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Post by Deleted on Jul 6, 2015 14:39:45 GMT
I have a few dilemmas regarding the direction a future new product should go which you lot may be able to offer some insight into.
The main issues are: upmarket or fairly budget (ish) and would making it a hybrid put off potential customers. Both cases would be valve or mainly valve.
As a one man band it would obviously be MUCH better for me to make a small quantity of upmarket units rather than many more at a lower price... But as a relatively unknown brand many may think "I don't care how amazing it is I'm not taking a punt on that at £1800". The upmarket one would be MC only with no option for MM. I don't believe many people paying that amount for a high end phono stage will be wanting to use a MM cart...
The cheaper one at probably around £500 would be MM only but people could of course use a SUT for MC.
Hybrid techniques, using valves and solid state together where each can play to its strong points, allow a substantial improvement in performance and saving in cost compared to purely valve, the issue of course is that some misguided souls may think "I don't want my "valve sound" polluted by silicon" .
I held a poll on various new product ideas on pfm a while back and out of TT power supply, small mains regenerator for pre amps, head phone amps (one cheap one high end) and phono stages at different prices, solid state and valve, it was definitely phono stages that were of most interest to people. Hence this now.
Opinions please (constructive hopefully!) welcome as it's interesting to get the view of potential customers rather than me seeing everything from an engineering perspective!
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Post by Eduardo Wobblechops on Jul 6, 2015 14:49:12 GMT
Nowt wrong with hybrid stages IMHO, both the Firebottle and Longdog stages are hybrids and both are great sounding units.
I'd suggest the best way to drum up sales is to offer loan units around the forums, one of each at their respective price points.
Are you still making a head amp?
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Post by Deleted on Jul 6, 2015 15:05:15 GMT
Nowt wrong with hybrid stages IMHO, both the Firebottle and Longdog stages are hybrids and both are great sounding units. I'd suggest the best way to drum up sales is to offer loan units around the forums, one of each at their respective price points. Are you still making a head amp? I'd almost certainly make one OR the other and not both. That method of selling is one I've used for several years now with the Arkless 640P. I can still offer a head amp yes. I only built the one sample which you no doubt read about on AOS. There was precisely zero interest so I haven't pursued it any further. A head amp is a strange beast in that although they can be made fairly simply and cheaply a really good one is anything but. The one I built is point to point hand wired on tagboard and uses very sophisticated power supply techniques (internally. Raw power comes from a wallwart) and hence is £800. This is the one which Marco reviewed as being slightly better than the £1800 Ortofon SUT he was using at the time.... |
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Post by Eduardo Wobblechops on Jul 6, 2015 15:43:11 GMT
Yep, you also let me borrow it. (I'm Ali Tait over there). I'm currently using a Denon HA 1000, which I just recapped. Great sounding unit.
If just one is to be made, not sure you'd sell many at 1800 TBH, I'd suggest the cheaper unit to start, see how you get on, maby try the more expensive one at a later date?
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Post by Deleted on Jul 6, 2015 15:50:18 GMT
Have fun Jez, I am little known now and I am having trouble people believing it,s good yet in the 1980's no problem.
I think the choice of how and where to spend hard earned cash has moved to Bingo and video and that deadly digital lies technology.
It seems most people would rather watch "Deadenders" than listen to good music nowadays. I have trouble convincing my landlady to watch a good documentary on space and time, she rather watch "Chicken Sauce Lane"
And there is the China Syndrome it cost cheap built cheap and so cheap if it breaks it's so cheap buy another. The talented designer based in the west stands no chance without support from the press, and from my past experience obtaining a trustworthy business partners is a real nightmare. We live in a grab, mine not your world now days, and to be honest it is shite.
