What is the average lifespan of a phono cartridge?

Well, not my case, but some cartridges are extremely expensive, and I am quite sure that many audiophiles having them will want them to last for a very long time. You normally don’t throw away a perfectly good $5k or more cartridge.

You normally don’t throw away a perfectly good $5k or more cartridge.

This is a typical MC dilemma

... and $5k is low budget MC as we can see nowadays, why not a $15k cartridge just for 1000 hrs as Raul said ? LOL

Official trade-in (instead of re-tip) is just about 60-80% of the new cartridge, good business :)

This is what we call premium segment

Yeah...not for me, anyway. And if some vintage MMs sound as good as you say they do, it makes even less sense. But then the problem is that there are not enough of them for everyone. Some will think that $5-$15 for an hour of listening is still acceptable expense. A little crazy especially if you play turntable a lot but better than buying $1500 pants, I guess. Opinions vary, though.