Upscale Audio and Primaluna

I don’t go to forums and almost never post. But I feel a need to clarify some things that are pervasive falsehoods.

First off, we sell vintage tubes to anyone except out of the country and guitar amps. There was a time where I wanted to sell new old stock cheaper but only if you bought your gear from us, and that really pissed off a lot of people, except the customer that bought gear here.   We stopped that, raised the prices to market price and let her rip.  

@Jumia Please send your name, telephone number and email to Info@upscaleaudio.com  Tell us who you dealt with. Even if you don’t know a name we have robust records of every customer interaction no matter how they come into our company. I will have the store manager call you. I want to know the exact words that were used.

None of my salespeople are on commission. I learned that when I worked at Rogersound Labs, the best audio store that ever existed. We don’t review what brands they sell, what categories, or if they try to “load you up” on accessories or high-profit stuff when they buy a system.  

I will admit one of my salespeople is a PrimaLuna freak, but it comes from his love for his own system and he should remember that doesn’t make it right for everyone. None of my salespeople talk down systems if they want to have a job here. Besides, they are paid an hourly wage. There’s no incentive. Some of them sell 30% as much as others, but I know they are doing other things like troubleshooting and customer service. 

I don’t worry about that because they are all amazing in their own ways. Kat is a classically trained musician, acoustics expert, and degreed Recording Engineer. Ash is not just an experienced audiophile with years of managing a store, he’s a degreed Electrical Engineer. Renee was regional sales manager for Dynaudio, Sean was sales trainer for MartinLogan. Josh worked as tech support for Tubestore. I could go on and on. I hire the best I can and pay them better.  I'm still understaffed and need more industry experts...not slick rick salespeople. 

The only thing I monitor is the percentage of returns. If that number is too high, then two things may be happening.   A: They are not asking enough questions to get it right or B: They are allowing sales to occur that should never leave our store. People want to buy the wrong stuff all the time, and we have to be brave enough to tell them it’s a waste of their time and money. I don’t need the business if we are doing them a disservice.  

I guess we’re doing something right since we’ve grown double digits every year to become one of the largest dealers in the U.S.   Do we make mistakes? Sure. When you are processing 400 orders a week even 1% is too high.   Every customer gets sent a survey, and we have 4.87 stars with 9877 reviews.

I do not own any portion of PrimaLuna, but I have been heavily involved since the beginning. Herman van den Dungen is the owner, and we started doing business together in 1999 with the Ah! Tjoeb CD player he built. That player was a true giant killer and we sold thousands of them. Herman distributes some of the biggest names in audio into the Benelux area. In a 2000 visit, he showed me a stack of broken amps from one of the most prestigious names out there and complained how they were not only overpriced but broke over and over. We are kindred spirits and agree that high-end audio has gone off the rails with companies being bought by Private Equity groups that don’t give a sh*t about audio looking to make a buck by raising prices and lower cost of goods sold. You don’t need to be an engineer to see this. Look at the most expensive “reference” products from 20 years ago, adjust for inflation, and look at what they actually sell for now.  

Herman is well-connected in Europe, and hired the best engineers, including the former Chief Engineer from Goldmund Switzerland, and he imports the finest parts into the best factory in the world.   This isn’t just a business. It’s a cause. We both work on a reasonable but lower margin but get them into the hands of more grateful customers. And again the proof is in the explosive growth and the resale value of PrimaLuna. Recently our original products the ProLogue One and Two have become “collectible” sometimes selling for more than retail on Ebay. It’s one thing to be a collectible 40 years later. It’s another to do it 10-12 years later.  

Someone mentioned a comparative video I did on how a competitor’s preamp is built vs a PrimaLuna. I took that down some time ago as I don’t want anyone going out of business. But why you would not want to know facts about parts is baffling.   You want to buy an 11 pound preamp for $5k? That’s up to you. But others are grateful to be told how things work and spend money on parts and engineering. Not stories. I would not buy a preamp without looking inside using Google Images and checking the weight.