Good luck Jez
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Post by Deleted on Jul 6, 2015 16:15:15 GMT
Yep, you also let me borrow it. (I'm Ali Tait over there). I'm currently using a Denon HA 1000, which I just recapped. Great sounding unit. If just one is to be made, not sure you'd sell many at 1800 TBH, I'd suggest the cheaper unit to start, see how you get on, maby try the more expensive one at a later date? Ah yes I'd forgotten that someone else also tried it. Obviously you can't have been impressed enough to buy one....  . Marco thought it the best step up he ever heard... at the time.... It would be hugely advantageous to me if the more expensive option was "a goer"! It's not easy to compete on VFM gear when you're a one man band as there are no economies of scale and everything has to be hand built. The cost of casework and the time involved in drilling holes accurately for phono sockets etc is where much of the money goes, drilling holes and mounting hardware is the same process whether it's a cheap or expensive unit therefore it is difficult to compete at the lower end of the market but once you get up to the £1500 + area I can offer increasingly higher VFM. Obviously there is a hell of a lot more time and effort involved in making say 30 £500 units than 9 £1800 units! I plan to make the £1800 unit a bit like the "transformers" films in as much as a hugely over sized case and psu so that things like an active or passive pre amp (I prefer passive personally) and headphone amp could be added either from new or at a later date |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 6, 2015 16:34:06 GMT
Have fun Jez, I am little known now and I am having trouble people believing it,s good yet in the 1980's no problem. I think the choice of how and where to spend hard earned cash has moved to Bingo and video and that deadly digital lies technology. It seems most people would rather watch "Deadenders" than listen to good music nowadays. I have trouble convincing my landlady to watch a good documentary on space and time, she rather watch "Chicken Sauce Lane" And there is the China Syndrome it cost cheap built cheap and so cheap if it breaks it's so cheap buy another. The talented designer based in the west stands no chance without support from the press, and from my past experience obtaining a trustworthy business partners is a real nightmare. We live in a grab, mine not your world now days, and to be honest it is shite. Good luck Jez Oh I'm well aware of all the involvement in the industry that you have had Colin. You're reputation has not been forgotten! I've been in the industry for years myself but more behind the scenes than yourself. I fully agree with all that you say there.... It's a "sign of the times" and the "spirit of the age" to nick two song titles. I have no interest in any press involvement and have eschewed it so far. Same for potential dealers and business partnerships. I have no misplaced ideas in making any real money out of hifi... only a very few do and they're not often the engineers who design the products. If I can make a living, even if it's well below the minimum wage as it always has been in the 10 years I've been self employed doing this, then that's all I hope for. The curse of the box swappers is one of the biggest problems. If it says Linn. Naim or Rega on it then they sell like hotcakes, due to the brand image and the ease of re-selling without losing much money. I can build better sounding products than them and sometimes at a lower price but I don't have the brand name.... I guess it's a bit like someone hand building an exotic sports car from an old dilapidated aircraft hanger..... it may well be the fastest, best handling car ever built but because it doesn't fay "Ferrari" on the bonnet and it doesn't have their decades of history, it would be unlikely to sell! I live in the hope that there are enough people around who appreciate hand built in the UK by the designer himself hi-fi to scratch a living |
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Post by pinkie on Jul 6, 2015 16:35:12 GMT
On the subject of hybrids, I don't want my transistors degraded by valves! The high end option as you rightly say is the logical choice for a one man band, but I am not sure the market is there. It's not that there is no market for a phono stage costing £1500, but the big market for those sort of devices looks to big names and big international distributors. And if you factor in distributors and dealers you can bump some more costs into the price to the punter. This is the real dilemma for new entrants into the small modern market for HiFi. If you are going to go low volume, niche, no advertising, no retail distribution, then you fall into the business model of another forum owner who should be delighted to give you a section on his forum. However, the reality is, in the absence of other marketing channels, you would be like him, reliant on residual brand recognition and HiFi forums as a covert marketing tool. And my experience of HiFi forums is that, with a few exceptions, most of the purchases are budget if new, or on used / vintage which the sort of product you describe will struggle to compete with. (Oh and esoteric tunic options - there appears to be no budget limit for magic bullets and tweaks) I had a similar discussion with AK (specifically regarding his route to market for Technics mods). We concluded that people were happy to buy 6 £400 upgrades for a turntable, but would faint at the thought of spending £2400 on a finished integrated design. Can you design it as a modular kit - with a series of £400 upgrades?  |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 6, 2015 16:55:20 GMT
