No, I’d prefer it to be £10,000 as £120,000 is too much 
I don’t disagree, but you sort of missed the point. £35k on a car is a lot of money, but you have a car, with all the usefulness that comes with it.
A hifi system that costs £35k can only apply itself to producing sound - that’s it. That makes the £35k an awful lot of money.
I’m not talking about pleasure here; you and I are aligned (which is probably why we’re members of a Naim forum) but the question was is Naim expensive and the answer is yes, really expensive!
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I suppose if Naim can charge what they do and the distributors too within the range that demand is not so elastic, then it just makes business sense to charge what they do.
After all, regardless of cost to develop and manufacture, you peg your price at a point where you think it will be compared favourably to the competition.
Though I admit, I’m not sure how they’ve pulled that off with annual 5% price hikes since way back. That far outstips inflation.
But complain all we like, all of us that bought Naim new clearly thought that it gave better sound for the money compared to slmething else.
IMO its correctly priced by virtue of the fact that:
- The company remains profitable
- It can afford ground breaking R&D to keep it ahead off the competition
- There is a full range of entry points for every pocket
- There is a thriving second hand market to serve upgrades for those that cant afford new
- There is enough margin in the product to ensure good service from the dealer network (usually)
- Every product gets a best in class 5 star rating
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That’s all very well but I’d love to be able to buy Statement for £10,000…
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Interesting, IKWYM but for me Bentley is nice Volkswagen these days and Breitling and Bentley prices can fall through the floor in weeks. Not interested for those reasons. Its all perceived value in the eye of the beholder. Bear in mind, both Breitling and Naim now have venture capital investors. Each to their own!
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A price freeze would certainly be better than a screen freeze.
G
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Just shows the subjectiveness. I do not want a car, I do not need one, certainly not for 35k. I rather spent this money on Naim, which is much more useful to me and will not be done in within a decade.
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I think some items in the range are over priced. I cannot, for instance, see £950 of value in a Fraim base. Nor do I accept the argument that the price is justified by the development costs, since these would have been fully recovered many years ago. Fortunately for me, I purchased most of my Fraim in 2001.
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This is the fly in the ointment - the competence of Naim dealers varies widely and Naim is totally uninterested when failures are reported. A lot of the price is dealer margin, set on the assumption they will do home install and give advice on getting the best from the product etc.
Some are fine but many are glorified box shifters - as evidence of this, the vast majority of issues on the streaming thread should have been handled by the dealer!
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Dealers aren’t network experts. The majority of network issues on here occur because people have faffed around without knowing what they are doing. Multiple routers, poor mesh networks etc
Still using Naim electronic equipment I bought twenty five years ago, on a daily basis .
The answer is No for much of the Naim range , expensive is not how much it costs but whether it represents value for money - and I think a lot of Naim equipment will last for many years and then it can be serviced
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Ooh Matron 
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Too expensive? Heck yes, isn’t everything these days 
Value though , I’m starting to wonder with the streaming kit. My Naim journey since the mid 80’s has been of buying kit that lasts 15 years or more and still works and sounds good. The streamers and the newness of their software updates or fast tech obsolescence make them a more difficult buy for me. Other kit at the same price or even other kit that is more ‘updateable’ at a substantially lesser price makes me think that some of the products are more in the disposable realm and should be paid for accordingly. It’s a dilemma.
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It is a bit of a carry on.
G
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I suppose it depends on your frame of reference.
I don’t think the separate amps/pre-amps are expensive for the value they represent in terms of sound quality, longevity, ability to service & repair and second hand value, particularly when compared to their peers.
I do think the same items are more expensive and represent less value than they used to, given the way the price increases have often been over and above the rate of inflation, particularly in recent years.
Not sure how I feel about the newer products. Too new understand the long term value of those but I doubt they will compare favourably to the old school products, given the pace of change in the technologies used and the likelihood a gen 1 product loses a lot of desirability once a gen 2 or 3 is released.
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Much of the issues with first gen streamers is that they were developed before online streaming was a thing. They still work fine for the original purpose and reasonably for many online streaming things. Had Naim not sold them at the time, they would have been accused of not going with the then-new times
This is really just an issue with having enough computing power that allows later software upgrades with sufficient headroom. The new streamers have this and I fail to imagine what could change in the streaming world that would require so vastly more resources that the new streamers could not accommodate. 4K music is unlikely
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If they are selling network products they should be at least minimally competent. I could give examples of a long established dealership demonstrating less network awareness than the average gerbil!
Also when I bought a brand new CD player from a dealer and asked for a home install he flat out refused - I lived less than a mile away. Their mark ups are not a small proportion of the price!
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The concern is “Venture capital”. There are so many examples of VC’s being an absolute disaster for the companies they buy, often in effect with the companies own money by increasing borrowing to pay themselves dividends and recoup the purchase price. They tend to squeeze the pips so I’d be worried about R&D, unless it’s for volume product. They will try to increase the brand recognition before offloading it. Probably in a worse state than they bought it, and the next owner if a VC will do the same thing again.
At least that’s my experience with several companies that have tanked under VC ownership.
When the music stops the last VC in the chain of owners takes a hit.
Better to remain independent
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…so would I
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