What Are Your Audio Morals?


Assuming:

A. We all want to audition equipment before we buy it;

B. We all want the most for our money;

C. We all can find the same equipment cheaper on the Internet than from high end dealers;

D. We all know that you can't audition equipment on the Internet.

Therefore, the question is: How can you morally audition equipment at dealers when you know you won't be buying there?

After all, the dealer is giving you his time, his advice, the exclusive use of his listening room (all at the expense of customers who may actually biuy from him), a pro-rated percentage of wear and tear on his equipment, and a pro-rated share of his rent, electricity, salaries, advertising, taxes, maintenance, etc.

What do YOU do when you want to audition equipment? Do you:

1. Use your local dealer and buy from him?

2. Use your local dealer and buy elsewhere?

3. Don't use your local dealer, but buy elsewhere as long as you can return it?

4. Take a chance and just buy based on reviews, thinking maybe you can sell it if you hate it?

5. Other?

BTW, I am not a dealer. I'm just aware that if we all use dealers as free audition services knowing we'll buy elsewhere, local dealers will soon be extinct.

Maybe that's OK. Perhaps, with the advent of the Internet, local dealers serve no purpose anymore. That may be a future topic of discussion.
plasmatronic
Morality? Difficult situation. I agree with Macm above. We all window shop and compare stuff without intending to take advantage of our local dealers.

(1) You visit your local high end salon and listen to speakers you can't afford. You spend a lot of time and ask a lot of questions and because you're a nice guy the dealer spends his time with you knowing, because youve been honest with him, that you cant afford to buy from him. Maybe he'll refer one of his customers to you with a used pair for sale. Later on, you see the speakers advertised on Audiogon for a song and buy them. Nothing wrong with that as long as you were up-front with the dealer and he knew he was volunteering his time. But wrong if you gave him the impression that you were a buyer.

(2) You visit your local dealer and listen to a pair of bargain speakers that you know can be bought on-line at a discount. The retail value ($300) is not enough for the local dealer to spend time with you and give you much of a discount. The dealer is a jerk, has BO and a foul mouth. You still gotta buy from him and not try to save a few dollars going elsewhere, unless he called you a name or insulted your family.

(3) It is, imo, wrong to go to a store and give the impression that you are interested in buying a product from them when you intend all along to buy from someone else. But what about comparing the same set of speakers, say, to different competitive products at different dealers. Three stores all sell Speaker A. You compare it to Speaker B at store 1, Speaker C at store 2 and Speaker D at store 3. You decide to buy Speaker A. From which dealer do you buy Speaker A? My bet is the one who offers the best price. Would it be wrong to buy it at an even better price on-line? Immoral?

I buy on-line when there is no local dealer or buy from the dealer who gave me the most help. I try to buy from local dealers for the same reason I buy tires from the closest tire store. I like to support local small businesses because I want them to stick around (in my own interest - nothing to do with morality).

(4) You're on vacation and you visit a high end dealer to listen to the latest thing. You fall in love with it and spend an afternoon there. But, its too big to carry home, you don't want to pay for shipping and you prefer to be able to take it back to your local shop for service, so you leave the store fully intending to buy it back home. Is that moral? I say only if you tell the shopkeeper that you're on vacation and not a buyer before the demo and he volunteers to share his time with you.

Some of the dealers from whom I buy actually do business over the internet rather than locally, but I buy from them because they answer my questions, over the phone or by email. I wouldnt ask them any questions though if their prices weren't good, and that's the bottom line. If a local dealer wants to stay in business he needs to offer service and competitive prices.
I don't know if this is helpful or not, but the use of the wprds honesty and integrity is writ large from both perspectives.

I was a retailer in the late '70s and formed a single long term association with someone thereafter. I purchased easily $250,000 worth of eq

... apparently I rudely interrupted myself. So I purchased a lot of equipment for myself and others.

In the past two years, he has shown me B&W Nautilus, McIntosh, Parasound and Conrad Johnson equipment. In some of these instances when I purchased equipment, I did so through Audiogon. I simply could not afford to do otherwise.

From an integrity/honesty perspective, I told him each time I did. I gave him gifts including a case of fine wine to thank him and he knows very well that I will still purchase a proportionally high number of separates from him. As I stated to him once, without his help I would not have heard the B&W Nautilus line and for that I am forever grateful.

We are friends and I believe I've conducted myself in a forthright manner as one would when dealing with friends or any one else in an open fashion.

Besides, when he offers used equipment that I want, it would be purchased everytime.

Gotta go now... don't want to miss any Audiogon opportunities!
I agree with the honesty perspective. If you tell a dealer your intentions, it is their decision whether to spend time with you or loan you a demo. If they think it's a worthwhile investment, they'll try it, if they don't, they won't. I'm going to borrow two CD/DVD players from my dealer in a couple of weeks, and unless I don't like either, buy one from him. I'm also going to ask him if I can borrow a processor at the same time which I intend to buy used. It's a reasonable request, as I'll be spending 2-3k for the source, and I want to know which sounds better with the processor I intend to buy. I bet he'll agree. If I were just asking to borrow the processor demo and if I liked it, buy it used, that's less clear if it's reasonable. It would still be his decision though, as I'd be upfront about my intentions.
To those individuals who think it "immoral" to audition at a dealer & not buy; I ask you, when YOU sell equipment on Audigon that you didn't like, do YOU tell prospective buyers that you hated the sound of the piece or think it sucks? Do you give them your analysis of the sonics, if you don't like the sonics? No, you don't, because you'd never sell the piece. To chastise others on auditioning equipment in dealerships is a pompous & self-righteous act, & IMO, ridiculous. Spending countless visits & hours to a dealer without any intention to buy anything could be considered less than ideal ethics; but people "window shop" in all varieties of retail establishments en masse every day. It's part of modern life -- don't get so self-righteous & hypocritical about it.