Welp... "HongShan Capital nears $1.1bn acquisition of iconic audio brand Marshall"

I thought it stayed pretty civil though, think y'all are overacting a bit? I get it's a no politics discussion forum but being overly protective of a few posts seems unnecessary too.
 
Danny Devito Smh GIF
 
EOengineer said:
I could be mistaken, but IIRC “no religion and no politics” are the lay of the land users accept when they join this forum. Perhaps @DrewJD82 can clarify.

I can’t speak for everyone here, but those rules are part of what attracted and have kept me here. Those banned topics are drenched in toxicity and this place represents one of the few places we can enjoy talking about the things that bring us together, and sidestep these areas where many of us just aren’t going to concede ground.

There are users here who repeatedly try to push this line, and I’d really love for them to fuck all the way off. Not because I don’t agree with them, but because they’ve dared insinuate that the same rules we all agree to and observe here shouldn’t apply to them.

I’d prefer a zero tolerance policy over arbitrary calibrations of whether a comment was political enough, or offensive enough for any given person’s individual taste, as those thresholds typically skew depending on whether the expressed sentiment is positive or critical of their team.
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Guys say GD and JC which is partly related to religion, and some find that highly offensive I'd imagine, yet I've not seen anyone complain (coughs). Not everything is black and white or clear-cut. Just something to consider.
 
FuzzyAce said:
I thought it stayed pretty civil though, think y'all are overacting a bit? I get it's a no politics discussion forum but being overly protective of a few posts seems unnecessary too.
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This would be a very sensible approach but I'm afraid in reality people would just won't be able to refrain themselves and always end up being a shit show. I vote for no politics allowed or religion.
 
Back to the topic.
It is very sad to look at what Marshall becomes = "The Stockholm-based company" !!! sold to Chinese private equity firm.
 
Elf said:
This would be a very sensible approach but I'm afraid in reality people would just won't be able to refrain themselves and always end up being a shit show. I vote for no politics allowed or religion.
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Yeah, I'm not saying this forum should be pro politics or religion, but the occasional posts that veer off course are just that... occasional. I get there's a fine line there where stuff could get out of hand, but this thread didn't seem so based on the lack of overall interest. Anyways, I'll move on from it.
 
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In terms of politics, it is certainly a very emotionally charged time at the moment. The world is in upheaval and society is very divided in many countries. I am sorry that I have made a few ironic remarks in a certain direction and will refrain from doing so from now on.

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Marshall is fucked.
 
Can’t help but feel like the writing has been on the wall for Marshall (and a TON of other music industry companies). More will get sold in the coming years, or just die out.

They basically just needed to jack up the value of the brand as much as possible to cash in on it before selling. I absolutely cannot see a future where it makes sense for Marshall to be churning out guitar amplifiers on the scale they’re set up for, with UK manufacturing and the existing model. Even in 2025 it’s just not sustainable or a good move IMO.

The brand itself has value - most people don’t know what Marshall even is, but they recognise the brand and logo and associate it with live music.

Making a new advanced flagship amp, or really anything is not going to suddenly make people go out in their droves to buy a new guitar amp. Spending loads of money on developing it would just go straight down the drain, I don’t see it recouping or selling better than any existing amps. Add in the fact that AI is going to change things a LOT in the coming years, a tough economic climate right now, it’s just way too risky and not worth the reward to be throwing money around and taking big risks.

I can imagine whichever Chinese guy is calling the shots taking one look at Marshalls factory and thinking “why are we spending so much building amps here when we can do it for like 5% of the cost, faster, and with less red tape” and closing it all instantly. The one thing they really don’t need outside help with is manufacturing.
 
MirrorProfiles said:
I can imagine whichever Chinese guy is calling the shots taking one look at Marshalls factory and thinking “why are we spending so much building amps here when we can do it for like 5% of the cost, faster, and with less red tape” and closing it all instantly. The one thing they really don’t need outside help with is manufacturing AND SHIPPING WORLDWIDE.
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FIFY, lol

I agree with all your points, but wanted to address this particular one, IMO there are only a few paths moving forward:

1. Start making all parts in China, ship everything to the Vietnam factory to put together, and either close down the UK shop or decrease it's manufacturing to only a a handful of models.

2. Sell off the high worth individual assets, liquidate the rest, and them license out the Marshall name to the highest bidder.

3. Keep everything as is and hope for the best (I doubt this will be the case)

Probably the only thing that has prevented this from happening so far is that Zounds was probably under an agreement with the Marshall family that they could not do this. Now that it has sold, Zounds will still do all the headphones, BT speakers, etc. and Hongshan will handle the amp side of the business or license it to someone who can.
 
Byrdman said:
FIFY, lol

I agree with all your points, but wanted to address this particular one, IMO there are only a few paths moving forward:

1. Start making all parts in China, ship everything to the Vietnam factory to put together, and either close down the UK shop or decrease it's manufacturing to only a a handful of models.

2. Sell off the high worth individual assets, liquidate the rest, and them license out the Marshall name to the highest bidder.

3. Keep everything as is and hope for the best (I doubt this will be the case)

Probably the only thing that has prevented this from happening so far is that Zounds was probably under an agreement with the Marshall family that they could not do this. Now that it has sold, Zounds will still do all the headphones, BT speakers, etc. and Hongshan will handle the amp side of the business or license it to someone who can.
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If you were a total outsider and you looked at the brand name and what you can do with it, what they sell already, you’d surely focus on selling speakers, headphones, t shirts and hats etc. Now seems to me like the purpose of Zounds buying Marshall Amps was just so they could sell both sides of the business as one.

I think option one is the most likely, at least for the time being. If anything remains in the UK I think it would be hardwired and/or customised stuff. Would certainly be a shame for them to let go of some of the guys who’ve been there 40+ years and have real skill in building (try doing tolex and grille clothes yourself and you quickly appreciate the skill they have to do it so perfectly every time). The thing with Marshalls factory is it’s really designed around mass production and doing things quickly and efficiently at scale. I’m guessing that’s the only reason they build the 20W amps and JVM’s and things there still.
 
FuzzyAce said:
I thought it stayed pretty civil though, think y'all are overacting a bit? I get it's a no politics discussion forum but being overly protective of a few posts seems unnecessary too.
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Because the second one person who isn’t as rationally minded and has a chip on their shoulder with whatever grievance they’ve perceived, it all falls apart. The risk/reward ratio is far to skewed in the risk direction when the reward is “a few of us might agree on the same things while 50% vehemently disagree and absolutely nothing productive will come of it on a gear forum” while the risk is having half the forum suddenly disliking the other half and quips popping up in regular threads as a result of things said in a political thread.

On every single forum I’ve been on that’s allowed political discussion, I’ve seen long time members end up leaving because the conversation skewed a way they didn’t like, or the disagreement couldn’t be left with ‘agree to disagree’. Every. Single. Forum.

And I know the other mods won’t mind me speaking on their behalf with this, but none of us want to deal with coming here and moderating political bullshit. This morning was a perfect example; I’ve got a friend visiting from out state, I had a quick few minutes to check for NAMM updates before taking off for the day, I come on and find Reports about politics instead then spent my time having to read through posts that shouldn’t have been made to begin with.

All that said, I have political discussions going on in several PM’s. I really cannot fathom why it’s difficult to just take them to a PM instead of shitting on the kitchen table where everyone has to eat at.
 
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