so much of themselves into it. I can only imagine how tremendously satisfying that must be, to have accomplished that. To have created that. All that musical enjoyment. All that love.

Then after a lifetime of doing that you are gonna turn around and monetize it, like some toaster or something? I mean yeah sure, Paul McCartney, Michael Jackson, whole long list of em did just that. Which only serves to burnish the rep of those who won’t.

It's a keeper, what I said from the beginning and totally unoriginal, was only repeating what others had said before me. One of the many things that sold me on it, the number of guys who said they are done looking. Lots of other stuff to work on, but the phono stage is not one of them. To build something so good is quite an accomplishment, especially considering the phono stage is probably the most critically demanding component in the whole audio chain. Quite an accomplishment.

To keep price down Keith would have to order a production run of certain key parts like faceplates, chassis, etc. Depending on sales volume this could be something around a years worth or so of production. Prices have gone up so much since the last time, that this time he looked and said the price increase to produce would be astronomical. Probably one of several factors but a crucial one. Anyway, point is the VTPH2A was and is an awesome phono stage, it was selling well, but now will be made no more. A real shame, I don't know of anything to recommend in that price range, and as performance goes you are now realistically looking at $5-10k. It will be missed.