Have you ever thought much about making them more upgrade kit-friendly? My priorities are so skewed that I'd even pay to be in some kind of upgraders club. Ha ha.

Consider your Title officially updated!

Ha ha, very nice. I could really go for a new upgrade club sandwich!

Bad idea. You'll keep wanting more bacon, more ham, and more interstitial bread until you can't possibly eat before it gets soggy and unappetizing.

I used your trade in program that you had in place previously. For me it was great, I absolutely could not believe how much money you gave me for my trade-in, I felt like I got new speakers for practically nothing! So it didnt surprise me when you discontinued it, There is no way it could have made money. Especially if you took my old speakers and sold them on ebay, that company will put anyone out of business with their fees. I always hoped the program would be reactivated in some manner and I think it can be done effectively. My thoughts are, first, only you know whether or not an in-house refurb store works for you. There are internal logistics involved that only you know. If it were me I would refurb them and then wholesale the trades to another internet company, like accessoriesforless, and be done with them. The whole trade-in plan is about selling more new speakers, not about getting into the refurb sales business. Second, the allowance for trade-ins, my pilot program would start at minimal numbers, whatever you figure you can retail the refurb for less all the costs and profit margin and at least another 20% from there. There are not a lot of options for customers to move their old speakers. I have both bought and sold Axiom speakers on Ebay and it was a pain in the ass and they really just dont do much money to begin with and by the time your done paying the seller fees and PayPal fees you dont end up with much. Unless you have a friend that wants to buy them there arent many options. I just bought an Epic system and tried to sell a pair of M3's on Ebay, they did not sell and I got lucky that a friend bought them but I would much rather have sent them to you using boxes you supplied, for a discount on my new system. Clean, simple and easy, and I would have been happy with whatever (within some sort of reason) you offered. There is a lot of value in having a guaranteed buyer at a guaranteed price who is making shipping easy and wont call or email back later with ridiculous complaints. That value is a big advantage to you in valuing the trade-in. Third, I dont believe that shipping necessarily has to be included when selling refurbs. Taking the shipping cost out of the price will certainly make it appear a better deal and some customers may even pay less for shipping than the cost you had included. I would have no problem paying the shipping as long as the deal as a whole was still good.

Actually, that's a good idea, if you can use AC4L as an outlet or something. I know you don't really want to deal with resellers, but just for refurbs it might be worthwhile.

I liked the idea before and I like it now. However, the tradeup value for items I would consider trading in is shot due to cosmetic damage thanks to an incident with my cat

If you can make it economical for all parties involved, I think it is a great idea!

There are a lot of advantages to wholesaling, none the less being cash flow and exposure to a whole new customer base who may decide to buy new instead of the refurb.

That is AWESOME. Chalk up another one to Axiom customer service!