Printer Friendly Forum Posts - kicker and circuit city!

This is going to be good, its going to brings us some really good equipment at low prices, its about time companies used more mass outlet stores to get there products to us

While I still think local shops are a great enviroment, I and many others dont like to over pay for equipment and no local shop can buy in the volume as a major retail outlet, even very few internet sites have that type of buying power

Will the quality of the product go down ofcourse it wil, but we will all get over it and things will work themselves out in time

skold.... what did you just say? low prices? have you priced MTX amps @ CC lately? they are like 3x what they should cost. they have nothing going in the low price department.

They have the old MTX Road Thunder subs for like $30..... lol

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"Shiny chrome when used in conjunction with bikini models is particularly effective in inducing brain deficit disorder"

02 Jeep Grand Cherokee

Monster System on its way.

What are the MTX amps going for down there in the states. Just wanna know how they compare to Canada

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double-secret reverse-osmosis speaker-cone-induced high-level interference distortion, Its a killer

i was looking at an MTX amp today on CC website. the MTX MXA6001, 300 W RMS @ 4 ohm is running 359.99. i'm not quite sure what pricing should be on MTX but it seems a little high.

Bah..that MTX amp is overpriced, but that's how these places make their money (even BB and CC). They make their money off selling to the uninformed consumer. It's not a bad thing really. You pay retail when you buy from CC and BB but you pay more than that when you go to a local shop for the most part. Shops will generally have MUCH better installers than CC or BB. Some of the installers there have little to no experience at all.

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Dave

Pioneer Premier DEH-P660
15" Kicker CVR
Profile AP1000M
It's Loud

I can't speak for everywhere, but where I live we have shops that sell for the same or less than BB or CC. The thing I keep pointing to is this; lots of people go to BB and CC because they ASSUME they are cheaper. And you know when you assume, it makes an A$$ out of U and ME. I look at the total picture and what I see is some of the shabbiest installs you can imagine. I have seen shadetree installs that top some of their work. Not to say ALL of their installers are bad. People like pimpincavy and others will do work, but you have some that just want a paycheck. A shop HAS to do good work, or it won't survive long. I don't want to offend anybody. This is my just my opinion.

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'85 Toy

kicker gives its dealers set prices to sell their product at so thats not going to factor in. its the same here as it is a Curplus City. what bothers me is knowing that in three years the stuff is gonna be garbage. have you senn the new subs? it's all cosmetic. pretty soon, just like rockford and ABC before, it's all going to go down hill. quanity over quality.

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man i love the point about uninformed consumers. as a matter of fact i was at circuit city the other day, buying a movie, and i decided just to look at the car audio stuff. i over heard one salesman talking to a lady and he had no clue what he was talking about. with just the 5 minutes i heard the two talking i could have helped her more than he helped her. it was clear that she was confused and as soon as the salesman left i told her my opinion, she actually said i helped her more than he did. i know this is a little off topic but i thought i would add it in there. so many good points are made here, especially the install ones. i just installed my first sub/amp set up about a month ago. and even i knew that the guys at CC did a shatty job on my first car.

[QUOTE=supradude]lots of people go to BB and CC because they ASSUME they are cheaper. ] you are so right. i see people coming to my shop all the time that thought they got a good deal down at ABC, and then the guy that got his stuff here, for less $$, pulls up next to him and helps him realize. we actually did a system here once for less that $600, installed, including a custom box, that would have been at least 5 db louder on a meter than the $1100's worth of equipment from ABC. it was laughable, but i did actuall feel sorry for the second guy. if he only knew how much the advice of a knowalagble professional was worth.

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knowlageable? whatever.

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bluetruck wrote:

skold.... what did you just say? low prices? have you priced MTX amps @ CC lately? they are like 3x what they should cost. they have nothing going in the low price department.

I just called my local CC and the amp Hightek said "MTX MXA6001" for $359.00 is only $237.00, thats cheaper than I can find on the net right now, and my supplier who is a middleman for a large South Florida Retailer gets it to me for $175.00 , but its still a mass retail outlet but I digress..