On the subject of hybrids, I don't want my transistors degraded by valves! The high end option as you rightly say is the logical choice for a one man band, but I am not sure the market is there. It's not that there is no market for a phono stage costing £1500, but the big market for those sort of devices looks to big names and big international distributors. And if you factor in distributors and dealers you can bump some more costs into the price to the punter. This is the real dilemma for new entrants into the small modern market for HiFi. If you are going to go low volume, niche, no advertising, no retail distribution, then you fall into the business model of another forum owner who should be delighted to give you a section on his forum. However, the reality is, in the absence of other marketing channels, you would be like him, reliant on residual brand recognition and HiFi forums as a covert marketing tool. And my experience of HiFi forums is that, with a few exceptions, most of the purchases are budget if new, or on used / vintage which the sort of product you describe will struggle to compete with. (Oh and esoteric tunic options - there appears to be no budget limit for magic bullets and tweaks) I had a similar discussion with AK (specifically regarding his route to market for Technics mods). We concluded that people were happy to buy 6 £400 upgrades for a turntable, but would faint at the thought of spending £2400 on a finished integrated design. Can you design it as a modular kit - with a series of £400 upgrades? It's a strange old world this hi fi lark... people will spend vast amounts on things that will definitely make no difference but baulk at spending it on actual kit which certainly will! The cheaper option would have to be MM only, cheap casework and powered by a wallwart followed by a SMPSU in order to be viable at all at £500 or so. None of which need have any adverse effect on the sound but, as we all know, many people have deeply rooted views on electronics in spite of having no knowledge of the subject and will assume these things make it sound less good. There is a kind of cut off point when going up market where once the expensive casework, sockets, switches and transformer etc have been accounted for, the rest is fairly cheap. Hence it would be very difficult for me to make anything for less than say £500 and there may be better VFM competitors... BUT, get to £1500 + and I can then probably make things to compete with £2500 + products made by big companies. They save a huge amount on parts and have machines that stamp out perfect rear panels in seconds etc This gives them huge savings on production costs compared to myself of course. However they then have staff to pay, a marketing and advertising budget, distributor mark up and then dealer mark up. Sorry to be stating the bloody obvious there BTW! I couldn't do it as a modular kit in the way you suggest no. The original purchase would still need to be £1800 but as the casework and power supply are already there the headphone amp and active/passive pre could be £400 or less even for very high quality. Of course some may want to buy it as a headphone amp which later has a phono stage added.... just thought of that! |
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Post by Eduardo Wobblechops on Jul 6, 2015 17:02:20 GMT
Yep, you also let me borrow it. (I'm Ali Tait over there). I'm currently using a Denon HA 1000, which I just recapped. Great sounding unit. If just one is to be made, not sure you'd sell many at 1800 TBH, I'd suggest the cheaper unit to start, see how you get on, maby try the more expensive one at a later date? Ah yes I'd forgotten that someone else also tried it. Obviously you can't have been impressed enough to buy one.... . Marco thought it the best step up he ever heard... at the time.... It would be hugely advantageous to me if the more expensive option was "a goer"! It's not easy to compete on VFM gear when you're a one man band as there are no economies of scale and everything has to be hand built. The cost of casework and the time involved in drilling holes accurately for phono sockets etc is where much of the money goes, drilling holes and mounting hardware is the same process whether it's a cheap or expensive unit therefore it is difficult to compete at the lower end of the market but once you get up to the £1500 + area I can offer increasingly higher VFM. Obviously there is a hell of a lot more time and effort involved in making say 30 £500 units than 9 £1800 units! I plan to make the £1800 unit a bit like the "transformers" films in as much as a hugely over sized case and psu so that things like an active or passive pre amp (I prefer passive personally) and headphone amp could be added either from new or at a later date I didn't get the chance for a proper listen as you asked for it back! It was at the point where you'd fallen out with Marco as I remember. sounded very good on first impressions. |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 6, 2015 17:09:51 GMT
