One of my best industry friends is an absolute king maker in terms of building and managing the top selling and performing audiophile brands. He’s been the president and/or CEO of a few of the most lofty brands out there and is currently bringing serious life to one of the better European audiophile electronics (they’ve got got speakers now too) companies out there. He has built many a successful dealer network for high-end audiophile brands and has some sage advice to anybody trying to build an audiophile brand to have any kind of 50 state, mainstream appeal. As he says “If you want to sell your products in all 50 states, you need to be in Magnolia. No excuses.” And he is right. Here at FutureAudiophile.com, we’ve physically called the best AV, home theater, audiophile, custom installation and hybrid dealers in every U.S. state and Canadian province and there are certain parts of this country that have people with high incomes (HHI) living there but little to no real opportunity, outside of Best Buy and/or Magnolia, to hear anything that resembles a really solid audiophile, two-channel music playback system in a retail setting.
There likely aren’t any more stand-alone Magnolia retail stores as we had here on Wilshire Boulevard in Santa Monica but there are plenty of Magnolia stores built to go inside of a Best Buy big box store just as the Minnesota retailer does with other categories like kitchen appliances or computers with Apple. Is selling your brand in Magnolia the fast track to audiophile success? No, on its own it isn’t however if one aspires to have widespread, mainstream consumer electronics appeal, you really should have your gear sold in Magnolia. If you are a car company (think: McIntosh after recently being bought by Bose) that you have all of these wealthy people interacting with your brand but how do they actually buy a system? There is no Mark Levinson gear being sold at the parts counter of your Lexus dealer but you can drive your $100,000-plus Jeep Grand Wagoneer up to a Best Buy and buy a McIntosh two channel or home theater system. That’s why in a world where there are no more national AV chains like Ultimate Electronics and Circuit City and barely any regional chains left after Tweeter, back in the 1990s, consolidated them all into one public entity and then profoundly failed as a retailer – despite a $750,000,000 company valuation at the time. Best Buy and Magnolia, for all of their warts (and they have many), are the only game in town when you look at reaching your fair share of the 330,000,000 plus people in this fine country with higher end AV gear.
In a world where national retailers can go out of business in the blink of an eye, there are many who feel like Magnolia is currently going in the wrong direction including pundits and stock analysts who watch Best Buy’s shares. I am one of these skeptics (not an analyst however) and this isn’t the first time that I’ve voiced my concern editorially. Personally, I like having a full Magnolia store in my general neighborhood. They’ve show some very cool audiophile gear like top of the line McIntosh electronics, 800 Series Bowers & Wilkins speakers and big MartinLogans ESLs on display for Angelinos like me to hear and love. At the same time, the underlying way that Best Buy is going about selling audio is concerning and likely not sustainable and somebody needs to make a stink about it. That somebody might just have to be me. So here we go …
Magnolia Tip No. 1: Unplug the MartinLogan ESL Speakers and McIntosh Tube Amp That Plays Audio In Open Air
The idea of getting people into the Magnolia in-store area of a Best Buy big box store is smart. The idea that playing them some of your best speakers and your most iconic, tube-based electronics in open air is just embarrassing. The French audiophile speaker company, Focal, commits audiophile malpractice at AV tradeshows when their marketing gurus spend a fortune to play their $700,000-plus reference-level Focal-Naim system out in open air at places like the CEDIA show which is often hosted in a huge, noisy Denver Convention Hall. This misguided audiophile demo sounds about as resolute as a transistor radio playing at 110 dB and it teaches the custom installation community to not sell audiophile electronics because of the terrible sound that they make paired with an even worse example of what is possible in the business of stereo music playback in the high end. While not everybody thinks about it, there are ramifications for our behaviors and in this case, we see how we can convince a key group of influencers why they shouldn’t embrace our hobby and that is a pure loss.
Unfortunately, most Magnolia stores have a similar demo with a pair of $10,000 plus MartinLogans ESL hybrid electrostatic speakers running in open air while being powered by something like a sexy McIntosh MC275 tube amp. On paper, this system is something that should be pretty compelling to anybody who likes music and might be interested in some unique form factors. In reality, MartinLogan ESL speakers are bipolar and need the physical boundaries of an acoustically well-treated room to sound their best. Moreover, MartinLogan ESL speakers (read a review here)don’t sound good off axis and sound even worse when you are standing up yet Magnolia will pay these iconic components for you without the courtesy of a suitable chair to sit in. That’s a well-intentioned yet an enthusiastic mistake that is completely avoidable.
