Torview
Well-known member
If a Chinese company reverse engineered a Swaro 8x42 SLC-HD and sold it at half the price, would you buy one?
China mostly replicates, very rarely innovates.
If a Chinese company reverse engineered a Swaro 8x42 SLC-HD and sold it at half the price, would you buy one?
Are we not both entered in the Prime ED contest? That's ZR's EL, "Made in China."
Brock
I wouldn't buy it...half price or not. China might and surely can reverse engineer the process and reproduce a seemingly Alpha pair of bino.
The issue isn't what is on the outside of the product but what is on the inside...what is under the hood. I really feel that while the bino might look the same, the inner works would be cheapened and lack quality control. Besides, I doubt if 'service' after the sale would exist.
Also, in regards to the 'social conditions of their workers'...true, the rest of the world might not care but I do. And if this question is directed at me, than my opinion counts. I don't shop at Walmart and while I am sure I purchase goods from China (how can one not considering they make just about everything)....if given an option, I would not support the money going to China to support such poor worker conditions, and environmental hazards.
You'd never know that from all the alpha owners on BF, but your comment gets us back to perterra's statement: "I really dont have a problem with made in China, I have more of a problem with companies who capitalize on the backs of the poor by not paying a living wage."
That statement might well apply to many U.S. companies:
American Workers Are More Productive, But Their Wages Are Flat, And In Some Cases, Lower
We're seeing some manufacturing coming back to the U.S., in large part to be closer to cheap sources of energy (natural gas) and raw materials (natural gas liquids, particularly ethane to make ethylene and polyethylene), but also because Chinese wages are on the rise, whereas U.S. wages are flat or lower than they were 5 years ago.
This means that we might see a "Made in USA" sports optics again even though the companies that own them will be Chinese.
Brock
I wouldn't buy it...half price or not. China might and surely can reverse engineer the process and reproduce a seemingly Alpha pair of bino.
The issue isn't what is on the outside of the product but what is on the inside...what is under the hood. I really feel that while the bino might look the same, the inner works would be cheapened and lack quality control. Besides, I doubt if 'service' after the sale would exist.
Also, in regards to the 'social conditions of their workers'...true, the rest of the world might not care but I do. And if this question is directed at me, than my opinion counts. I don't shop at Walmart and while I am sure I purchase goods from China (how can one not considering they make just about everything)....if given an option, I would not support the money going to China to support such poor worker conditions, and environmental hazards.
At least I think so. My OH says I have a stupid, childish sense of humour.
Not without good reason.
Ah go on, comment away. I think this ground has been well-covered in the past. It'also interesting to see the various perspectives from different countries- former manufacturing hubs v. SOE's. Very little manufacturing goes on here, so it's of no consequence from where we import anything, we'd be in the dark ages without trade, and we export little beyond agricultural produce, pharma, IT and Banking Crises. There's never been an Irish Binocular. The view is obviously different from the U.S. Or Germany, but in any case I doubt that sports optics make up much of the GDP of any economy.Interesting topic I better not comment don't want to ruffle to many feathers.
Bryce...
Ah go on, comment away. I think this ground has been well-covered in the past. It'also interesting to see the various perspectives from different countries- former manufacturing hubs v. SOE's. Very little manufacturing goes on here, so it's of no consequence from where we import anything, we'd be in the dark ages without trade, and we export little beyond agricultural produce, pharma, IT and Banking Crises. There's never been an Irish Binocular. The view is obviously different from the U.S. Or Germany, but in any case I doubt that sports optics make up much of the GDP of any economy.
We're seeing some manufacturing coming back to the U.S., in large part to be closer to cheap sources of energy (natural gas) and raw materials (natural gas liquids, particularly ethane to make ethylene and polyethylene), but also because Chinese wages are on the rise, whereas U.S. wages are flat or lower than they were 5 years ago.
This means that we might see a "Made in USA" sports optics again even though the companies that own them will be Chinese.
Brock