Beoworlders,

In the past weeks I saw a few topics about the strategy and products of today. 90% of the replies from Beoworlder are against the rebranding of Philips and Samsung products, repimping of old designs, and the current prices.

Today I was thinking:"damn, so much complaints and not a single answer from B&O self". With this view I thougt: "maybe it's time to ask a explanation...."

I would ask if you, Beoworlders, would give me your thougts on a letter and the points in the letter.

I personally thought about this points:

- why is B&O redesigning older desings, or is mr. Lewis out of ideas ?
- why is B&O rebranding Philips HDD's instead of designing them by themselfs ?
- Has B&O lost his elegancy ? (bl 6000/8000, bs9000, bc9500, bv5 style, instead of the spacy/plastic bl9, bv9, bv8 etc.)
- Has B&O ever looked at this site to see how fans think of them ?
- What's their explanation for the current prices of their telly's
- Your thougts.....

I would really like to know how B&O is thinking of those points, and if they can give us a good answer I will post the mail in this topic...

Regards,
Beobird
 

While it would be nice to know B&O's real thoughts on these questions it's unlikey they would ever share them in public and the best we could expect is a "Thanks for your input, you can be assured we take the views of our customers seriously at all times........blah, blah", standard customer response type letter. I would be amazed if they didn't follow this site (and other similar site around the world) with great interest as its all but a free, always up to date, customer survey. As such I think such a letter may be a bit of a waste of time.

What would be interesting to know is what percentage we represent of the greater B&O buying public - our views may not actually those of the greater market, the chances are we offer a greatly skewed viewpoint. (for example the percentage of BeoWorlders that are Mac users is a significantly higher percentage than the overall figure in the mass market therefore conducting a computer based research poll here would give a somewhat different perspective than a poll from "the streets").

I´m with Puncher.

they all ready read it

Beobird:

Beoworlders,

In the past weeks I saw a few topics about the strategy and products of today. 90% of the replies from Beoworlder are against the rebranding of Philips and Samsung products, repimping of old designs, and the current prices.

Today I was thinking:"damn, so much complaints and not a single answer from B&O self". With this view I thougt: "maybe it's time to ask a explanation...."

I would ask if you, Beoworlders, would give me your thougts on a letter and the points in the letter.

I personally thought about this points:

- why is B&O redesigning older desings, or is mr. Lewis out of ideas ?
- why is B&O rebranding Philips HDD's instead of designing them by themselfs ?
- Has B&O lost his elegancy ? (bl 6000/8000, bs9000, bc9500, bv5 style, instead of the spacy/plastic bl9, bv9, bv8 etc.)
- Has B&O ever looked at this site to see how fans think of them ?
- What's their explanation for the current prices of their telly's
- Your thougts.....

I would really like to know how B&O is thinking of those points, and if they can give us a good answer I will post the mail in this topic...

Regards,
Beobird
 

Good idea - you should do it!

B&O may read this website, but a cogent set of points addressing the concerns of one (or a group of) loyal B&O customer(s), would be a good way of drawing their attention to the concerns of their customer base. I'm sorry, but even if B&O read this site regualrly, any complaints brought up on these pages could simply be dismissed by them as 'noise in the system', rather than genuine grievances - particulalrly when most of the promising threads dealing with this issue seem to end up petering out into an exchange of inane platitudes between forum members. Why can't we have a little bite for a change? There's nothing wrong with challenging posts and comments that cut slightly against the grain. Some more input from posters like 10% and 355F would be so welcome sometimes, as I've always looked forward to their refreshing take on some of the issues we've discussed relating to B&O recently. This is the friendliest forum I have come across, but please let's not allow the discussion to stagnate for fear of causing the slightest bit of offence!

It must be a JOKE - a letter to B&O.

You have not really got it - have you - B&O is not making their profits (or losses) on us - Beoworlders.

The company have a differentiated maketing strategy - and it is not targeted at us !

It is targeted at rich oil sheiks, new russian millonares, rock stars and so on - WAKE UP ! 

In 1990 25 % of Danish households had a B&O TV - today probably 1 %.

B&O did not do this because they did not like the Danes - but they did it to survive in a tough world !

However, I must admit - I also thing that B&O have design problem - maybe it is me who is getting to old.

From an Arne Jacobsen fan (OK - Lewis did alright with the Beosound 9000)

Erik-nl:

It must be a JOKE - a letter to B&O.

You have not really got it - have you - B&O is not making their profits (or losses) on us - Beoworlders.

The company have a differentiated maketing strategy - and it is not targeted at us !

It wasn't mentioned as a joke, but I can understand your reply. It's just the point that I want to know for sure that B&O doens't target to us anymore... But I hope that there will be a new sales director with good eyes, and that he will see that the group oil sheikes is to small to survive, they need people like us...

I think it´s a good idea. In Spanish Forum there are several complaints with the new B&O products and with his strategy.

Erik-nl:

It must be a JOKE - a letter to B&O.

You have not really got it - have you - B&O is not making their profits (or losses) on us - Beoworlders.

The company have a differentiated maketing strategy - and it is not targeted at us !

It is targeted at rich oil sheiks, new russian millonares, rock stars and so on - WAKE UP ! 

In 1990 25 % of Danish households had a B&O TV - today probably 1 %.

B&O did not do this because they did not like the Danes - but they did it to survive in a tough world !

...

I think I understand your outrage, Erik. BUT I simply don't belive that any business which is done with passion will ignore what Puncher quickly mentioned above. That said, I do believe there is enough passion left in B&O's headquarters ... Still, I agree with you it's not neccessary to write a letter to them

the best thing to do is as always vote with your "cash ", b&o  and any (business) the only language they understand !!!!

not begging them to sell me two-three years products out of date 7-8 times the price. let them do their sums sink or swim!!!!