Are McIntosh tube amps and MartinLogan ESL speakers totally cool to look at? Yes, by all means, they are. Should they be ever played for any human being with working ears under these absurd conditions? No, they should not. Wanna know a simple solution to this self-inflicted problem? How about unplug the speaker cables and not play terrible sound coming from iconic and legendary audiophile components? That potentially lures people into that part of the store with the visual impact of transparent looking MartinLogan speakers and/or the ever-relevant glow of tubes inside of a McIntosh power amp without embarrassing people with unnecessarily awful sound from a system capable of so much more.
If I were the manager of a Magnolia store, I would have someone from my sales team who was not on the phone or with a client at the time, stand in front of the store and interact with human beings. I wouldn’t trust this task to an intimate object like audiophile speakers and electronics. If my talent pool was too introverted to handle that unique challenge, then they are too introverted to make the $200,000 a year that they should be making on commission at a high volume Magnolia location. I would find new, gregarious and hungry talent who would be technological ambassadors for the store as well as the hobby as a whole.
Magnolia Tip No. 2: Put Your Whole Sales Team on Full Commission
Hungry salespeople sell more. They just do. The legend of how Circuit City folded (and fast) is told decades later with some arrogant executives getting on the old company Lear Jet and deciding that a small percentage of top performing salespeople at that legendary chain “made to much money”. That level of ignorance was spewed at me by a Harvard MBA (it is always a Harvard grad who does this by the way) when I sold AVRev.com to Internet Brands back in 2008. They were upset that I spent a bunch of money in my best year to take my best client (who spent $180,000 per year at the time, God I miss those days) to play golf at Pebble Beach including a $6,000 (at the time) private jet. They cut those expenses when they whacked me and the clients cut their spend from $15,000 per month to zero. Brilliant move guys. Brilliant, if your goal was to lose each and every client for the publication (and they did just that).
The idea that people on commission make too much money is just plain silly. People who are willing to gamble their own financial security deserve to make more money when they are successful. In the case of big publicly traded companies, successful salespeople who make more than some of the executives, make the suits sweat a little bit. Why? Who knows as the suits make their money on stock options and stock grants that become worth more as the commissioned salespeople sell more.
The suits at Best Buy should invest in enthusiastically hiring and developing a diverse team of total killers for their national sales staff at Magnolia. Train them as if they went to Audiophile University. Reward financially them like they are the rock starts that you think they can be. Never get jealous of their success, in fact, promote it to the rest of the team and show others how it is possible to make a one percenter ($400,000 and up) income. This would make Magnolia AV into a sought-after destination for the nation’s top audio salesmen versus them making jokes about “blue shirts” which is just plain unfortunate.
Magnolia Tip No. 3: Sell More Brands – Not Less
Have you been inside of a Magnolia store recently? This year, they now unfortunately sell fewer audiophile brands than in recent years. KEF keeps getting a stronger and stronger position in the store’s product offerings. Definitive Technology is out. The recently-sold and gorgeous Italian speaker brand, Sonus faber, is also out. Is there anything new and exciting being sold in Magnolia in their place? No, there isn’t. KEF, even their quite-expensive Blade speakers, are just not that exotic anymore. Changing up one’s product offering is a good strategy and the best retailers do this as a positive course of action every few years. The problem here is that the brand diversity is greatly diminished with nothing to replace it. SVS’ new speakers are a worthy audition (same with their new subs which are just coming to market) but SVS isn’t new to Magnolia AV. Consumers like choices. Magnolia has limited their choices for reasons that don’t make sense to the average consumer.
Magnolia Tip No. 4: Try Embracing Chi-Fi Gear
There are some in the audiophile retail world who poo-poo Chi-Fi electronics but they shouldn’t. These high value products offer performance oriented, value-based components that are easy for younger consumers to get involved with the hobby at more reasonable prices. Can these Chinese companies jump through the demanding hoops that Best Buy will want them to? That is an unlikely outcome for even the best Chi-Fi companies but perhaps there could be a little bit of an exception. Topping, S.M.S.L or iFi are all strong, value-oriented brands that could take a place below NAD and ARCAM in Magnolia’s product lineup.
