I'd suggest you look at this Forbes article. If a 10% increase in membership price ($5 increase from $50), gets only a $0.10 increase in earnings per share, all their earnings can't be from memberships!

Do you believe the oil companies are just covering their costs with the recent price increases, and their record profits are just a fluke?

I've got some land in Louisiana I'll sell you!

And that's the way it is...

I spent many years as an employer and have dealt with all the expenses, insurance etc. You could as easily argue that they don't make a penny on the memberships or the sale of tires.

It's a matter of how efficient they are at keeping their expenses down. This will determine their profitability. Membership is just another product they sell, and by the time you figure in all the mailers, processing and office space... They aren't making pure profit on that either.

Wasn't long ago the stock was below $35... now $50+

According to T.W.I.C.E. they sell a LOT of CE.

A huge profit also means huge taxes to pay... So spend and build. Spend and build.

Revenue as 52,935,228,000 ending a 52 week on 8/25/05. Yes -52 Billion.

Acc. Dist-62
Cash Flow Growth 11.3


Last 4 quarters

EPS Growth 17.60%
Sales Growth 10.00%
Gross Profit Margin 12.00%
Net Profit Margin 2.00%
ROE 12.00%
Net Debt/Total Cap 4.00%
Debt/Equity 6.50%
ROIC 10.00%

Denon is now selling the 3806s and 4306s to distributors that have been selling the silver line ie: 486, 786, 886 products. Fagan, a local dist is anouncing this on the opening page of their new website. If you click on the anouncement and look at the specs on these pieces you will EVEN SEE DEALER COST, no password, available to the general public !!!!!!!

IDIOTS

http://www.thefagancompany.com/

Now oil companies... thats a different story... I could go on a big political soapbox about those guys but I waste too much energy planning their fantasy demise already. I don't need Costco to go to work... I choose to shop there. When big Insurance companies make record profits off of my need for health care and greedy government colluded oil bastards squelch research on alternative fuel sources... it gets my ardor up a lot more than some national no service chain store selling grey market Martin Logan speakers.

Amen Brother (wow my second Amen in 2 days)

Most major Grocery Chains... Safeway, Alberstons etc. say that their net-net (not the gross), is around 1 to 2% after costs...

A lot of the Costco stores are taking in over $1 mill a day, so 1 to 2% of that ain't too bad! How many damn Costcos are there??? Lets say if there were 50... That could be $1,000,000 daily in profits... That is unless I hit the wrong key on my calculator!?

I don't know how many Costcos there are out there... But I do know for a fact that they are making money on merchandise sales too!

When I had my own gig going... at the end of the year, I was usually about 20% in the frickin' hole!!! The high cost of not charging enough for my services & billing actual man-hours!!!

A friend of mine was selling Costco some el cheapo in-wall speaker & volume control packages a few years ago... but he gave up, because they kept requesting lower and lower prices & he was losing money!

For what it's worthy, I notified Fagan of their faux pas (I assume).

Martin Logan has issued a statement that they had nothing to do with Costco and are hunting down the transshipper.
[Link: cepro.com]

Hey Phil, thanks for letting the general public know what our cost on said items is and where they can find it. With Denon being such a whored out line with minimal profit potential to an integrator it is great that we continue to shoot ourselves in the foot by posting cost pricing on a public forum.

Now, about the Executive Member refund - I got back just under $100 this year which made my membership almost free. That thing is they had my $100 for a full year before they had to pay it back. Take my $100 along with guesstimated 13 million other americans and wisely invest that over the year and you have a nice vacation fund after writing refund checks. Also keep in mind that a certain percentage of Executive Members never each thier full membership price back at the end of the year which helps to offset the folks that do get the full $500

To all of you who worry about the public knowing "the bottom line" on what a piece of equipment costs (dealer cost/sheet), stop worrying and start selling "ME". It is a very simple formula. If you cannot sell yourself, how are you going to sell against Costco or internet pricing. Stop worrying about the things you cannot control, and worry about the things that you can control. Thats my 2c.

Actually there are over 460 Costcos out there... 14% mark-up for Branded items... 15% for private label items. Even if they only averaged $200K per store per day, that's $92,000,000 million per day - not too shabby!

Average employee pay is $17 an hour... which is 42% higher than the average Wal Mart Employee...

FYI Denon is owned by D&M Holdings (who also owns Marantz, Escient, Snell, Boston Acoustic, McIntosh, and Replay TV)... Ichiban who knows

Check it out www.dm-holdings.com

Although I think that its pretty much settled that your not really sure of your facts

My quesion is, how do all these $10,000 speakers slip thru the cracks. Is it possible for a major retailer who closes sevral store locations or is just wanting to trim down some inventory fat to make a behide the scenes deal with companies like this and not get caught or overlooked due to huge ordering? just wondering.

With all due respect, how are our concerns expected to be taken seriously by our vendors when we collectively can never seem to put our money where our mouths are?

After all of this hoopla, is there ONE ML dealer here who can honestly say that they'll be placing less orders because of this situation?

Speak now or forever hold your peace.

Is there ONE ML consumer that wants a pair of Aerius i's in Cali?

Sorry, couldn't resist!