small companies making today's best products

Best reason to "buy small": guys like Duke, designer-manufacturers who will take the time to work with you. Since everybody agrees that both the corporate and cottage models can produce good kit, why not work with an actual person? I've never spoken with Duke, but he's unfailingly humble and helpful on these boards, something more people might try. He also makes good speakers.

He won't be here forever, but as Raquel so effectively shouted in the parking lot, neither will the corporate entities. Neither will the dealers. We won't, either!

J

who is more likely to offer customized products, a large or small company, and in which case do you think a consumer will be better satisfied ?

Is'nt it true that there are good and bad examples in all levels of this industry, small manufacturers, middling and large and Dealers. I think certain areas are easier for small manufacturers to compete, cartridges, speakers and cables come to mind. Here, development is often painstaking trial and error of different components, looking for the best combination. Electronics are more difficult but possible for one man and his dog outfits, but there are exceptions, Berning, Tom Evans come to mind.
Large companies can provide excellent after sales, CJ, Macintosh and ARC seem in this category.

What are the Pros and cons:
Small companies:
May sell direct on sale or return, lowering cost
Probably waste less money on marketing etc, lowering cost.
More responsive to my needs, can build to my requirements. Thinking Of Daedalus Speakers here, each pair built to your needs
Avoids dealers, big plus for me. I know excellent ones, but I feel pressured to buy and that I'm wasting there time if I don't. just me I know.
Personal service from the boss with queries, tends in general to be better after sales than large companies

Cons:
May go out of business, so no after sales support, but so can large companies.
May be more difficult to sell second hand, lack of brand awareness.
Component cost higher, cheaper to buy 1000 capacitors than 10

I am sure there are many more possibilities. In general I like the idea of encouraging start ups, helping the little guy, if you like.

The money large companies spend on R&D gives them a real advantage , Also the more units a company makes the cheaper it becomes .
When you see the Revel factory and how things are done it's easy to see why there a leader in the industry , very impressive .

I suspect if a reliable and comprehensive study were conducted by experts between small and larger high end audio companies, the results would be a draw in terms of which can deliver the best sounding solution and larger companies would win statistically in terms of providing higher quality and value overall and offering lower risk overall for most.

The caveat would be I think if small companies from the far east, like mhdt for example, were properly included, teh smaller companies would do better in terms of value but still present a risk in that finding the good smaller companies can be a challenge to find reliably.

Also I think results might skew somewhat more back towards smaller vendors if the scope were limited to those vendors who break the norm and deliver solutions geared around high efficiency speakers and smaller amps, often tube based.