The product shortages plaguing almost all major car audio brands are providing a windfall for second and third tier brands.
Dealers who find their main suppliers are back-ordered on key products, are turning to secondary brands to keep sales afloat.
Sanjay Sharma, Director of Merchandising for GoFast Solutions, a distributor in Connecticut, said, “We are the Dual distributor and we have Power Acoustik and Soundstream….We’re definitely seeing an increase in their business. Those brands never had that opportunity and now they do.”
Epsilon, which sells brands including Soundstream and Power Acoustik, committed an error earlier in the year and doubled its typical order. “We have a 100,000 square foot warehouse that was fully stacked. The aisles were full. You couldn’t get a forklift down. Then COVID hits and that little mistake has paid off because I’ve gotten dealers to try our product that would have turned up their noses. And we’re going to retain this business… because the product doesn’t break and you have the features,” said VP Sales Ronnie Brashear.
High end retailer Marty Dean, Owner of Soundz Plus, IL said he’s buying brands such as Kicker and Memphis, which he usually doesn’t carry, because his regular lines are out of stock.
DS18 says it may end the year doubling sales. “If you have supply you will sell everything. That’s the situation today,” said CEO Alberto Susterman.
PowerBass has enjoyed double its traditional summer sales and could do more “if we had more people and more time in the day. We’re picking up from the ones that are out of product,” said VP Product Development & Global Marketing Erik Harbour. “I have containers leaving every Thursday… It used to be every other Thursday.”
DD Audio also saw a spike in sales. “We tried to limit what some customers are getting to ration it out, it didn’t make any difference. Nationwide we just saw tremendous sales. Now we are… pushing our service team to repair as many 500 watt and 1000 watt amplifiers as possible to get them out as B stock to dealers,” said DD Audio Product Manager and Marketing Coordinator Kevin Doyle.
He added, “Guys are just buying whatever; close outs, B stock. It’s awesome to see our dealers this busy. We’ll see …if it sticks. If there’s another stimulus round I assume we’ll see another bump like this, as generally this industry sees a bump at tax return time. This is like an extended tax return.”
SounDigital said it is air freighting in product to help keep up with demand.
