What happened to Vitus???

Penthouse-D said:
My original question "what happened to Vitus" was directed to not only the brand itself, but 2-3 years ago there would be a post on this site nearly every day. Recently , maybe one every 6-8 months.... the brand has been "forgotten". Yes, wonderful awards, finally the new amp, but a guy in Colorado can't buy one...I've been a Vitus owner since the RI-100 was released. Close to 10 years. I had a NYC dealer who did not carry the line, sitting in my apartment listening to my RI-100, and because of that afternoon, he became a dealer... I upgraded to the SIA-025 easily because my dealer (who I have a RELATIONSHIP with), made it easy to do... The ," in a perfect world" theory here isn't working.. While you attempt to roll the brand out again, the consumer is tiring of the difficulty. In the end, it's all about the end consumer , the person who spends the last $... Lastly, here's a final example of how you are quickly losing the consumer. There is an RI-101 on Audiogon. It's obviously the new model. The guy can't sell it for 50% off retail. No-one cares!!!! 5-6 years ago, an SIA -025 would've sold in a week for a 35% discount.. Because there were dealers, press, buzz, etc... I'm certain your business plan is very dealer focused. Very few dealers, NO discounting, etc. Basically , the Spectral model. That may have worked had the brand started and stayed that way. It didn't. People have moved on to other brands, the brand has very poor resale, you can't see one unless you, in many cases spend $$$ and travel time.The brand is struggling...It's about the end consumer. US, not the dealers who will have the luxury of selling exclusive brands at full retail.. Most of us have moved on.....
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Hi Once again..

regarding the RI 101 on Audiogon.. thats with an old model dac.. its no longer available.. RI 101 only comes with optional DAC/Streamer module only.. and to clarify.. the old dac was a $2,760 option. in other word the ad stating the new price of the unit at 20600 is misleading..

I think you prefer not to call me.. but dont hesitate if you want to know the FACTs about Vitus and what we do..
 
How long is your contract with Vitus? You're making my point. I should call you for the facts?... I get it, but if you want to sell product, you should be listening to your customers. Not me listening to you. Quite frankly,I'm giving you the most valuable information. Get A LOT of good dealers, make it EASY for me to see/ listen, and possibly buy the product, and lastly, if a dealer sees fit, let them offer a discount to loyal customers. I may be wrong, but what I'm hearing is " full retail only". The market has become very competitive with many great brands. T+A, Gryphon, any more. Good luck with that...
 
Highendbyoz said:
Hi Ritmo,
I think there is a misperception here..

Let me clarify..

I never said/planned to have only 4-5 dealers across the country. As I said on my earlier post, we have taken over distribution of Vitus Audio in March 2019 and started from scratch with our dealer network. In other words we have established 5 dealerships in the last 9 months since we took over distribution.

If you were to take a snap shot picture of the dealership network today, and call it not enough you will be right.. but we are building the network and will add more dealers going forward.

We will continue to the shows and do dealer events as well .

as for the comments by Penthouse-D, regarding the product being late for 2 years.. I can tell you this.. VA is not a company that dishes out products every year.. It takes a good 2-3years before they are happy to introduce an upgrade or introduce a completely new product. Take a look at SIA-25. .it still is going for over 10 years with only one upgrade in those 10 years..in other words it takes time for a VA product to be commercially available. Also I never said we wont have a dealer in each state and force consumers to travel 100s miles for listen VA products. What I said was we are building our dealership network from scratch with dealers who are committed to the brand and showcase it properly..
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Great! Glad you are pursuing a strategy of more visibility and a wider retail network.

Please don’t misunderstand my note. I’m simply encouraging you to be appropriately active on this site as you further develop the dealer network and Vitus introduces new products.

Wish you great success!
 
dznutz said:
It has been, it was never as amazing as it was marketed. People who actually owned them complained that the units weren't as well designed and built as they should have been. At these prices amps should not be humming or buzzing.
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Please direct me to the sites where, as you wrote, Vitus owners "complained the units weren't well designed and built as (well) as they should have been..."

I locate only glowing reviews and comments on Vitus gear.
Thanks.
 
Most Manufacturers will go out of their way to ensure that criticism doesn't exist in the public domain. If you are simply a Consumer who relies on Dealers, Reviewers and Marketing material then your only getting half the truth. Very few Dealers will criticize a Brand, most will simply drop them and move along.
 
How can you even state that there is no criticism existing on the public domain? There are many, many critical comments about hi fi products that you can access with a quick search.
I asked you where you got your information about Vitus owners (plural) being displeased with their Vitus gear. I'm not asking you for something uncommon. I'm simply asking that you cite your sources.
Or did you make this up what you wrote? Without sources, that's the only conclusion I can make.
 
^ You must be speaking in absolutes, I am not. I do not take anything on the internet as fact. I also don't owe you anything, feel free to purchase whatever you like and enjoy.
 
I'm simply trying to determine whether your statement was your opinion or factually based.
Be well. Enjoy music.
 
Not living in the USA, i can assure you that Vitus has maintained its presence in many other parts of the world and continues to produce very impressive gear imho.
 
I suppose the distributor play a very important part in the brand presence in your region . Hans ole did visit Malaysia a couple of times & we treat him like a true Viking 😄.
Not much issue with my Vitus - Masterpiece MPL mk2, MPP mk2 , MPD MK 3 - all these upgraded without much issue & Vitus MPM monoblock is excellent driving my Focal Stella Em
 
Penthouse-D said:
Get A LOT of good dealers
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As if one snaps their fingers . . .

