Buying new, but old speakers

Well, if you are paying only what they are worth used, then it will be a deal. If you are paying for 'new speakers' i would be not so eager.
Just so you know, the "AVON' Castle speaker was actually made ONLY from 1984 to 1986 NOT 1996!! (from the Orion Blue Book 2007 edition) The retail of the standard was $1799 and the 'exotic (wood finish) $1999.
The 2007 used retail values are only $420 to $497 and the 'mint' trade in is only $248 to $296.
So if you are paying more than $550. for these you are being taken advantage of.
The TEN YEAR ERROR on the part of the dealer is sort of interesting. A slip of memory or really a baldface white lie?
25 year old speakers will need new surrounds if foam. If rubber they may be OK having been in a sealed box. The caps in the crossovers certainly are going to be a problem soon enough, being 25 years old.
I would be far far more leary of this so-called deal unless the price IS around $500. or LESS.
Just my $0.02

Googling(after I posted of course) Shows other Avon speakers in England (other than the ones in Orion Blue book) so I would guess they were sold in USA only from 84 to 86 but were continued to be sold in Great Britain for much longer and the 1996 is when reviewed in GB.
So I am not certain where the OP is located? GB or USA?
Anyway, be careful with this purchase.

Hi Elizabeth, thanks for the reply. I'm actually in Canada. The price to be paid is over half off MSRP. I'm not sure if we can post links here, but you can find a review of the Avon on Gramophone. Just type into Google "Castle Avon Gramophone" and you should get the review. It says the speaker was launched in 1996. Also, there are some reviews of the speaker on audioreview.com from a few users who were purchasing it new around of the turn of the century. The speaker is a floorstander with one woofer and an offset tweeter below it. There must have been an original Avon in the 80's and an updated model in the mid 90's.

The surrounds are rubber, and I'm not sure I would be too worried about the crossover caps. The real question is, are these speakers the best $900 option? I have heard the Howards but not Avons, I don't doubt that they sound nice. I might be swayed if they have that beautiful wood finish Castle is known for, but if they are black?

You are right Blkadr, the surrounds are rubber. I spoke with the dealer this afternoon and confirmed this. They are black, but hey, it's not like I can be too picky when it comes to old Castle speakers, especially ones that are in perfect shape.

I am not unhappy with the sound of my system right now, quite the contrary in fact. But I've always been intrigued by floorstanders and I find that feeling isn't going away, so now I'd like to live with one pair for a while and compare them to my regular speakers (Quad 12L2). Castle has always sort of intrigued me too, so when this pair came up I thought why not? If I don't like them I will sell them and maybe take a hit but not a huge one. For $900 I'm not sure there's another floorstander I'd buy. Maybe a pair of used Quad 21L2. That all depends on how much I like the Avons though, and I won't know until I hear them. But it'll also be cool to own something that's a little more obscure than most other speakers. They definitely have the Castle build quality too...when packed the speakers weigh just over 100 lbs!