Welcome to Marketing 101. The goal of marketing is to convince the target audience that this is the widget that will serve your every need and motivate you to action. The target audience is not the audiophile, but the masses. They are the ones to most likely to react to name recognition when the need speakers and the marketing department has done complex statistical research to identify and define the needs of the masses and saturated them with it through focused advertising. Buy that widget now bucause this is what you are looking for even if you don't realize it.

Name recognition is huge withing the masses. Dare I say it, but if there was a suggestion of B&W, the masses would think you were talking about a root beer.

Bose has been around for years to build the mystique. While their revenue may be reaching established growth goals, they have an advantage - they don't have to publish it as they are a private company. If they were a public company, they would have to report earnings, and any dip in earnings would have shareholders and analyst screaming for product improvement - forcing the issue that they are able to avoid.

When things settle down in August, I am about to become a proud owner of Bose as I search for that 'perfect' speaker. It will become the standard to educate the rest of the family as I compare it against other speakers. I figured out how I could do it for free. Sams Club has the Accumass 10II (previous generation - subwoofer passive/unpowered) with very liberal return policy, up to one year - but interest free for 90 days. Just keep the box, packing material, and receipt. That is 3 months to compare with others having 30 day trials, side by side in my own home. How sweet is that!