Myself and other half Sue decided today that we would drive 50 miles or so to York to visit a hi-fi dealer there to listen to Quad S4's, Dali Oberon 7's and Wharfedale Evo 4.3's if they had them. I mentioned that I would ring them at nine but then Googled to find that they didn't open until eleven. Anyhow we set off with a nice lunch in mind if all else failed. On arrival I noticed a rather nice Audi R8 and Mercedes AMG parked outside as did Sue but went in and had a brief chat with one of the staff. I said we would just start with a look around to see what they had. They had most of what I was interested in but I was then told that I should have phoned ahead. I said that I was going to but it would have left us leaving home at gone eleven and the journey was an hour and half. That would have pushed time a bit for such a demo. The response was that for a demo they required a three or four day notice period and was on condition that they had nothing booked in. It was very clear they just didn't give a damn and weren't going to do anything at that particular time. Yeah OK so they knew we were looking at loudspeakers around the £1k mark so I wonder if things would've been different had we been interested in Sonus Faber's..?
I have since phoned a dealer in Hull who are now trying to organise a home demo of some Dali Opticon 6's and KEF R5's. They have the KEF's but not the Dali's.
Apparently they are going to ring when it is all sorted.
Time will tell maybe..?