Quality issues with Tekton speakers....


I was reading all the buzz about these Tekton speakers and after sorting through all the reviews, decided to order a pair of the Pendragon (the big ones... $2,500 a pair).

When they arrived, I found them to be boxed well and in perfect shape, although one thing was very noticeable once I looked at the speakers. The woofers had a slightly different tone (color). The upper woofer in each tower was basically dark gray or black (like most paper woofers you might come across) and the lower woofers were slightly blue in color. After looking on the web some, I could not find a Pendragon speaker photo ANYWHERE that had this color difference. Since they did not come with speaker grilles, I knew the color difference would bother me as long as I owned the speakers.

I contacted Tekton (Eric Alexander) via e-mail and explained the issue. After almost a week of not hearing back, I sent another e-mail and his response was...

(copy and pasted right from my e-mail)... " I'm sorry. Please refresh my memory. What seems to be the problem? Thanks, Eric"

I described the issue again and he offered to exchange the speakers. I said there was no need to ship back a huge pair of 85 pound speakers and have him send me another pair and suggested maybe he just send me grilles at no charge to cover the speakers and I could live with the slight color difference in the woofers. I really feel that grilles should be included in a $2,500 price tag however.

All of these e-mails took several days to answer by the way.

He agreed and said he would get the grilles out right away... they were sent a few days later and upon arrival, I realized there was a pretty big problem. I had a normal type speaker grill with 4 pegs on the back and a speaker with no peg holes. After all the time, e-mails, no answers, etc., I was not interested in wasting any more time with the matter and asked for a partial refund through PayPal and asked a simple question... why send me grilles for a speaker that he just shipped to me with no holes to put them in? His reply was to offer to make new grilles and send "velcro dots" to affix them to the speakers with.... WOW.

The WORST part about all this: Within 30 minutes of making a PayPal claim about the issue and asking for a partial refund from him, Eric tried to call me right away... now that there was money at stake.

The really sad part of all this is that the speakers actually sound pretty damn good now that they are broken in... I just hope the quality and communication come up to the same level for the sake of Tekton as a company.
128x128audiofreak32
Grilles should absolutely be included for $2,500 as almost EVERY manufacturer includes a grill with their speakers. You are also missing the issue of the driver color not matching - this is an easy quality issue that should have been caught before they shipped.
Audiofreak.
You said he would exchange the speakers. Can't get much better service than that. Anything after that is a compromise to you it sounds like. You should change out the speakers. If Eric suggested that, then it is probably the best solution. Eric is a good man, and seems to run a very conscientious business. I have no affiliation with them and they do not know me.
I'm the first to ask this, so maybe it's a dumb question and doesn't apply because of how those are built but...is there some reason you don't just exchange drivers? There's no need to send the whole speaker back - can't he just send you a pair of color-matching drivers? I'm assuming they just screw into the baffle like so many other designs, and connect with the usual clip-on connectors. Is there some reason this isn't being tried?
I don't agree that most speaker manufacturers include grills. Really this seems like such a small matter (at least to me). Regarding the off color drivers, he acknowledged that and offered to exchange the entire speaker! This is going beyond the call of duty. The reality is that different things upset different people. Based on the information stated here, I'd be happy to do business with this company.
Charles,
If the vendor offered to make an exchange to set things right, then they did the right thing given the situation.

Different vendors/products view and handle grills differently. My preference is to always have them included, although I can understand where some value oriented companies, like Tekton perhaps, might look to keep costs down anyway possible. I like that, as long as accompanied by timely customer service to address any issues when needed.