Well, well, this seems to be a sore point for everyone, so may be I can shed more light on this. As a customer I would like it to be 50% of the price....sure, why not. As a dealer (or an associate of a dealer) I am also realistic on what is possible and what isnt. At some point it has to make business sense also.
I understand that some people may be overcharging for certain products, its up to the customer to decide who they are and what products these are. I do happen to know of a few such products available in India and know personally that dealers can sell them for much less and still make a reasonable margin, how they want to run their business is up to them.
Now, specifically for Usher and other products made in China/Taiwan - a lot of western high end audio companies also have their equipment manufactured in these places but still charge many times over, so its not only about where the product is made. Distributor pricing is different for different vendors, some vendors operate only on volume, some operate on a fixed price, some are graded, etc. If I can order $200K worth of Usher products in one go, then the pricing would be different, very different, but alas, thats not the kind of committment that I would be willing to make, if anyone here is willing to do so, lets talk
The volume of business in the US is way way huge, compared to what is even remotely possible here, hence they are probably getting volume discounts that I can only dream of and even then we are on many instances lower than the $US pricing.
SKR, I assume you are knowledgable about the business based on your comments, are you aware of the shipping and customs duty costs in India? There is absolutely no point in comparing with other countries which have different import/export charges from ours. If you look on other threads, other dealers and people who know this business have already replied on the costs and its all out there for everyone to see. Its a myth even in the US that margins are huge, once you factor in rentals, inventory costs, salaries, there isnt much left. Many stores have closed down.
In any case, some of our Usher products are on par with $US pricing, some are lower by as much as 25%, so it really depends on the component. If you dont want to compare with $US, lets pick Singapore and make that comparision. Is Singapore cheaper, hell yes, they have an import duty structure that is in low single digits (compared to ours) and yet our pricing is very close to theirs on certain products, also dont forget that our VAT is 12.5%, Singapore is 7% if I am not mistaken. For a moment, just think what we could have done with pricing if the Gov did away with the huge import duty...
While I cant speak for others, I can tell you that the products we are bringing in are excellent value for the money. Some products we are able to bring at reasonable discount, while some we cant. We can also do this since for ARN, the retail business is not their bread and butter. If it were like it is for most dealers, it really scares me how some of them can survive. Dont forget the cost of doing business along with rental spaces, demo rooms, in places like Bangalore, bombay, Delhi. I have recently had the option of carrying an excellent line of products from a US company but had to turn it down since based on their pricing it would have worked out nearly 50% more in India.
BTW, I asked in a separate thread a few weeks back as to what people thought would be a good price for components in India as opposed to US pricing, and if I remember correctly, not a single person replied to it.
Sorry if this came across ranting a bit, but as I mentioned before I have seen both sides of the coin, I wish more dealers would post on this topic.
cheers
Sridhar
Hi,
I think prices for Usher products should be much lower than 10% from US price list because basically these are Taiwanese speakers and sells for much less in other Asian markets.
We cannot compare prices of every other country's products with US prices.
I think USA is the main culprit in pushing the prices up for High end audio products worldwide which makes it difficult for Asian buyer who do not earn in dollars and pounds or Euro's.
This is the reason High end Audio does not attract masses even though the sound quality is much better.
Even the chinese products marketed by US importers are getting costlier.
But the enigma is that unless a product is recommended by Stereophile or TAS or anyother US website no body feels confident in buying it. And they (US importers and press) know it very well.
SKR
Rs 87.5K + VAT. I can tell you folks that this price will be hard to maintain. At this point this speaker is discounted 22% from US Retail and folks, this is the speaker to beat at this price 
!!