Volume was the point I was trying to make , if you buy 1000 Kicker KX600.1's your going to pull them in for just around $150-170 range or cheaper depending on the deal you make, then most retailers are not going to sell it at the MSRP of $580.00, there going put them up for about 220-260 range

it's gonna get real hard to be a kicker dealer. ebay was already enough competition for my shop and now this. we're looking at buying into Resonant Engineering in the spring to stay competitive, and not have to build our car audio reputation around a company that is quickly taking a dive. we're actually lucky that we've only been in town for a short time, so we still have room to justify backing out of the kicker line up

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Well, you guys would sh*t kittens if you lived up here. That MTX 6001 runs 599.99 up here, which is still 100 bucks less than what a rockford 6001 goes for. Remeber thats Canadian funds but still. I will agree that when companies go to big retail stores the quality of the product generally goes down hill, but the companies still make alot more money and lets not forget that thats why these manufactures are in buisness. Its not because they have some great intentions of making the absolute best thing on the market, if they do then thats great, but in the end its all about the botom line. The companies that go to the big chain stores do take a risk though. If someone like rockford, who only makes car audio products, or at least for the most part, ever lost all of their big box retailers they would go bankrupt over night. They would be left with a huge reserve of stock and manufacturing facilites that would be far to expensive to run because their incoming revenue would be cut down considerably. It seems almost impossible that a company the size of Rockford or Kicker could ever go outta buisness but when these companies go big its all good, but if they ever crash then they crash hard and very fast. This is the same reason that companies are scared to deal with Wal-Mart. The other thing is that when companies go big then their prices basically get dictated by their bigest clients, and this puts them outta favour with their independants, which once again will end up damaging their reputation, and put them behind the eight ball if their big box deals fall out.

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double-secret reverse-osmosis speaker-cone-induced high-level interference distortion, Its a killer

the question should be will Kicker be able to meet the demands around X-mas time? also I hear Clarion will be coming into Circuit City, again.

i heard alpine was going to best buy. anyone else heard this?

I heard that alpine was going to Best Buy to. Does anyone know what kind of credentials/experience someone would need to install at CC? Once I turn 18 im getting a job there doing sales, but a guy I talked to there said i would need to be MECP certified, or have a lot of experience before I could do installs. But I have heard from people that many CC installers have little to no experience. I dunno, maybe the store near me is a good one.

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i'm pretty sure you have to be MECP certified, but from what i've heard from people who are MECP certified, the test you take is easy. so basically you can have no experience, pass the test and become certified. i'm lookin into getting a job in sales as well.

you have to be certified if you are to be the head installer...otherwise they will hire anyone off the street and give them trainging on the job.

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BB is getting alpine in Feb, hence why we picked up Kicker. as for getting a job, they hire pretty much anyone...as for a lead position, neither our lead installer or sales guy is MECP cert (its just the guys who have been there the longest. for god's sake, we had a part timer who was a Sr. Sales Associate..what a joke.

i'm an S&I manager at CC. basically I don't care about experience when hiring a new guy. I look for drive and excitement in general for the industry. General mechanical abilities are required, but the rest i can teach. I also look for quick thinkers, people I won't have to explain something to 500 times. CC doesn't care about MECP anymore, they used to offer an instant pay hike once certified(when i started as an installer I got certified), but now they replaced that with an hourly bonus program based on overall productiveness. My guys average about 2.5-3.50 an hour extra after the bonus, because were a pretty busy location.

By the sounds of it dude, CC needs guys like me to keep their dept. and reputation on track. A store is only as good as the people who work it. Hire an idiot trained by an idiot and you have a store full of idiots. No offence intended and not directed at you.

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Top Secret, I can tell you but then my wife will kill me.

On the topic of Kicker..I was skeptical upon the realease of the 05' products, HOWEVER..the CVR's seem to have improved from last years model, which happened to be a good design as well. From speaking to an SPL guy daily who just starting using CVR's..They are durable, get loud and sound good as well. I'm gunna stand by Kicker for now. We'll see what the future holds for them.

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Dave

Pioneer Premier DEH-P660
15" Kicker CVR
Profile AP1000M
It's Loud

I have just heard the new '05 12" CVR. I have never really been a fan of kicker. But I must say these that I heard sounded quite nice and got pretty darn loud.

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Nik
Jeeputer Progress
[|||||||||||-] 90%
Check it out.

Yep..the new CVR's will be a sleeper this year..1 12" CVR and approx. 900wrms=144.7 on the new TL. in a 99 Monte Carlo. My next setup should eventually be 3 15" CVR's in my Jeep run off approx. 700wrms.

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Dave

Pioneer Premier DEH-P660
15" Kicker CVR
Profile AP1000M
It's Loud

Well guys I just got back from our roadshop rally for Circuit City and all I have to say is wow. I was able to look at our Kicker line and it is fantastic. In case you guys didn't know we will also have the full MTX Thunder line back on our shelves. Kicker put on a great show along with MTX It was great talking to both teams and I'm proud to say I have them on my team. As far as working for CC it has been a great experience and I"m even more excited going forward. If you are looking for employment put in an app. online it can't hurt we do hire even beginners but be ready for hard work B/C we have one of the most extensive training programs In fact our final test is quite a bit harder than a basic MECP test. < That is not my opinion I just hired a kid who went through school in Oklahoma and passed with flying colors, but scored 60% on our test. I have worked for a couple of places and within 3 years at Circuit I worked my way from sales to install to assistant to mgr. Don't be fooled though it took a lot of hard work as anyone who is who in the industry can tell you, but if you put in your time and build your compitancies you can definatelly go far. After all the Roadshop for CC is still on top of the game turning out more installs daily than anyone else. You just cant argue with that kind of experience.