BnO are not the least bit interested in opinions.

The very actions over the past 18 months prove that this is a management team totally out of touch with reality.

A great shame, altering the stores- as mentioned in a previous post, will not help- I t will bankrupt the dealers.

To little and to late- its the dealers I feel sorry for. Its not to late,but i regret to say the management is bereftof new ideas and reality

As far as I see it, we are back to an extent to the early 90s. We have an expensive to run exclusive dealer network that automatically increases the price of the product. We have a range that is skewed to the expensive end of the range which is being battered by the rapidly advancing technology and a design team that is having problems adapting to this fast moving market. They are trying - look at all the products launched. And rebranding Philips etc is not new!

We are not a representative sample of buyers. We are however a sample! I think our views are valid and ones that I am sure Struer do consider though clearly only as a small part of their market research. The major problem at present is the price of the flat screen portfolio. Simply too expensive compared to models from other companies which can now produce models that can look equally elegant  at a tenth of the price.

The Audio range is still good in my opinion but too reliant on the BS9000/BL8000 range. I like the new speakers though and think they allied to good integration with downloaded music can be the salvation of B&O. Concentrate on what B&O do so well. I think a similar route to the STB-C in TVs is required so that one can use one's own computer as storage but have an easy to use interface in true B&O style. This needs to be as good as anything on the market - hence two way. A bigger and cleverer Beo5 with the lovely two stage touch sensitive screen but wireless connectivity to the music server is the way I would go. I confess that my Beo5 is rapidly turning into a paperweight. 

Beobird:

Beoworlders,

In the past weeks I saw a few topics about the strategy and products of today. 90% of the replies from Beoworlder are against the rebranding of Philips and Samsung products, repimping of old designs, and the current prices.

Today I was thinking:"damn, so much complaints and not a single answer from B&O self". With this view I thougt: "maybe it's time to ask a explanation...."

I would ask if you, Beoworlders, would give me your thougts on a letter and the points in the letter.

I personally thought about this points:

- why is B&O redesigning older desings, or is mr. Lewis out of ideas ?
- why is B&O rebranding Philips HDD's instead of designing them by themselfs ?
- Has B&O lost his elegancy ? (bl 6000/8000, bs9000, bc9500, bv5 style, instead of the spacy/plastic bl9, bv9, bv8 etc.)
- Has B&O ever looked at this site to see how fans think of them ?
- What's their explanation for the current prices of their telly's
- Your thougts.....

I would really like to know how B&O is thinking of those points, and if they can give us a good answer I will post the mail in this topic...

Regards,
Beobird
 

Don´t listen to the rest in this thread ho are against your mail ! But if you just send it to B&o´s general mail support your mail will have zero impact ! You must send it directly to a  executive manager for maximum response and impact...!!

Basic human facts: 

Often you don´t see what you are doing bad in many situations because you are blind folded and stressed to come up with some good results!

But a alienage group of people (costumers) have much more easy to see problems objective and from a distance to mark out what can be refined...

 

So ask LEE for a mail address to a executive marketing manager at B&o....

My 3 cent´s...

 

Regards Fredrik L. 

Here's what's important from a business point of view:

 

1. Are they making a profit?

2. Will them make more of a profit utilizing your ideas or is it just something that will make you happy?

3. Why do you really care?  For example, if they got bought out by, oh I don't know, Sony... would you flip out?  Even if it could be the Ford/Volvo buyout which has benefitted Volvo to no ends with a minimum of "selling out"?

 

If you can answer those questions then maybe you can see if the company is in trouble or not.  Particularly #1 and a bit of #2.  And with #2 remember this: there's a reason why some people are running B&O and the rest (us) are here posting in some forum about them. 

Don´t listen to the rest in this thread ho are against your mail ! But if you just send it to B&o´s general mail support your mail will have zero impact ! You must send it directly to a  executive manager for maximum response and impact...!!

Basic human facts:

Often you don´t see what you are doing bad in many situations because you are blind folded and stressed to come up with some good results!

But a alienage group of people (costumers) have much more easy to see problems objective and from a distance to mark out what can be refined...

So ask LEE for a mail address to a executive marketing manager at B&o....

My 3 cent´s...

Regards Fredrik L. 

I asked for one of the directors mail adresses so I hope it will be ok . 

Erik-nl:

 

It is targeted at rich oil sheiks, new russian millonares, rock stars and so on - WAKE UP !

Let's hope not, since this is not a market. The absolute majority of these people never make their own purchasing decisions, and instead have managers, designers, interior decorators, a/v consultants and numerous other go-betweens who provide to their whims and caprices. Their only relationship to B&O is how the remote works, and that is very likely to be a non-B&O large panel two-way remote, at any rate.

soundproof:

Erik-nl:

 

It is targeted at rich oil sheiks, new russian millonares, rock stars and so on - WAKE UP !

Let's hope not, since this is not a market. The absolute majority of these people never make their own purchasing decisions, and instead have managers, designers, interior decorators, a/v consultants and numerous other go-betweens who provide to their whims and caprices. Their only relationship to B&O is how the remote works, and that is very likely to be a non-B&O large panel two-way remote, at any rate.

 

Speaking of which, we were at a friends house on Saturday evening and their daughter was watching TV. I noticed there was a staggering amount of B&O distributed through someones house (BS9000, BV7 etc etc) on whatever programme she was watching. Turns out it was Coleen - Coleen who you may ask?? The girlfriend of Wayne "Shrek" Rooney from Manchester Utd!

You can tell at a glance that the're both real fans of the brand and the products. It lead me to think  - I wonder how many Premiership footallers (and the associated WAG's) don't have B&O systems in their houses??

 It just goes to show that being stylish isn't always good for your image or reputation