There seems to be a ‘Hi-Fi Culture’ in the UK. Lots of manufacturers of audio equipment etc. I do n’t see that in The Netherlands. Where does that come from?
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My take is that music is more part of the culture in the Uk than here in the Netherlands. Go to a church there and a decent chance there is proper choir and organist. Go to a football match and what you hear is people singing - much more than here.
As a result of this, Hifi is more a thing than here in the Netherlands where people are hardly prepared to pay for culture.
On the contrary, the Dutch contribution to Hifi is not to be underestimated. The CD format and player is mostly the result of some good engineers at Philips and we’re still stuck with 16/48 format - or multitudes of it.
If you want Dutch Hifi culture, take a look into Philips MFB.
Oh, the cd is 12 centimetre just to make a metrical statement against the 12 inch format of the LP. The inner circle of the cd has the size of the Dutch Guilder ‘dubbeltje’.
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Very interesting point of view and perspective thanks…
ATB Graham
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Not to mention class D, with Bruno Putzeys and his work on UcD whilst at Phillips (though in Belgium not the Netherlands)
And whilst reading that, Grimm Audio came up, a Dutch audio company Bruno has been involved with as well.
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Indeed. Philips certainly contributed. I like the passion for Hi-Fi and music in the UK. In the UK there is a lot to choose from.
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Oh I need to look into this more. I did not realize that Grimm Audio is Dutch. I heard about them.
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Also, having a maritime climate in the UK, the weather is so often pi** poor, we have to find our entertainment indoors. 
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I put it down to the BBC and its previous culture of striving for excellence. Many hifi companies started from that culture.
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There are a lot of interesting hifi-stuff happening in the netherlands. I think Denmark and the Netherlands are the most interesting HiFi-places in the EU. You can also have a look at audio-alpha (.net).
Try the Sonnet Pasithea preamp/DAC which is fantastic. Their poweramps (and the Metrum Forté poweramps) have an interesting design that give them a great tube/solidstate-type sound in a solid-state box. There was a great review of both by Mike Lavorgna on Twittering Machines.
Farad makes great powersupplies. There a several more great powersupply-makers, dont remember the names right now. I know one makes PSU:s for hi-end recording studios.
MagnaHiFi together with Farad makes the really excellent Mano Ultra Mk3.5 streamer (with a Farad S3). Try it with the Gentooplayer software - I use it myself. Super with a Melco with Minimserver. I am using the I2S output to a ladder-DAC and you just cant believe the violins come from a digital source.
Audiophool makes great powersupplies, they do a fab mod of the Cisco Meraki switch, they do Taiko-type music-servers. I had Audiophool replace the clock in my MelcoN1Z with an OXCO-clock with very low phase-noise with good results.
There are more but this what I remember without looking up my bookmarks.
And I live in Sweden 
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I’m not sure that there is necessarily a connection between hifi and a love of music, although there is probably a greater interest in music in the UK.
Anyway, we’re on shaky ground here, as a fair comparison would have to take into account the number of manufacturers, the number of retailers, the number of people who still buy decent hifi as opposed to cheap equipment bought from non-specialist retailers, etc.
I think an interest in technology also helps.
I live in France, there seems to be limited interest in hifi here.
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Thanks Jan. My name is also Jan b.t.w.
I am starting to see a pattern. Dutch manufacturers seem to be under-represented in online Dutch Hi-Fi shops. The shops probably focus more on main-stream products.
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It probably started way back in time with home hobbyists playing with early radio.
The UK was the first country to start national public radio broadcasts in 1922 and manufacturers of valve (tube) radio’s and speakers followed, this started the UK on the road to being an audio enthusiast location.
Later the transistor arrived and with low cost mass production, the market was flooded with equipment from the far east and hifi became available for all. This growth in home entertainment fuelled the drive for better sound the specialist audiophile market evolved and that further aided the UK as a leading audio nation.
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You may find this an interesting read:
Of course this being a naim forum I should probably mention this to: Our Story | Naim Audio
Personally, I think one of the reasons is perhaps because there’s a lot of months where the weather isn’t great and it gets dark early (like @badger1954 mentioned), nicer sometimes to spend spare time listening to music indoors (certainly here in Salisbury it’s pretty gloomy right now!).
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That was a very nice read! Thank you.
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don’t forget about Germany. A lot of interesting hifi brands with a long history, still on the market and bringing out some new great stuff.
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take a look on the website hifi.nl, a lot of interesting articles on the history of hifi and Dutch products and dealers
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Yes, I follow hifi.nl and Alpha Audio for news.
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Well my dads name is Jan …
Hepta loudspeakers are interesting, don’t forget AJ van den Hul.
I know a bloke in Renswoude who builds entire turntables.
The OP has an interesting thought. I do not know why Britain should be a centre in Europe for HiFi but I suspect it has to do with the music industry (not necessarily the music itself) in terms of recording and production in post-war and the BBC. Also, Britain used to make loads of things in the 1960s/70s for domestic and export consumption. This produced in turn lots of people who were very good electrical and mechanical engineers. Engineers working in sound production in studios recording and transmission translated into making HiFi for home consumption. Some also came from left field for who knows why like John Michell of Gyrodec TT fame, who made models for movie sets and for instance made the spaceship for 2001 A Space Odyssey. as well as a jobing mechanical engineer.
There were a lot of new HiFi companies in the UK in the 1970s. I would not say the industry is a major thing these days and has become a niche market. People who are willing to spend what Naim wants you to spend on your streaming Hifi system etc are few and far between. The lower end of the market is almost all made overseas and of course a lot of that in China.
There have been many good companies doing similar in Europe too, from the Netherlands, Scandinavia, France, Switzerland and Germany are just a few countries with companies like Philips, Thorens, Dual, Micromega, Focal and Hegel.
Specifically in the Netherlands they have a good background in electrical engineering with Philips and other non Hifi companies like Victron but compared to the UK it has a much smaller population and is not such a big producer of industrial goods. It is a lovely country though, I enjoyed working there.
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You have Kharma, and Bert Doppenberg👍
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