So, I aint american so I am on the outside looking in here, but I am assuming that the Roadshop is the CC install Bay but under a fancy title?. If that is correct then are you saying you are on top of the Game because you do more installs daily than anyone else? I have a couple questions for you, just to clear things up a little. First, where are you getting the info that you guys do more installs per day than anyone else. I am just kinda interested if this is based on yuor local buisness or if this is based off of facts and stats on a national level or what. And second, last I checked CC wasnt exactly a super profitable chain. Is it big, absolutly, but since you are publicly traded all of you financial figures are released and you guys didnt exactly make hand over fist last year. Dont take this the wrong way cause I am not trying to bust your balls here or anything, I just wanted to know if what you said was based on fact or just and overwhelming sense of pride in your company.

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double-secret reverse-osmosis speaker-cone-induced high-level interference distortion, Its a killer

I work at CC as well. I knew we were getting Kicker and possibly Eclipse, but not too sure on that one. Also, say bye-bye to Code Alarm and hello again to DEI. Not just alarms and remote starters either.

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Wildkind Concepts

when are the stores going to actually start carring it all?

As far as I know, we will start in the spring some time.

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Wildkind Concepts

And to reply to the previous statement ... year end numbers we did more installs than anyother retail chain. Even though our stores didn't improve much the Roadshops gained a good portion of maket share FY04 and this was with a product line that was far from what You'll see starting to arrive in April. In reply to Subtleapproach we will definatelly have MTX thunder including the sledgehammer enclosures. As far as head units it is still up for grabs we will be bringing in some unique Audiobahn units which will arrive shortly, but as far Clarion or Eclipse the deals are still on the table getting sorted out.

i am disturbed by your comment of being proud of putting out more intalls in a day than anyone else jman. im sick of having to fix bb and cc's crappy installs. as an installer, you should understand that the time it takes to do install doesnt matter, but the quality of it does. god i hope you guys dont get eclipse. you guys can keep audiobahn and mtx. and oh well with kicker, the U.S. is becoming a pure capitalist country that disregards quality, as long as companies like adire keep popping up we will be ok. a lot of opinions compacted into a few sentence but you guys get the point

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Pioneer PEH-9660mp
Mb Quart PCE-216 biamped
JL 12W6v2
Sony XM-4026 amp for tweeters
Kenwood KAC-7251 amp for mids
JL-4100 amp for sub

OK, fair enough, I just wanted to know because the only info I could find about that is in the well thought out, corprate rant on the CC website. It actually looks very much like Best Buy's. I now feel the need to point out that quantity doesnt nessasarily translate into quality. While the work that your particular shop does might be very good, that doesnt nessasarily hold up for the chain. When I read your previous post on page 3 it just seemed like a litle bit to much self promotion for my tastes, which is also why I asked where you got the numbers from. And if you want an exact number for the first 3 quarters of last year CC was trending down 2.7%, which isnt nessasarily a big deal, just most chains are only ever happy with forward momentum and get kinda pissy when they sit still. I havent seen the 4 quarter or year end numbers yet. I'm glad buisness is good in your end of the world though.

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double-secret reverse-osmosis speaker-cone-induced high-level interference distortion, Its a killer

Cars don't have problems from quick installs. Now what does cause problems are the newbies who are messing around with car electronics that haven't been properly trained. Now if you have been around the block bullman you would know that quick installers are generally good installers because of the knowledge base they have and the ability to apply it to different cars. Even while working at a custom shop I took pride in being able to get installs done quickly that never came back with issues . I apply that with all of the associates I manage today. It has more to deal with work ethic and pride than anything else I also apply this ethic to my installers and make sure they also are able to make this happen. And no I dont cut quality in any way and find myself fixing more of our local competitors screw ups which include a major retailer and 2 ma and pa shops. And to put it all forward into this I'm proud of putting out more installs each day solely because I have a ton of repeat customers and a lot of word of mouth that keeps atleast my shop busy with cars open to close. And no I'm not dogging any other chain or store out there because I have seen many other shops that ran a truly good business and I know what kind of work it takes to do this and likewise I have seen CC shops that are poorly ran. And being from Canada you should remember who is going to intercept that missile before it makes it to you and I can gaurantee it is not France. Sorry about the length guys.

