high end speakers are overpriced

The profit you make from a product has to be fair. If you make substantially more profit than that, it is called overcharging. 

For example, imagine you have a blown tire and the mechanic asks for one billion dollars to replace it. This is what you call overcharging. 

Just because some audiophiles like you dont understand that its wrong to overcharge doesnt it make it right. 

There is no "crime" involved if it is a transaction between consenting parties.

yes but why consent to being swindled? you are complicit if you turn a blind eye and encourage this activity. It will not stop unless we all boycott them

Anything about the speakers you've never built, that's what.

They are custom tuned hand tuned and tweaked by ear. Proprietary technology. They are tuned to sound correct. Most speakers out there are not. That makes them very unique. 

what do you want to know? 

@millercarbon 

I am not claiming that my speakers are superior to yours. If you want custom tuned speakers normally that requires payment upfront. I dont have any speakers to ship to you. 

All I am saying is that we are being taken for a ride. We are both victims so you should be directing your anger at the speaker companies not me. 

High end speakers are priced far higher than they cost to make. This is greediness. Many audiophiles are being told lies about how much skill and effort goes into making a high end speaker as a false excuse to justify their unreasonable prices. Many speaker companies use so called custom drivers which are just off shelf drivers with minor tweaks to cause confusion about the true cost of the drivers. Many companies dont mention anything about their cabinets to hide the fact that its just plain old mdf. Companies will also apply high gloss finish to the cabinets to make them look far more expensive than they are. Most people dont know how cheap mdf is. All of these are underhand methods to justify their crime.

Kenjit, what can a builder use to determine what "Fair" is? Can he pay his employees an above minimum wage, provide some medical insurance, and maybe a small retirement fund?

There are plenty of manufacturers that pay their employees, pay rent, bills, etc and still make speakers that cost a few hundred dollars. Ive just given you several examples. If you used higher quality parts the price would go up but not by the amount being charged by most of these high end companies. Stop denying their greediness.

You seem to think that profit is a dirty word. There is often a large amount of work, R&D, startup costs and risk to bring a product to market. The reward is profit if it succeeds. The risk is financial loss or even catastrophe.

That is true of the cheap speakers I listed at the start of this thread. There is R&D and a large amount of work to bring those to the market. Now take those same products and instead of using drivers that cost $30 you use scanspeaks costing $500. So the price now goes up by $470. However the manufacturers will now charge you an extra few thousand more. This is not justified. It is greed. All the costs you mention had already been accounted for.

No one is forcing you or anyone to buy speakers if they think they are overpriced. And of course, there is arguably overpriced gear out there, and buying used often yields bargains as monied buyers scratch their itches often and sell like-new gear at a deep discount.

The used market is another reason speakers are overpriced. The manufacturers know that the prices will go down on the used market hence they need to start the prices very high to not diminish the perceived value of the goods. Nobody is forcing you to buy overpriced speakers however if you continue to buy overpriced speakers, that will affect the rest of us who want high quality speakers at reasonable prices. The manufacturers will only continue charging us exorbitant prices if people like you consent to it. That is why prices have gone higher and higher over the decades. You are complicit in this.

A good case study is Richard Vandersteen

Thats an example of a speaker that costs a lot of effort to make but you can get superior results for less money using conventional crossovers. Time coherent speakers have never become popular because they dont work. Its a myth. Most speakers arent time coherent and most audiophiles are perfectly happy with that.

Rich people are strange. They want bragging rights so some equipment doesn’t appeal because it’s not expensive enough (which makes them ripe for fleecing)!

And as I have stated they are making prices go higher and higher which makes it harder for ordinary audiophiles to enjoy beautiful sound quality. These ultra high end speakers could be affordable for most audiophiles if they were reasonably priced. Making high quality sound more and more inaccessible to the rest of the public is criminal.

My modest $10,000 audio system (an amount that friends, who think their Bluetooth speaker is fine, think is insane) is a bargain in comparison.

I hope its not an mdf box with drivers in ’em! if so you have been fleeced. Do not be so naive and get yourself a custom tuned system. Your system is mass produced am I right?

Some recent topics from OP. If you go look at them, the details don't vary much.

@hilde45 

What you need to understand is that if you look at the entire speaker industry and the topics you get on this forum, there is no variation there either!

Its the same old wooden boxes with two or three drivers screwed into the box and a small circuit called a crossover inside it. You get folks day in day out asking should i buy a B&w or a dynaudio? its the same old nonsense every day Hilde45. So dont you dare accuse me of being repetitive. I have already elevated myself to the next level of the game which is CUSTOM TUNING. The rest of you are still stuck at the level of buying products that are not custom tuned hence its a compromise.

But still you have the free will to buy elsewhere

no you dont. You could buy a cheaper product but not the same or equivalent speaker for a lower cost. 

Feeding or not the market is up to you.

and if you feed the market you are complicit in the wrongdoing. Boycott the manufacturers and they will have no choice but to lower their prices or go bankrupt. Once the prices become lower, EVERYBODY will be able to enjoy high end speakers not just the elite. Stop arguing and start boycotting.