Ah yes I'd forgotten that someone else also tried it. Obviously you can't have been impressed enough to buy one.... . Marco thought it the best step up he ever heard... at the time.... It would be hugely advantageous to me if the more expensive option was "a goer"! It's not easy to compete on VFM gear when you're a one man band as there are no economies of scale and everything has to be hand built. The cost of casework and the time involved in drilling holes accurately for phono sockets etc is where much of the money goes, drilling holes and mounting hardware is the same process whether it's a cheap or expensive unit therefore it is difficult to compete at the lower end of the market but once you get up to the £1500 + area I can offer increasingly higher VFM. Obviously there is a hell of a lot more time and effort involved in making say 30 £500 units than 9 £1800 units! I plan to make the £1800 unit a bit like the "transformers" films in as much as a hugely over sized case and psu so that things like an active or passive pre amp (I prefer passive personally) and headphone amp could be added either from new or at a later date I didn't get the chance for a proper listen as you asked for it back! It was at the point where you'd fallen out with Marco as I remember. sounded very good on first impressions. You will probably get the chance to hear it again at that bake off in a week or two, as the step up device of a high end multi box valve phono stage I'll probably bring along. The latter is definitely not for sale and is a bit of a lash up I built many years ago but recently made some big improvements to. The separate power supply is a 4U rack mount box and has a 25 way power connector that plugs into the actual phono stage... |
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Post by Eduardo Wobblechops on Jul 6, 2015 17:26:56 GMT
Cool, look forward to hearing it.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 6, 2015 20:05:18 GMT
Have fun Jez, I am little known now and I am having trouble people believing it,s good yet in the 1980's no problem. I think the choice of how and where to spend hard earned cash has moved to Bingo and video and that deadly digital lies technology. It seems most people would rather watch "Deadenders" than listen to good music nowadays. I have trouble convincing my landlady to watch a good documentary on space and time, she rather watch "Chicken Sauce Lane" And there is the China Syndrome it cost cheap built cheap and so cheap if it breaks it's so cheap buy another. The talented designer based in the west stands no chance without support from the press, and from my past experience obtaining a trustworthy business partners is a real nightmare. We live in a grab, mine not your world now days, and to be honest it is shite. Good luck Jez Oh I'm well aware of all the involvement in the industry that you have had Colin. You're reputation has not been forgotten! I've been in the industry for years myself but more behind the scenes than yourself. I fully agree with all that you say there.... It's a "sign of the times" and the "spirit of the age" to nick two song titles. I have no interest in any press involvement and have eschewed it so far. Same for potential dealers and business partnerships. I have no misplaced ideas in making any real money out of hifi... only a very few do and they're not often the engineers who design the products. If I can make a living, even if it's well below the minimum wage as it always has been in the 10 years I've been self employed doing this, then that's all I hope for. The curse of the box swappers is one of the biggest problems. If it says Linn. Naim or Rega on it then they sell like hotcakes, due to the brand image and the ease of re-selling without losing much money. I can build better sounding products than them and sometimes at a lower price but I don't have the brand name.... I guess it's a bit like someone hand building an exotic sports car from an old dilapidated aircraft hanger..... it may well be the fastest, best handling car ever built but because it doesn't fay "Ferrari" on the bonnet and it doesn't have their decades of history, it would be unlikely to sell! I live in the hope that there are enough people around who appreciate hand built in the UK by the designer himself hi-fi to scratch a living I believe a few people do appreciate your work, but for me time is running out I was told today a Class D design I did with anti pumping bass problems is going to be patented and I am getting a royalty cool. Send me a PM I have a patent MC stage you might like to try, the patent has run out now so no probs. |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 6, 2015 20:19:16 GMT
Jez: Just a thought but would it be worth considering a P/X offer to existing owners of the Arkless 640 against your new stage? I'm just thinking that it might tempt many who already know how good your stuff is to put their hands in their pockets. It would also allow you to tempt some newcomers in by reselling the 640s on. I'm not sure if it's practical or desirable for you but I do think that it is worth exploring if the numbers are right. Only you can judge that one though.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 6, 2015 20:32:38 GMT