God knows what these Chinese-made components will cost when soon-to-be President Trump launches his sales tax (that’s what a tariff is for those who watch too much Fox News and/or ignore the 400 economists in Chicago who tried to explain this concept to a six-times bankrupt Nepo-baby with an Ivy League “business” degree) but time will tell. And for that matter – what percentage of products sold at Magnolia aren’t made in China? 800 Series Bowers & Wilkins? Yes. Big McIntosh? Yes. KEF Blades? Yes. Most everything else is made somewhere that will be taxed by Mr. Trump (China, Mexico and Canada) via executive order on “Day One” as he has enthusiastically promised. Want to own a pair of MartinLogan ESL speakers you should buy them right this second? The ultra-cool audiophile speakers are made in Canada (in the Paradigm factory in Ontario) so tack on 25 percent to be paid by American consumers as those speakers are no longer made in Kansas (fill in Wizard of Oz joke here…) and you can go on.
Magnolia Tip No. 5: Refresh Your Demo Material/Music
The touchscreen-based system that Magnolia uses to switch AV equipment is very slick. It is basically a version of what the old stereo store was doing with a wall full of speakers back in the old days but Magnolia does this with a big-ass touch screen and very sophisticated audio and video switching. It is a massive improvement over what we dealt with years and years ago in more traditional stereo stores. The customer or the salesperson can select your musical source, your system configuration (2.0, 2.1 etc…) as well as your specific electronics, audiophile speakers and possibly a subwoofer. You can even connect to this system via Bluetooth from your phone to play your own music.
Where a refresh could be useful is to update the demo material on the system as there are some stock options that are the easiest tracks to access on Magnolia’s system. It wouldn’t take much to refresh these demo tracks that are featured. You can ask any reputable audiophile magazine (we will pick some killer, relatable and impressive tracks for you at no cost – just ask) or poll your sales staff as to what are great demos and go from there. People want to hear music that they relate to more than music that is just well-recorded. The well-made recording is assumed. Playing music that makes people get “the feels” is the trick and the playlist that Magnolia uses is really tired at this point thus it is time for an update.
Magnolia Tip No. 6: Offer More Sales Training, More Often
Forget my 25 plus year role as publisher or CEO because at heart, I am a stereo salesman. I truly relate to the guys who make a living working at my local Magnolia in ways that I don’t think that they know, but I do. The nature of selling audiophile gear leaves you with plenty of downtime during any given workday or shift. What can be done to use online modern online educational resources to train your sales staff, right on their devices, so that they can take online classes and be tested so that they are ultra-well-informed about the products that they sell as well as are using the best possible sales techniques. Respectfully, loafing around watching a movie from the Kaleidescape in the Magnolia theater isn’t benefiting anybody. Perhaps tie this concept into getting max commission and you will see Magnolia’s sales team be motivated to constantly be improving their personal game. Those benefits will yield results that will not just benefit Best Buy’s stock price but will bring more people into the audiophile hobby as well as engage with more system upgrades – both of which are excellent outcomes.
Some Final Thoughts on How (and Why) Magnolia Can’t Be Allowed To Fail …
We just watched an excellent streaming show on Amazon Prime featuring William Hurt and Paul Giamatti on the 2008 banking crisis called Too Big To Fail. While Best Buy can absolutely fail (see Circuit City, Ultimate Electronics and Tweeter for historical examples) the audiophile hobby will suffer badly if this were to happen to Best Buy. Simply put, Best Buy (and Magnolia AV) are just too important to the world of enthusiast electronics. There are just too many places around the United States where people only learn about audiophile products from Best Buy and/or Magnolia. There are simply no other national retail chains and close to no remaining regional chains post Tweeter’s bankruptcy.
There are many who want to see Best Buy/Magnolia fail because they aren’t part of the “audiophile club” or they are a clunky arm of a publicly traded company. I get that view but it is wrong. Magnolia AV is the single most important distribution element in the high end audio world. More people will learn about audiophile gear from Magnolia than any other retailer. And while online retailers like Audio Advice, Crutchfield, JaguarAudio.com and others try to sell products directly to consumers, they can’t provide the experience and education that comes from a positive in-store experience. Amazon.com is a beyond-powerful retail giant but respectfully, they aren’t as important to the audiophile hobby as Best Buy and Magnolia AV.
