scuttle
500+ Head-Fier
- Joined
- May 23, 2009
- Posts
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- 43
Quote:
It says absolutely nothing about honesty - or at least doesn't have to. There is a point when a fault is so egregious that it will inevitably become public. If you are faced with such an occasion, the best thing you can do is to get your version out first. You put your spin on it and, hopefully, no one remembers - or even hears - anything else. (And if you have been professionally involved with manufacturing in any way relevant to dealing with such issues then I am stunned that you don't know even the basics of PR strategy. I imagine the truth is that you have been involved with manufacturing but have had nothing to do with PR and communications - which rather makes your opinion worthless, leaving me to wonder why you thought your "special" qualification was worth invoking.)
Is that the case here? We don't know. Because we don't know how bad the fault is, because Focal haven't told us. Reasonably, it sounds pretty bad - even carried around in the bag that Focal thought should provide adequate protection and treated reasonably (otherwise there wouldn't an issue, surely?), headphones have been breaking. But this isn't enough information - buyers of high end audio products should demand more than this rather lauding a company for inflicting spin on them and holding back the facts they actually need.
Also:
- Focal must have had some sort of PR problem already - because when I just googled them the first auto-completion I was offered was "focal headphones problems" - which means that is the most commonly googled search concerning them! So praising them for honesty when they seem to have already had quite a public problem to deal with may be rather over generous.
- Having googled them. I now know these are portable headphones. Leading me say "What you talkin' about Willis?" I'd assumed that they had to be listening room queens like Stax or HD800s. But, no, they're meant for a life on the road. The idea that headphones in this class should break from ordinary use if carried in a not sufficiently well-padded bag strikes me as - I believe this is what the kids say - "whack."
Coming from a manufacturing background myself I think Focal has done a great job with their response to the Spirit One issue. Some companies take really long times to react and not all react in positive manors. The fact that Focal admits there was both a build issue and shipping issue says a ton about their honesty.
It says absolutely nothing about honesty - or at least doesn't have to. There is a point when a fault is so egregious that it will inevitably become public. If you are faced with such an occasion, the best thing you can do is to get your version out first. You put your spin on it and, hopefully, no one remembers - or even hears - anything else. (And if you have been professionally involved with manufacturing in any way relevant to dealing with such issues then I am stunned that you don't know even the basics of PR strategy. I imagine the truth is that you have been involved with manufacturing but have had nothing to do with PR and communications - which rather makes your opinion worthless, leaving me to wonder why you thought your "special" qualification was worth invoking.)
Is that the case here? We don't know. Because we don't know how bad the fault is, because Focal haven't told us. Reasonably, it sounds pretty bad - even carried around in the bag that Focal thought should provide adequate protection and treated reasonably (otherwise there wouldn't an issue, surely?), headphones have been breaking. But this isn't enough information - buyers of high end audio products should demand more than this rather lauding a company for inflicting spin on them and holding back the facts they actually need.
Also:
- Focal must have had some sort of PR problem already - because when I just googled them the first auto-completion I was offered was "focal headphones problems" - which means that is the most commonly googled search concerning them! So praising them for honesty when they seem to have already had quite a public problem to deal with may be rather over generous.
- Having googled them. I now know these are portable headphones. Leading me say "What you talkin' about Willis?" I'd assumed that they had to be listening room queens like Stax or HD800s. But, no, they're meant for a life on the road. The idea that headphones in this class should break from ordinary use if carried in a not sufficiently well-padded bag strikes me as - I believe this is what the kids say - "whack."