Oh I'm well aware of all the involvement in the industry that you have had Colin. You're reputation has not been forgotten! I've been in the industry for years myself but more behind the scenes than yourself. I fully agree with all that you say there.... It's a "sign of the times" and the "spirit of the age" to nick two song titles. I have no interest in any press involvement and have eschewed it so far. Same for potential dealers and business partnerships. I have no misplaced ideas in making any real money out of hifi... only a very few do and they're not often the engineers who design the products. If I can make a living, even if it's well below the minimum wage as it always has been in the 10 years I've been self employed doing this, then that's all I hope for. The curse of the box swappers is one of the biggest problems. If it says Linn. Naim or Rega on it then they sell like hotcakes, due to the brand image and the ease of re-selling without losing much money. I can build better sounding products than them and sometimes at a lower price but I don't have the brand name.... I guess it's a bit like someone hand building an exotic sports car from an old dilapidated aircraft hanger..... it may well be the fastest, best handling car ever built but because it doesn't fay "Ferrari" on the bonnet and it doesn't have their decades of history, it would be unlikely to sell! I live in the hope that there are enough people around who appreciate hand built in the UK by the designer himself hi-fi to scratch a living I believe a few people do appreciate your work, but for me time is running out I was told today a Class D design I did with anti pumping bass problems is going to be patented and I am getting a royalty cool. Send me a PM I have a patent MC stage you might like to try, the patent has run out now so no probs. I presume you are talking about rail pumping there? Good luck with the royalties. Thanks for the offer with the MC stage design but I don't need any technical help. That's the easy bit!  I have probably 50 or so designs for everything from MC head amps to huge class A power amps and everything in between... Getting anyone to buy them is the problem! We met briefly at Penta some years ago actually when you had those monster TOCA amps there.... You probably wouldn't remember me but I was the bloke with the dreadlock hair who asked you if TOCA were interested in hiring any engineers... |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 6, 2015 20:38:29 GMT
Jez: Just a thought but would it be worth considering a P/X offer to existing owners of the Arkless 640 against your new stage? I'm just thinking that it might tempt many who already know how good your stuff is to put their hands in their pockets. It would also allow you to tempt some newcomers in by reselling the 640s on. I'm not sure if it's practical or desirable for you but I do think that it is worth exploring if the numbers are right. Only you can judge that one though. 'fraid I don't see any mileage in that.... Different markets I reckon. I'm still doing the Arkless 640P for the time being and will continue to support them. They are a twat to do though as so many of the original components have to be stripped out before even starting. |
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Post by MartinT on Jul 6, 2015 21:57:52 GMT
If you couldn't sell the head amp, then I'm not sure about a phono stage. What I do know is that you shouldn't skimp on casework. No-one wants to pay, say, £500 for a component and have it presented in cheap folded steel. This is where the head amp fell down, in my opinion. Yes, I saw it and had it running in my system briefly.
Some of the more off the beaten track components, like headphone amps, seem to be doing well. How about a power amp in a Raspberry Pi case, to go with a streamer? Good analogue design to accompany superb digital value. Just an example.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 6, 2015 22:20:36 GMT
If you couldn't sell the head amp, then I'm not sure about a phono stage. What I do know is that you shouldn't skimp on casework. No-one wants to pay, say, £500 for a component and have it presented in cheap folded steel. This is where the head amp fell down, in my opinion. Yes, I saw it and had it running in my system briefly.Some of the more off the beaten track components, like headphone amps, seem to be doing well. How about a power amp in a Raspberry Pi case, to go with a streamer? Good analogue design to accompany superb digital value. Just an example. How did that happen? It's news to me! I sent it to Scotland not Basingstoke! What did you reckon? I probably will be "skimping on casework" as any sort of bespoke casing costs too much... Remember I have no money whatsoever! (quite literally as I type this) so it will be a case (sic) of build one, sell it, use some of the profit to make the next one.... I'd probably use something nicer than that one though. It was built to try the idea and to show off it's sound to anyone who wanted to try it. My products are not likely to appeal to (or intended to appeal to) those who want to be impressed by the aesthetics... and I would never, for example, offer remote control as an option.... It's all about the sound! Think Sugden/Croft not Chord when it comes to appearance. I would only be aiming to sell maybe 10 a year and at that quantity any decent bespoke casework would probably add £200 - 400 for the case alone due to them having to be made as virtual one off's for each unit. I design equipment that meets with my own requirements and ideas of what really matters and hope there's a few out there who have similar requirements. Both appearance and ease of use matter nil to me of course, and yes I'm no business man or entrepreneur. I'm an engineer. If making money was the main aim I would be in a different trade altogether. Or at least shelling out foo cables etc.... |
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Post by MartinT on Jul 7, 2015 6:49:52 GMT
Marco brought it over, I assume you had loaned it to him? At the time, I thought it was very good but lacking the ultimate resolution of the Paul Hynes experimental phono stage we had at the time. It was certainly the equal of the Whest I was using then but I don't think it was good enough to match the Aurorasound I'm using now. However, great value for money but my comments stand about the casework/presentation.
