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Originally Posted by jpelg /img/forum/go_quote.gif
Where I think Grado will miss (or be slowed down) is in price. With the HD800 coming in at a nearly 25% less, the PS-1000 represents a significant premium in price, which will undoubtedly cause all but the most ardent (& liquid) headphone fans to hesitate, me included. If Grado wants to simply usurp the used HP-1/PS-1 market, then they will have succeeded. However, if the PS-1000's were in the $1200 range, they could have been the model that woo-ed me back into the Grado fold, and I'd more likely have ordered a pair by now.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Canman /img/forum/go_quote.gif
Well said. I feel much the same way and I'm glad its being talked about. I don't doubt that I would enjoy the PS-1000 at least as much as any other Grado headphone. I can't get over the price premium and its value proposition, particularly in comparison with the cheaper HD800. It's my opinion that the significant premium over the GS-1000 is to avoid cannibalization of sales among the two top models. Sorry to sour the thread but I think Grado's pricing decision is a very bold move.
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I'm glad I'm not the only one that feels this way.
But of course, I was one of the folks on the HD800 thread who practically begged people to quit complaining about the price of the product. The point I was making there is that the price is what it is. Either you think the product is worth that much to you, or you don't. Either you pay the price, or you don't.
The difference, at least to my way of thinking, is that I can somewhat feel good (or justified in my mind) when I pay $1,400 for a Sennheiser product that was started from a clean slate and represents a tremendous effort on their part to advance the state of the art in terms of headphone design.
With the PS-1000, no such efforts were made by Grado. Moreover, the price set for the PS-1000 is clearly not based on any cost-based formula whatsoever but is instead a direct attempt to exploit a market opportunity based on the prices that have been observed in the used market for the HP-1000 and PS-1, or so it would seem.
I'm not saying that I won't eventually own a pair of PS-1000, because if they sound good enough, I'll definitely consider it. At the same time, I agree with Jimmy that the $1,200 price range would have been far more reasonable (at least given that it's merely a spin off product), not that it's my job to set a price for someone else's product.
Which I guess takes me full circle. When it comes to evaluating the sonic merits of the PS-1000, the benchmark has been set pretty high, and it will have to produce a sound that is worth at least $1,700 to my ears before I'll lay my money down. That's a rather tall order, especially in these market conditions.
But business is business, and I'm sure they understand the basics of cost-volume-profit analysis at Grado Labs. They've never dropped any of their retail prices in the past, at least not that I can recall, so perhaps they know the market better than we do.