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New Home Depot concept coming to Audio?

Home Depot just opened a new store in town with a different name - it's called Expo and it's a mega-store for home remodelling and decorating. It has high-end appliances, oriental rugs, etc. My wife, who has been reading about kitchen upgrades for the past year and has tried in vain through different venues to see all the products she has read about can now see most of them in one stop locally. I don't know how the prices are, but if the concept catches on I would think the prices would come down somewhat based on competition and increased sales in this market segment.

I've always wondered if high-end audio manufacturers will ever see benefit in this approach and support it as well. I don't think you'll see a mega-store with only products that you see in boutiques, but the ability to go see a lot of different manufacturers' products in one place, many more than you see in any given high-end shop today, would be an interesting concept to consumers. I suppose the market for $3K ovens is bigger than the one for $3K amps but does it have to be?

I know a lot of high-end shops are falling on hard times, but there are some where business is just booming and it would seem to me that one of the big-time retailers could open a new chain that services the high-end audio / video market and designs stores with display capabilities that go well beyond what we have to choose from today and gain a critical mass of manufacturers. Any opinions? -Kirk

kthomas

Showing 2 responses by ed_sawyer

ed_sawyer
588 posts
 
Tweeter staff vary. Some are quite clued-in, and come from a high-end background. I have friends that work there that are an example of this. Sure, some of them are clueless, but I've also encountered plenty of cluelessness in high-end stores as well. Tweeter will always only be upper mid-fi at best since that is what sells the most. Some of their product is nice (Sumiko/REL/Sonus Faber) but they don't have any electronics of the same caliber. And, that part of the market makes up a small percentage of their sales.

My friends who work at tweeter and at high-end stores basically loathe the typical audiophile customer: they come in and listen for long periods, are high-maintenance from a customer service standpoint, rarely buy things and when they do they beat them up on price or simply buy used or off the net. Can't say as I blame the sales people. The sales folks seem to much prefer the non-audiophile types who tend to spend more, buy more often, arent' such chiselers, and are easier to deal with.

Any wonder why the high-end shops are falling on hard times... ?
ed_sawyer
588 posts
 
You must not have been in the stores around here: Proceed, Pioneer Elite, Sonus Faber, REL, I'd call those things upper mid fi at least. Maybe bordering on hifi (the REL).
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