There seems to be some rather good looking but inexpensive casework coming from China these days? May not be much more expensive than what you're using now, but a lot better looking. It IS all about the sound but these things do matter to buyers whether we like it or not.
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Post by pinkie on Jul 7, 2015 7:12:24 GMT
Martin's point about casework is valid - but comes back to that "what is your route to market"? question. Who will pay £2000 for a phono stage? Relatively - plenty of people, but they will buy from dealers, they will buy a brand, and they will expect it to look pretty and look expensive. And be expensive - we have that example I gave Singularity about the F1 arm, that at a certain point the normal "demand curve" of economics reverses, and for luxury goods, the more expensive it is the more demand there is. And your example highlights the reason "normal" route to market products are expensive. Take your £1800, add £200 for casework, £100 for packaging,  ? for returns, servicing, and dealer support, £1000 for dealer profit and then £600 on the top for VAT and you are at just shy of £4000. Frankly at that price customers won't mind if its £5000, but they will mind whether it looks expensive or not. And therein lies your dilema. A bit of basic marketing is needed. Who wants it? Why do they want it? How will they hear about it? What will they pay for it? Our target market we identified in the first paragraph won't hear about it through forums. A market interested in absolute engineering where it matters, the best sound quality, and unfussed about being able to touch, see and hear it at a dealers, and prepared to pay £1500 is probably small. And would want to be sure that it is any good. Personally, and I doubt I am unique, I wouldn't shell out that sort of money on ANYBODY on a forums recommendation. You are a classic example of a marketing cliche - the manufacturer who makes the most amazing product, and sits back and waits for the world to realise it (I realise you are canvassing interest, but forum comments are not even drachma never mind euros as you found with your mc stage). And you lack a forum of your own, with a claque to promote on other forums at your behest, and even a legacy brand. There is discussion on another thread about patent enforcement, and copyright which noted Coke don't bother to patent their formula. A classic example of a non-causal measurement. In the first place patents are not indefinite, so any coke patent would have expired. And secondly, far more valuably, they have a brand and a trademark, which they chuck millions of dollars at defending. With no brand, no advertising, and a reliance on forums for interest, I think at the very least you need to follow Firebottles marketing idea and put a "loaner" out for people to try on a "pay the postage and pass it on" basis. Of course, if you don't have the cash for that its going to be tough, and I would go the MM route. And forget the bottles - make it sound good, and keep the price at the forum £400 threshold. Although - as you note - it needs volume, and even at that price I'm not sure how much there is. You could try some slightly more formal market research, and see if you can get a decent sample of members across the forum to tell you what they have, why they have it, whether they are thinking about changing, what their budget would be, and a few questions around "what would make you realise its the one for you" But be careful of having something you can make, and hoping people will just want it. Best of luck. |
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. Marco thought it the best step up he ever heard... at the time.... 
I have probably 50 or so designs for everything from MC head amps to huge class A power amps and everything in between... Getting anyone to buy them is the problem! 
? for returns, servicing, and dealer support, £1000 for dealer profit and then £600 on the top for VAT and you are at just shy of £4000. Frankly at that price customers won't mind if its £5000, but they will mind whether it looks expensive or not.