It was also mentioned about a PrimaLuna EVO 400 being compared to a REF 6 yada yada yada. I’ve been doing this for a living for 45 years and have the hearing of a 12-year-old. I could never make that comparison unless it was an instant A/B and level-matched within .5dB.   That’s the first training exercise I do with new employees to teach them about aural memory.  

Once you get to a certain level of sound quality the differences are so small they are hard to discern. I am most happy to invite a group of at least six of you together (to make it worthwhile) to come to my store with any EXPENSIVE tube amp, preamp, or integrated, and we’ll do a double-blind LEVEL MATCHED instant comparison. I did just that for some members of the audio society and the results were shocking to some of them.

I’m not saying don’t spend more...if you have the jack, go do it. But don’t tell some dude with fewer resources he can’t own a reference system for less. I just spoke to probably the most-read reviewer in all the magazines and he told me in no uncertain terms the EVO 400 is the best preamp he’s ever had in his system. Period. And his best friend who is an analog guru owns one and feels the same way. Look what Steve Guttenberg said on Youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3yMJQ43ZgE  about the EVO 100. He gets it.

It’s fine when we sell big-ticket stuff but I get a bigger thrill selling a newbie a $3k PrimaLuna integrated and seeing the lights come on, or having an employee tell me this is the best job they’ve ever had. I was going to retire at 59.  I don't need to work.  But I love HiFi and I have people working here since the beginning.   I owe them a career that pays well. My wife and I have no kids. Now it’s about giving back to my employees, and their families.

Way too many words but I’d rather not have to post any further.  

Kevin thanks for clearing the air.

I have only had great interactions with your staff.

@rsf507 To be honest, If I wanted to modify my systems ,I went to my local dealers and listened. Home audio has been a distant second to live music for this old man.  The open space and closed showrooms of the pandemic brought me to the forums.Searching for opinions and access  that evaporated with the isolation of the pandemic.  I had little to add until people expressed their opinions about their experiences with a dealer I found to be exemplary. I have never received such a warm welcome to a forum before...a troll. Very cool. Thanks. 

I have resisted chiming in up til now. It is amusing to me that KD brought up the Ah! Tjoeb because that is exactly what I was going to bring up. My observation is that Upscale has always put forward-at center stage-bang for the buck products that might appeal to those that harangue the prices of top-shelf audio products. It is a great business model. Much more sophisticated gear than a certain Michigan-based retailer that sends out cheap paper flyers every three weeks. 
Another marketing technique that demonstrates KD's savvy is coming forward with some "special edition" of a high-profile product. We have seen that with his versions of VPI tables, the Manley Chinook, the Ah! Tjoeb (IIRC a modified Oppo), and many others. 
I do think KD's equation of weight to quality is bit askew. The more accurate answer is that it all depends. Certainly that Ah! Tjoeb cdp was not heavy compared to the competition nor the Manley Chinook. While an amp's weight, particularly if tubed, may demonstrate the amount of heavy iron incorporated (trannies), what if they are of mediocre quality? Is every single part incorporated in a piece of PL gear of the same quality and within the same spec as the higher priced competition? Common sense tells anyone with half a brain that the answer is "all depends upon which competitor you are talking about". And let's not forget that the euphonic qualities of PL pre-amps are due largely to being rather high in even order harmonic distortion. 

Well, as far as time on the tubes, I changed my last set out when the hour meter on my projector, that I installed and turned on at the same time that I installed the 75SE, hit 3750 hours. Since there's no hour meter on the 75, 4500hrs was my estimate, since I listen to plenty of music without theater. Could have been more. The guys at Audio Research suggested it was time to swap 'em, so I called Upscale for some new ones.

My speakers are 97db efficient, and the Amp only dives the highs/mids, so if I see 5 watts on the needles it's LOUD.

In other words, the tubes are never stressed.

I run a set of 6H30DR true Super Tubes for twice that, so they'll get swapped to new 6H30DR's when the 150's get up there again. The DR's have a 10K hour rating from what I read. I swap the DR's in my preamp at the same time. No strange noises, and the big tubes never stray out of bias.

If you guys think I'm way out out line, I'm listening...