I have never heard them but have always found the Wharfedale Elysian 4 a great looking speaker. Sometimes it is not just where it is made but also name prestige too.
Peformance at price point for speakers manufactured in China?
Lately I've been doing some "window shopping" for speakers on various sites, and this question pertains to how much more speaker one can get for the money when they are manufactured in China.
Specifically, I did some browsing on Music Direct and came across the Wharfedale Elysian 1. I see a listing for a pair with stands that claims it has been marked down from 5800 to about 4k (this does not appear to be an open box) which is interesting, because a pair WITHOUT stands is listed at 5k; but regardless, if these speakers were not manufactured in China, how much more would they probably list for?
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Sorry @bigtwin , the point of my thread was not to make a negative post. However, I was thinking that the reason a British speaker company would manufacture their product in China was to produce more product for the money, and I was just curious as to how much more product it would be. That's all. |
@immatthewj I didn't take your post to be negative about China. I'm Simply agreeing that it brings the cost down and I'm fine with that. It's the global supply chain that brings down the cost of so much. Cheers. |
More likely more profit from the product. With consistent quality control, the final product is the same no matter where it’s manufactured. There is only one business reason to outshore manufacturing/assembly; greater company profit. From a purely financial standpoint, it would be foolish not to. |
The starting point for profitability in retail speakers is to sell them for 10x the driver cost. Everything after this is "bonus." Off shore manufacturing, and "in house" drivers are two ways to achieve this. The last thing you want to do is offshore, and built in house drivers while ONLY achieving a 10:1 ratio. That way lies barely hanging on. Custom, one person shops like Fritz are rare exceptions. I also want to say that I think being a bespoke speaker manufacturer in this economy is one of the most challenging gigs you can have. |
@thecarpathian , I guess that's kind of what I meant, as don't they all want to make as much profit as they can? In other words, if a company manufactures their speaker in China and sells it for 4k, what would that speaker sell for if manufactured in the US or in Europe? So what I was wondering was could you take that 4k speaker which was manufactured in China and say it is "as good" as an a speaker manufactured in the US or Europe for X more amount of $. |
There’s the obvious risk that if you build a product in China but price it as if it’s made in Europe or the US you’re taking a bit of a risk as many people may choose to not buy a China-based product if it’s priced comparably to something produced in the US/Europe. My guess is that most manufacturers who choose to produce some or all of their products in China will feel compelled to pass at least some of that cost savings on to consumers because they’re getting something with a bit of less “perceived” value and/or quality. How much of the savings to pass along is purely an individual company’s business decision, but they should be careful lest they just come across as greedy and/or selling “lesser” products at a high price — neither of which is good from a PR or customer perspective. Just my take. |
I don’t know that there is an exact dollar amount to your question from users in a forum such as this. That would be a question for the company that makes the speaker or for someone in the industry, with experience both in China and the country in question, but I doubt you’ll get an honest answer (if any)! |
China is used because of its cheaper labor costs and the availability of other resources including manufacturing expertise. Finding another option besides domestic manufacturing is likely more costly. Trying to determine cost increase and thus a markup to derive a sale price seems like a waste of time. Which other country? Mexico? India? |
@kennyc , I suppose the comparison I was most interested in making would be with speakers manufactured in the US or in Europe. |
there is a story of Sockeye salmon caught in the Pacific North being frozen and then shipped to China where they thaw them, cut and gut and slice them up, freeze them again and ship them back to e.g. Seattle to grocery stores. They travel 12,000 miles for a few minutes of cheaper labor. Must be a pretty smooth workflow if it increases profits. Imagine how much easier is for electronics. |
I just bought a preamplifier... for peanuts... And trust me it is not junk , soundwise at least ... For sure if i was the owner a 50,000 bucks system i would not have bought it , i would have bought the ZOTL preamplifier of Berning ...😁 ( i returned one few months ago because it was not a good match for my AKG K340 i lost money and regret to have not kept it for my modified low cost active speakers because of my wife grin reading the cost😁) . My total system cost is near 1000 bucks ( half the price of the ZOTL preamplifier) but i paid it way less with my usual luck ... But many popular american products in the same price window (50 bucks) if it exist at all if they compete dont do more than these two preamplifier ... China can create junk and did it in huge quatities yes, and also just created a 1,000 km per hour train ...They go to the moon also ... And they are able in some case to create a low cost surprising pre-amplifier for peanuts ... I know because i own a tube one for my active speakers and the other S.S. for my movie headphone... the two for near 100 US bucks and impossible to beat save to pay thousand of dollars not a bit more sorry ...😁 Someone owning a multi thousand dollars preamplifier can laugh at me , but i learned enough in audio in the last 10 years to differentiate those who know and those who did not know ... I known enough to be satisfied with any basic good product because i know how to optimize them or modifying them ...Acoustics rules not price tag... Making the more with the less is creativity...