Is anyone from Best Buy listening? They are. Will they do anything about making their retail experience being more fine-tuned for the audiophile hobby in 2025 and beyond? Politely, that is simply to be determined. The easy answer is to keep watching the poor guidance on CNBC for the stock and not do anything meaningful for your customers to address it. The reality is that Best Buy and Magnolia, much like the big banks in 2008, are just too big to fail. They are just too important to the overall world of enthusiast audio in the United States at this point.
Where do you buy your AV equipment? Do you stop in to visit in your local Magnolia AV? Which of these ideas do you like the best? Which one would you like to see Best Buy take on for their higher end retail in-store venture, Magnolia? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below and we will post your comments in mere minutes.
Spot on! Mainstream audio / entry level audiophile has all but disappeared from bricks and mortar big box. Add ABT to the regional list – they do a good job. The current opportunity to actually listen in a good newby (future audiophile) comfortable environment with knowledgeable sales teams is unfortunately slim.
Jerry – this really hits home for me, and I’m sure it will with many of my former Magnolia colleagues. I shared it on our “Magnolia Family” FB page in hopes that they will read it and share their feedback. The most important thing that came to mind after reading your article is that Magnolia as it is today does not provide the “Experience” it once did. One of the most memorable store calls happened right after I joined the family and it was with the then representative for Kef and McIntosh, the late Rick Railston. He gave me some very valuable insight about doing an effective demo, but his main point was that you can’t allow your enthusiasm to flag because you’ve done the same demo 100 times. “You’ve got to remember that for your customer, it’s highly likely that this is their FIRST time, and you have to make it special for them.” If that can happen again and more often, maybe we succeed in keeping this business alive and attractive to a new generation. Thanks for your insight, you pretty much hit the nail through the board.
The feedback from the Magnolia HiFi group was interesting for both the variety and intensity. The general sentiment is that MHF wasn’t made what it was by the brands it carried, although, of course, we carried some of the most prestigious brands available. One of the most poignant comments was “Not a single mention of the essential reason for the original MHF’s success: standard-setting levels of customer service provided by true believers.” The problem is that there just isn’t enough talent with the combination of experience, passion and the fanatical dedication to top-shelf service. Nordstrom experienced the same challenge when they expanded outside the Pacific NW. The part you got so right is that the staff, in most cases, has been allowed to dwindle to the level of BestBuy clerks who don’t possess the knowledge or experience, few of whom have any passion for the product – or the music – and the gear is not set up properly. Those factors don’t add up to an experience, instead they make the cost of the gear itself the focus. Another spot-on observation from the group is that “audiophiles are geezers”. Future Audiophile’s mission to get new generations interested world of HiFi is admirable AND necessary, but we need to remember that our own experience of HiFi happened at a time and in places that no longer exist. Another comment from the group regarding the demise of the Magnolia brand: “perhaps an opportunity for another business model to fill the void?” What could that model be? Independent high-end stores? Some sort “click and mortar” business? Few folks in the group believe that BestBuy can or even wants to replicate something resembling the old Magnolia experience. They had a chance, but the more recent choices they’ve made pretty much wrecked any chances of that happening, and it appears that they are in the process of getting rid of the brand entirely. I rarely hope to be wrong, but this is one of those times.
These are very valid points raised in this article. Being a stat fanboy and ML owner I especially keyed in on the demo of ML speakers. Fantastic speakers but the author nailed it on what is required for an effective demo. I love my ML’s but the criticism of head n a vice aspect of stats are true in my experience. I can’t imagine that standing in an open air environment to demo ML speakers is doing any favors to the customer or manufacturer. Hope management at Magnolia is paying attention.
You make valid points I can only say, amen.I do wish Best Buy to fail simply because they are the worst retailer ever. I lodged a complaint with the BBB and their president basically told me to take a flying leap. They care nothing for their customer and fine with just being a warehouse. Another time I purchased an entire car audio system and had to wait 90 days for the install because I bought online at Christmas. I finally get there and they don’t have the items pulled, something else went wrong, they took so much time they wanted me to reschedule. I told them no I wanted a refund. They even screwed that up and I had to do a charge back on my credit card. Out of all the big box stores you mentioned Best Buy should have been the one to go. I haven’t been in one in many years and would do without if it involved going into one of their stores. For the life of me I can’t figure out why people still buy from them.