I'm sorry I was looking at the the wrong member name with the last comment please disregard.

a truly good installer should be a perfectionist. if you are at all worried about speed, then you are taking some focus from the quality of your intall. i used to install invisible fences. i personally only worried about quality and would get a perfect install done in a standard time. the guy who trained me who was capable of doing insanely well done installs(which he did while i was in training) was more concerned with speed after my training. i had to go back and fix some of his work and honestly, the couple of guys who cared more about how everything looked and functioned, and did not worry about how long it took them, put out the best installs. im not saying that you are conciously putting out crappy work, but when you are trying to beat the clock, almost everyone takes shortcuts even when they do not know it

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Pioneer PEH-9660mp
Mb Quart PCE-216 biamped
JL 12W6v2
Sony XM-4026 amp for tweeters
Kenwood KAC-7251 amp for mids
JL-4100 amp for sub

OK, well I was really on board with you until you made that weak ass missile comment. I got news for you, you'll probally blow the damn thing up over top of us anyways so we just get the goodness of the Radiation but dont get the pretty light show of the mushroom cloud. OK now onto buisness, first off bullman out of everything I have delt with I enjoy dealing MTX products the most because they are firstly the most reliable stuff I have ever delt, and that includes all the favs like RF, Kicker and Alpine. Secondly, ever product of theirs I have used has lived up to the hype. Now onto the whole issue of speed. You are both right. A very good installer is also quick, thats part of being very good. Really sh*tty installers can also be very fast but its because they cut corners so really both ends of the spectrum are covered. As to the new lines that CC is getting, Im glad you are getting decent product but its only good if you have qualified salesman to sell it and most Large retail stores simply dont have the Tallent to do it. Plain and simple fact is that alot of salesman at big box stores are there for a job not a carrer. Its sad but generally the truth. The line about cars dont have problems from quick installs is bogus as well. Cars are suposed to take a certain amount of time and if your doing cars in under half of the time it takes a good installer to do it then there is a good chance that there are going to be future issies with the car due to corners being cut. Also the number of cars through a bay dont determine the success, the revenue the bay makes does, at least from a buisness stand point. Its all about the bottom line. I dare say a car in southern california is going to pump far more cars through their bay in november than a shop in Calgary will because that calgary shop is going to be doing car starters for basiclly the whole damn month where as the Shop in Cali is going to be far more stereo driven. Stereos take less time than decks and alarms do but the revenue generated from car starters will generally exceed that of the decks. Unless of course you are just putting decks in Neons, Sunfires and fords all day posted_image

. I think I took up enough space for now, so Ill end this now and wait for the replies

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double-secret reverse-osmosis speaker-cone-induced high-level interference distortion, Its a killer

And in case you are asking if I have been around the Block I got 5 years experience so Im not exactly new at this

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double-secret reverse-osmosis speaker-cone-induced high-level interference distortion, Its a killer

That's cool you have been doing this a while and like I sad I'm sorry about the last comment I only intended that because I thought you were the previous post. And yes I live in Illinois and have been through the long hard remote start days sitting in the snow melting off the cars with the best of them in fact this last december my chief installer broke his hand leaving me to pick up the 3 or 4 he was doing every day. Bye the way do you have the new mtx amps in yet?

Unfortunatly no, I wanna see them but they kinda concern me as well being they have went the route of the color changing lights and what not. I am hoping they havent sacrificed quality for something so lame. The last series of amps we had were the most dependable thing I have ever sold. I had one all year come back and it was one we didnt install and am honestly thinking it was an install related issue. I dont think I am gonna have the new stuff for at least another month.

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double-secret reverse-osmosis speaker-cone-induced high-level interference distortion, Its a killer

I got to see them and got the whole rundown, but have not played with them yet. First of all they do have the new lighting but most internals are the same. The only thing they really changed is firstly they moved all connections on one side to make them easier to install and secondly they have a new xtant cooling system that keeps them cooler than what they allready were which should make them last even longer. Well that and the fact that they have a new 3000 watt monster that is strappable and is one ohm stable. Btw I got to touch the jackhammer and it is really a peice of work 320 pounds of art and muscle.

Ya that Jackhammer is about the most ludicrious thing I have seen in quite a while. Its not gonna sell, at least not in my store, but I guess they said that it was geared towards the High end customers like athletes and musicians and what not. Im glad they added the xtant cooling system, thats gonna make it nicer to install, less worries for circulation. So does your shop do any custom work or are you all deck and 2 pair or deck amp and alarm or whatever.

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double-secret reverse-osmosis speaker-cone-induced high-level interference distortion, Its a killer