Dealers have way more brands at the offer to them than they can possibly represent well. A "dealer" is not just someone that can get you the product; they have to be able to demo it for you (meaning, put the unit on a rack in a room) and we all know that there is only but so much room. And they have to really know it, be able to talk about it, and be assured that it'll satisfy the customer, won't break down, service is available if it does break down, etc etc.

If a dealer's racks are full, what brand should they drop in order to make room for something new?

Have a good talk in private (not online) with your favorite dealer and learn how they chose which brands they represent. I did that very recently here; it was a fascinating and instructive conversation.
 
Bart001 said:
As if one snaps their fingers . . .

Dealers have way more brands at the offer to them than they can possibly represent well. A "dealer" is not just someone that can get you the product; they have to be able to demo it for you (meaning, put the unit on a rack in a room) and we all know that there is only but so much room. And they have to really know it, be able to talk about it, and be assured that it'll satisfy the customer, won't break down, service is available if it does break down, etc etc.

If a dealer's racks are full, what brand should they drop in order to make room for something new?

Have a good talk in private (not online) with your favorite dealer and learn how they chose which brands they represent. I did that very recently here; it was a fascinating and instructive conversation.
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[emoji1310]

Well said. It’s not just the brands coming at you left right and center (there is definitely that), but what customers have to keep in mind is that we as dealers have to LIKE the people we deal with. They don’t have to be all lovey dovey, but they do have to be professional, responsive and supportive.

I don’t care how good the product is, if your rep is a jerk, we won’t deal with you. I sold my IT business, could have retired 6 years ago, so I’m doing this to stay busy and have fun. I had over 25 years of horrendous stress. I will not do that again.

I have dropped brands because of late Friday night calls from a drunk rep cursing up a storm. I have dropped brands because an owner of a company spoke in the most disgusting way about his wife (sexually) and I have avoided brands altogether with complete jerks.

There was one particular network transport brand last year that we were speaking with. This recycled rep (and there are sadly a few of them still around) was a complete jerk. We then lost complete interest in the brand. The owner just last week reached out to us and told us he’s no longer with them (for the exact reasons we expressed) and asked to speak with us again. How many of these international brands do these same recycled guys have to ruin before the manufacturers wake up? Stop hiring the same old losers! When you have a proper distributor doing a good job, stop getting greedy! Jesus.

For those not in the know, washed up reps take less of the cut than a proper distributor. But then you get what you pay for ladies and gentleman.

There are many good rep firms. Our focal/NAIM guy is INCREDIBLE. He’s hard working and always - always - professional and responsive. But there are still a few of the one man show reps who’ve been around forever and left a wake of destruction in their path.

For the life of me, I have no idea why these overseas brands continue to hire these washed up individuals. News flash: dealers don’t like them and that affects YOUR sales! There are plenty of good ones around that you don’t need to hire the same knuckleheads who promise you the moon and only deliver grief.


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I remember when I signed on as the North American distributor for Avantgarde Acoustics in '99.

They had zero North American dealers or sales.

I finally showed at CES 2000 in January of that year.

We went on to build a good name for the company, but there were a number of issues - the largest of which was that they were almost completely unknown, except for a few horn-lovers who largely kept their preference to themselves.

I (Avantgarde-USA) never had but about 15-20 dealers (yes, we were picky), yet we sold more annually than any country or territory had sold to date elsewhere on the planet...

We worked hard to support our dealers, including extra training, monthly newsletters, and appearing at local events, as well as at all of the larger shows.

I would probably still be involved, but I had to resign in 2005. When I signed on, the price was OK (the exchange rate was 87 (US) cents for a (German) Deutsche Mark. During that four-and-a-half year time period, the exchange rate went from 87 cents to $1.27 - over a 30% increase in cost to me! There were no new or nicely updated models, so they did not raise the price. I couldn't ask my hard-working dealers to take less margin, though a few of them would have done so, rather than have it all fall apart as it did subsequently. Therefore, I couldn't independently raise the price anywhere near enough to stay on as the distributor.

The last year - 2005 - as I hung on and tried to support the dealers as well as Avantgarde Acoustic, I lost a a LOT of money on each & every sale.

Finally I had no choice - and no more money to throw away on each sale - so I resigned in late October of '2005.

So there a lot of things that can affect the potentially tricky US distributor/international manufacturer relationship.

I wish OZ the very best as he moves forward, re-introducing Vitus to a much smaller available dealer network than existed in the past. At this time, the good news is that he has nowhere to go but upwards!!!

Go Oz!!! :congrats::congrats::congrats:
 
Jim Smith said:
When I signed on, the price was OK (the exchange rate was 87 (US) cents for a (German) Deutsche Mark. During that four-and-a-half year time period, the exchange rate went from 87 cents to $1.27 - over a 30% increase in cost to me! There were no new or nicely updated models, so they did not raise the price. I couldn't ask my hard-working dealers to take less margin, though a few of them would have done so, rather than have it all fall apart as it did subsequently. Therefore, I couldn't independently raise the price anywhere near enough to stay on as the distributor.
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This is still an issue right? Exchange rates, and the cost/availability of transport overseas (a problem right now!), can really be a headwind when trying to rep ex-US brands in the States I understand.

There are advantages US dealers have selling US-made goods these days.
 
This has been a really interesting thread and parallels my job experiences. I used to think the work was most important but found out over time that it was who I was working for and who I was working with were much more important.

It’s easy to draw parallels in the audio world.
 
I am having an issue with a loudish BUZZ when I use my turntable. I would like to hear from the people who have issues with A BUZZING sound. I never heard of this problem being voiced.
 
That’s what happened when your MPD is near your phono . I have that issue. So I always listen to vinyl with my DAC powered off
 
Not sure what you mean by MPD but my sacd player has been unplugged due to non use for forever. I must be getting the HUM from some other source.
 
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