YEP….I had a similar experience when I was shopping for Martin Logan ESL13 speakers a few years ago. They had the speakers set up on a “long wall”, about 10′ apart, with my listening position only 6′ in front of them. No wonder they sounded awful. AND…their demo room was overdamped, with sound deadening material on all walls, ceiling, and carpeted floor. It sucked the life out of anything you heard. The salespeople were considerate, but wholly unconcerned whether I bought anything or not. (Though they were interested in the demo CDs which I brought….taking pics of the CD cases!)
I used to dabble in the audiophile space. I had my B&W’s, my Krell amp and processor, even invested in higher-end interconnects and speaker cables. But as I got older, my preferences started to skew towards simplicity. Now most of my audio is supplied by Spotify through one of several Apple Homepods in my house. Easy peasy. Hard to see me going back, although whenever I walk into a Best Buy I make sure to visit the Magnolia section “just to look”.
We want you looking!!!!
The new stuff is SO GOOD TODAY.
I hope you get the bug and start looking around 🙂
PLEASE NOTE: we corrected a fact that was given to us incorrectly.
REL subwoofers, a client of ours, is NOT OUT at Magnolia.
We updated the article on 1/30 to reflect that REL is NOT out of Magnolia. They’ve been with them for 27 years and that remains in place.
Jerry
I was a manager for the original Magnolia, started by Len Tweten in the 1950’s. The company was run by Len and his family until it was sold to BB. It was a great place to work at and a excellent company to work for. It was a sad day for us when the company was sold and many, myself included, were concerned that BB would not be up to the task and standards created by the Tweten family. Sadly our concerns were well founded.
Rick – one of the things that always stood out in Magnolia’s Sunday TV Times ads in the old days was a line at the very bottom of nearly every ad: “Above all else, our most important asset is our people”. This is what BB never understood or even seemed to care about, and that, I believe, is why the BB/MAV didn’t have the success of the original MHF.
The industry’s manufacturers won’t allow Best Buy to fail anytime soon. I’ve been in the A/V business for over 40 years, and I have experience working for large manufacturers. Manufacturers rely on Best Buy to SHOW their products, so consumers can PURCHASE them. Whether or not they make their purchases at Best Buy is beside the point, because they usually don’t. But Best Buy serves (although it’s not THEIR intension) as a showroom for online (Amazon.com, Crutchfield, etc.) companies. When failing to “pay their bill”, manufacturers can write them off. Believe me, that has happened a lot…
Best Buy is nothing more than a warehouse store charging retail prices for zero information, poor product availability or service. It currently resembles an expanded appliance store. Magnolia, before the Best Buy acquisition, was a great place to go and shop. The staff were well informed, enthusiasts, provided good assistance and they had quality products. It is sad but common for the large corporate entities to take a successful company and want to change the identity and direction to match the group think of the parent corporation. In most cases, the key people leave as a result and the direction in turn usually results in a decline. It is a much different market today. In many respects, the enthusiast market is returning to the days before the big influx of Asian made, mass market HiFi products that were introduced during the Viet Nam War era. The specialty audio area will always be there but much more like it was in the 1950’5 and 1960’s.
As society transitions faster and further into the “click on your phone and order it” world, I would think that the best thing for Best Buy to maximize its revenue per square foot is to carry things that are hard to return via UPS/FEDEX…and things that people seem to want to touch/feel/see before buying.
For example, when it comes to a pair of $2k bookshelves…I suspect that most will not be concerned about ordering from Crutchfield and won’t make a 60 minute drive to a BB. On the other hand, if its a big pair of Logans, many of would feel better making the drive…both to hear them…and what if there is a problem?
In some ways, the bigger question is where will audio be in 10 years…if it trends toward multiple smaller speakers and subwoofers doing the job of towers….and class d doing the job of big/heavy amps…then BB may well have made a good decision to move away from the boutique model.
FWIW….I have two BB purchases in my system….and Oppo player and a REL sub…both were ordered and shipped without me ever hearing them.