Rick Ewing
Agent
- Joined
- Mar 20, 1999
- Messages
- 36
A lot has been written on the hypothesis "Does Bose suck" or "Is Bose worth the money". To answer the first question, if you compare the typical Bose Acoustimass speaker sound to a typical TV speaker or even some of the cheapy speakers that come with some inexpensive bookshelf systems or HTIB systems, the Bose cubes come out well. But when you start comparing them to anything else in their price class, Bose speakers (particularly the AM) start sounding inadequate.
Again, most people only have their TV speakers or a boom box for their previous reference. They might have a Bose system in their car or heard one in someone else's car, which gets them interested in a home system. Most Bose buyers probably never audition anything else. Many reputable HT stores don't carry them at all, and the ones that do are required to set up seperate listening environments away from their other competitors. You will not find the ability to A/B switch Bose speakers with other systems in a typical store.
As Jaime said earlier, Bose has a huge business in the speaker market. They have significant penetration in the home theatre market through their direct marketing, stores and retailers like Circuit City and Best Buy. They dominate the OEM premium car audio market where their profits are quite high (my car's Bose system cost $1500 when it was really worth about a third of that). They sell a lot of headphones with their high margin noise cancellation line being very popular with frequent flyers (plus they have a professional line for pilots). And finally they have a public address speaker business for auditoriums, stadiums, schools, hotels, etc. All this adds up to a company that does the business of what it does very well.
About the only thing Bose doesn't do is professional audio for studios and musicians. Because their technology has little respect in their areas plus high competition from established brands, Bose doesn't play here.
Again, most people only have their TV speakers or a boom box for their previous reference. They might have a Bose system in their car or heard one in someone else's car, which gets them interested in a home system. Most Bose buyers probably never audition anything else. Many reputable HT stores don't carry them at all, and the ones that do are required to set up seperate listening environments away from their other competitors. You will not find the ability to A/B switch Bose speakers with other systems in a typical store.
As Jaime said earlier, Bose has a huge business in the speaker market. They have significant penetration in the home theatre market through their direct marketing, stores and retailers like Circuit City and Best Buy. They dominate the OEM premium car audio market where their profits are quite high (my car's Bose system cost $1500 when it was really worth about a third of that). They sell a lot of headphones with their high margin noise cancellation line being very popular with frequent flyers (plus they have a professional line for pilots). And finally they have a public address speaker business for auditoriums, stadiums, schools, hotels, etc. All this adds up to a company that does the business of what it does very well.
About the only thing Bose doesn't do is professional audio for studios and musicians. Because their technology has little respect in their areas plus high competition from established brands, Bose doesn't play here.
