Re-Tales

Unless you live under a rock, you've followed Russia's invasion of Ukraine. You know something about sanctions against Russia and Russia's responses to those sanctions. If, in addition to not living under a rock, you're a tube-audio aficionado or electric guitar nut, you may have thought about a likely consequence of that war that's far less momentous than the destruction and carnage we see on TV: Will I be able to get new tubes for my amplifier? Especially those lovely Russia-made tubes.

You never forget your first time. Ask any audiophile about that first moment hearing music through a good hi-fi system—how it rocked their world and changed their life. Maybe it was at a friend's parents' house when they were a kid. Often, though, it was the first time they found themselves in a hi-fi dealership, back in the day.

Selling hi-fi gear online is hardly new. If you count mail-order sales, which is much the same thing, it's been happening since before amazon.com was a discount bookstore. Long before.

Is combining a record store with a hi-fi dealership a radical idea? Maybe not: It could be a way to reel in new, music-loving hi-fi customers where they're most comfortable, in record stores searching for music.

You may have heard that many hi-fi companies—manufacturers, distributors, and dealers—have done very well during the pandemic years. Some reported their best years in business—ever. With COVID-19 forcing people to stay at home, people sought diversion through home entertainment, including music. The industry benefited.

As I noted in previous Re-Tales columns, audio dealerships that stick to outmoded models after the world has changed may find themselves in danger of extinction. Such conflict between old and new has been with us since the beginning of time, or at least since the internet became ubiquitous. But the pandemic and its economic stresses and stimuli have accelerated the pace of change. So, how are dealers, um, dealing?

Lately I've been hearing stories about people getting back into hi-fi, often from the people themselves. Some are buying new gear, but others have dug out and dusted off older equipment. Demand for electronics repair services was surging even before the pandemic. Once it struck, once and future audiophiles stuck at home plumbed their basements, attics, and storage units and pulled out old hi-fi components, hoping to resurrect them, only to find they weren't working, or not well.

Should they get 'em fixed?