Perhaps we need a hifi or holidays thread!! In my job I had two trips to Brussels when we were working on a European project, but that was it! I’ve flown long haul once, to New York, and that’s it. Last year we went to Ghent, Nice, Menton, Amiens, Anjou, Berlin and Vienna, as well as several trips in the U.K. This year we’ve managed five weeks away in the caravan in the U.K., which has been wonderful. I’d be happy never to go beyond Europe, ideally with the caravan or by train. Now we are both retired the likelihood of significant hifi upgrades is effectively nil. The only thing I’d quite like if I was given them is an ND555 and a NAC 552, so I’m quite pleased that they are so expensive - they are beyond by reach and therefore I know I’ll never have them so they remain a fantasy rather than a real desire, if that makes sense. Holidays with the caravan, on the other hand, are very affordable and hopefully we will have loads more in the future.
I’m lead to believe that my local Naim dealer gets a bit of business via the international train station in a certain Kent town. Its a 5 min walk from station to dealer.
I flew to the UK in 2013, ordered an entire system of 6 boxes and speakers and a rack. Saved 20% instantly as it was a VAT free purchase and the shipping to my home 6000 miles away was about GBP1200, which was tiny compared to the VAT saving.
And the best thing was no distributor markup either. 20% off UK prices. Now, Naim rightly frown upon that sort of thing in most cases as it circumvents the system and takes money out of another dealer’s pocket. But in my case, there is no Naim distributor in country so it was a no problem personal import. I dare say if there was and I was buying local it would have cost double UK retail inc.VAT and I’d not be able to justify the cost of Naim.
Weird. The price difference UK - Germany is 300 EUR right now for the Nova (probably comes down to 250 if you have a relationship with the local dealer). Still considerably more but I would have thought Netherlands price is same as Germany
Yes that surprised me too. Netherlands is quite a bit more expensive than Germany, even though it’s right in the middle between the other two countries, so trucks from the UK will drive through it on the way to Germany.
The current prices seem to be roughly as such for the Nova:
UK: 4640 EUR (4199 GBP)
DE: 4970 EUR
NL: 5250 EUR
When i bought my Nova the GBP was at it’s lowest rate because of the Brexit uncertainty, which meant the UK price translated to about 4400 EUR at the time.
Spain €5295, which is 4783 GBP at today’s rate.
A Nova in Aus is $8,700.00 (including taxes).
At current exchange rate that is €5252 (£4737), so Aus is similar to Netherlands and Spain, all about 12.5% more than UK
A Nova in NZ is $10,650 (incl. Tax), £5,475…
There’s not that much difference between the the Aussie dollar an the Kiwi dollar. Someone is having a laugh.
8700 AUD equates to 4751 GBP (or 4560 GBP if you were to buy GBP at one of the major banks). Therefore, difference is between 361 GBP and 557 GBP.
Thats a whooping 10,018 AUD. Sucks to be us living on the other side of the planet with smaller population.
And what appears huge margins.
Sorry @Mike_S for stating the obvious and possibly making you feel worst. Based on the supplied prices, here is price difference compared with UK price rounded to the nearest %.
Country | Compared with UK price % |
---|---|
AUS | 13% |
DE | 7% |
NL | 13% |
NZ | 30% |
Have you got to the bank’s mark up the wrong way round? To the best of my awareness tge £47XX price is at the actual rate (1.8279 now) and in my experience everywhere gives a worse exchange rate if you buy that currency (and a worse reverse exchange rate the other way round if you sell). If you didn’t have it the wrong way round can you cite a particular place, worth knowing next time I exchange!
$5995. US dollars
@Innocent_Bystander, I am referring to how much GBP a bank would sell for a given AUD amount by any of the 4 major banks in Aus.
Which is NZ$9,000, but its sold for $10,650 here.
Yes, prices have gone up about 20 to 25% since I upgraded over 2018/19. It’s too rich for me to go further now I’m afraid.