Quote:
...there were many times, normally a month or so before NAMM that one of these mass retailer would advertise a crazy low price on what we thought was still a current product only to find out later (many times having just ordered some at regular price) that it had been discontinued and the remaining inventory was sold in total at a huge discount to the mass retailer. The independent dealers were not even given the chance to purchase...


Well, Dave, whether it is palatable or not this exanmple is still the law of supply and demand at work. The large outfit made a buy that nobody else could and cornered the remaining inventory. Presumably the buy was large enough to invoke the deep discount quantity price, which was likely influenced by the unit closeout, no doubt, but still indiciative of the way the free market works.

For good or ill, today's marketing concepts have changed, we must be able to adapt to the paradigm shift. It has already happened.


--Mac
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"Keep listening. Never become so self-important that you can't listen to other players. Live cleanly....Do right....You can improve as a player by improving as a person. It's a duty we owe to ourselves." --John Coltrane

"You don't know what you like, you like what you know. In order to know what you like, you have to know everything." --Branford Marsalis