MBL Insolvent

I was in business for 45 years.  If you want to sell ultra high end products, you must realize the air is pretty thin up there.  Maybe someone can take that wonderful technology and try to make a more affordable product.

Sad to hear but the ultra high end 2 channel market is so minuscule and the prices they are asking sometimes costs more than an Audi SUV or even a Rolls Royce, it is not surprising.  The economics is just tough...

"take that wonderful technology and try to make a more affordable product." For example, Linear Tube Audio worked with David Berning and did that with his ZOTL technique.

One thing that seems to be missing from a lot of high end manufacturer’s business plan is this: offering a product that qualifies as "value for money".

There are a lot of really good high end pieces that have interest to the hobbyist, until the price tag is looked at. Then the typical hobbyist smiles and walk away. Not so much (although this is certainly an issue with many) because the piece in question is unaffordable, but more because the purchase decision is altered by the fact that the price asked is simply not reasonable for what is being offered. 

We have folks in the high end audio business who believe that their goods are worth whatever price they ask for it, because there are people who can afford it....IMO, that is a fundamental business error. One which I believe the principals at MBL had.

The late John Strohbeen of Ohm Acoustics once wrote an article on the site where he indicated his admiration for mbl speakers indicating they were one of few that sounded right to him (other than his own Walsh CLS design) and took great pride in providing more affordable products cut from a similar mold.   His goal it seemed was always to deliver the best sound possible for an affordable price to as many music lovers as possible. 
 

Also interesting to note that Ohm Walsh speaker prices both used and new seem to have soared in recent years.