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It’s not just labor cost difference, there are also different costs in transportation, storage, maybe electricity, etc. I suppose one can use broad assumptions to come up with a cost number, then do some markup, but what’s the point? Besides satisfying curiosity, the higher determined sale price would have no benefit- nothing will change. @mahgister congrats on your new component. |
There’s also the lower pollution standards to consider when offshoring to China. Very lax laws allow toxic wastes to just be dumped wherever convenient. One can’t do that here. Chinese workers are exposed to all manner of toxins that wouldn’t be allowed here. On the bright side, they have some remarkable craftsmen/tradesmen whose work can rival anyone in the rest of the world, and is some areas, surpass them. The more they build and specialize, the more we’re going to use their people for labor, as long as the costs are low enough to offset transportation costs. Anything to save a penny. All the best,
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@kennyc , the reason I asked was because, as a hypothetical example, if it was widely known (except by me because I tend to be a bit of a cave dweller on this stuff) that a speaker manufactured in China that listed for 5k performed at the level of a US manufactured speaker that listed for 10k, I'd probably point myself in that direction. That's all. No big deal. |
@mahgister , not all inexpensive preamps sound good. As an example, in the mid 90s I was listening to my system with a B&K HT digital preamp. I felt my system could sound more "musical" and I felt the the preamp might be what I should be considering. As it happened, Audio Advisor was selling an extremely afforadable Vac pre (I found out later that Vac had a couple of different priced product lines at the time) and the brand name vac and the fact that it had a couple of 12AX7s in the circuit appealed to me. I truly WANTED to like it. That preamp sounded like nails on a chalkboard.
BTW, what is your picture of? For some reason, it always makes me think of the cover to the Lou Reed "Rock And Roll Animal" CD. |
For sure you are right... I lived through the same experience with cheap chinese products 10 years ago and also with the product of a new american player in town at the times ... The new american amp well reviewed was so bad i sold it the next day... The chinese audio toys were not much better at the times ... Things had changed, this new american company produce better design and improved now... Some chinese companies at lower cost produce as good as this new american company nowadays ... The problem is identifying the good design ... I used statistical analysis of all reviews... i then bought for peanuts a Fosi SK01 S.S. preamplifier and a Douk P2 tubes preamplifier, for 50 bucks each ...😊 The Douk tube amplifier is better now than a european-american one i bought 7 years ago for six time the price of the DOUK...I sold it after one year because the sound quality was too artificial ... Some chinese low cost products now , without being high end one for sure, answer the huge audiophile demand of the oriental market... Chalk board sounding preamplifier even at low price cannot survive long and sell big ... Chinese engineers improve design and cost... Chinese is no more a third developing country...North america are declining countries as the British empire was ... But you know already all this .. 😊
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It seems that there are those who want to assign some level of greed and unethical behavior to those in the pursuit of "profit(s)." Cost cutting measures, whatever that might be, are implemented at many levels, for many reasons. Many times, it's simply a reduction of waste and excess. Sometimes cost reductions allow one to compete in an arena of price driven products that they could not successfully participate in otherwise. Or, if they made the attempt employing current processes, they would die trying. Sometimes the math works, and the manufacturer can lower the cost to the end user, who directly benefits from those cost reductions. Some also believe that "profit(s)" go dollar-for-dollar directly into the owner's pockets adding a new exotic sports car or beach home to their collection(s). Most often, these individuals are true entrepreneurs and take a chuck of those "profit(s)" and invest them into developing new products (or improving old designs) to bring us the new stuff we'll be bragging about owning in future forums. As for Chinese manufacturing, I've dealt with a number of manufacturers who have product built "off shore." As some believe, this is not always a hand off where all the responsibility to shifted to the off shore entity. In many cases, the manufacturers actually have personnel assigned to supervise manufacturing onsite, thus assuring the same quality standards if built domestically. The reasons for reduction of cost of Chinese manufacturing has many components. Our level of complicity related to those reasons is a discussion for another day. |