Originally posted by audiolife D0o0d the average consumer could care less what all that crap is.. its cool you know it we know it but for gods sake if you are a salesman you sell ..dont teach physics... nice to know for applications but the "average joe" dont care.
(this isnt an insult just a point of view worst thing you should get out of this is you arent average and if you just wanna test knowledge there isnt any need you just follow your own nose) and there is alot to be said for "retail" especially if you are a begineer might pay a lil more but you should get real good service
no offense taken at all. Actually, I understand exactly what you're saying. I would like to however take the opportunity to further my agenda, which I feel is a noble and good one.
First of all, I feel that the current state of retail is unacceptable, and at best, decent. Retail serves a purpose of giving the unknowledgable a product that is hopefully good and provide our new initiate to car audio with service and support so that the product continues to function. I used to be a salesman at best buy. I worked in home audio and I sold tons of speakers. I sold way more than anyone there. Why? If the customer was serious about buying something, I'd take a few moments and educate them about what makes a good speaker good. I'd explain, in the simplest terms possible about many of the above concepts to them, maybe not the really in detail concepts such as phase relationships or the T/S parameters, but I'd explain direct and reflected source of sound, room gain, frequency response, and yes, transient response. It took maybe 5-15 minutes depending on the intelligence of the customer, but those that felt like they were learning something, their eyes lit up and many have told me that I've been the most helpful salesman ever. There were a few that didn't care how anything worked or why anything was, and those were the ones that pissed me off the most. Why?
The attitude of not wanting to know why things works or how things work harms us all, especially the technically savvy and the DIY. To a certain extent (lots!) the retail industry will cater to the "average" person. If the average person doesn't want to know why things are or how things work, then the retail industry will feel no need to provide that type of service. Since, in effect, people are not that knowledgable about car audio (or anything that can be bought in stores for that matter) and really don't care to know, the retail industry can get away with charging more because their customers simply don't know any better about production costs, and since the average person doesn't understand how their system works, when it breaks, they're not going to have a clue as to how to fix it so this burden goes back to retail. Retail needs to charge more in order to cover the service costs as well.
Since the average person doesn't know and doesn't care to know about the true essence of car audio, it lowers the bar everywhere of what gets put out. Don't get me wrong, there are tons of great products out there! But, since the average person cannot know to demand something that is truely better, then the pressure that is generated to make a better product is less than it could be. Sure, there's car audio competition, there's competition between manufacturers, and there's pressure from high end users for a high end product, but, for the most part, since the majority of the people cannot and do not demand more for their money... they simply don't get it.
the fundamental issue at hand here is that most people don't care or don't know what makes car audio good. Not many of our retail salesmen know it either and this knowledge will not emanate into the public for this reason. What this means for the DIY, technically savvy or the intelligent consumer is that they simply are not presented with a PRODUCT or SERVICE that they desire or need. I hardly want anything at tweeter, and that is a high end store! I go to best buy and laugh. It's like looking at children's toys. Of course, there can be good products at either places, but I'm making pretty accurate generalizations. I feel that people, if they understood that it is good and noble to want to understand how things work before they make a purchase, it would be a new source and a strong source to raise the standards of engineering and production everywhere AND it would either keep the costs same or reduce the costs. In short, I feel that the average customer is holding all of us back. And, I feel that there is no need for this current condition except for the fact that people lack the desire to know...
And, it is difficult to understand? At least this might be one of the arguments brought up against me, but, really I say it isn't that hard to understand, at least not what is really important. Applied to anything, all someone has to do is ask themselves "what is the purpose of this?" and "how does this product accomplish this purpose?". For example, I know nothing about refrigerators, but if I wanted to buy one, I am going to want a refrigerator that suits my needs well and I don't want to give someone my hard earned money for the sole reason that they have the fridge and I do not. This means that I don't want to buy it just because it's there. I want to know what makes a good fridge, how much they cost to manufacter and what parts, components and design elements will cause the fridge to cost different amounts of money. I hate paying too much money! There's no reason to! I've educated enough customers at
Best Buy of all places to know that people really aren't as dumb as they look. Sure, there are some dumb ones, but, that's the case in anything. I know I could explain to a 12 year old the point of any audio system, and how to go about acheiving it -- they will be fundamentally more educated than the average consumer and it wouldn't surprise me if they feel that something is "off" or "not right" if they decided to go purchase a stereo system.
Now, I understand that I come off as superior, arrogant, pretentious and egotistical, but please, please, think for a moment about what I've said. If indeed if all of us started asking questions and learning more (especially when it involves 1000s of dollars!) then the retailer and manufacturer would have no choice but to offer a higher quality product for the price or reduce the prices of everything. I do believe in companies getting profit, but only where profit is do. I do not believe in the milking of an uneducated bovine herd, which is what the "average" consumer is.
The educated consumer has power. Why do we let this power ooze from our hands? Long live America and Capitalism.
