Sonos: Better in black?
CNET's David Carnoy gets his hands on a custom-painted black Sonos ZonePlayer and ponders whether the company should offer black-colored products to its customers.
- Maggie Award for Best Regularly Featured Web Column/Consumer
For a while now I've been ribbing the folks over at Sonos, the leader in affordable multiroom audio, that I wished their products came in black rather than light gray/off-white. The fact is, if you have a lot of black components, you ideally want everything to match. That's why you see the XBox 360 in black--I mean, people want the choice, right?
Well, my dreams of black Sonos were realized when an anonymous donor (who wishes to remain that way) let us take some shots of a customized ZonePlayer ZP100. It's a fairly expensive proposition--companies like Colorware charge upwards of a $100 to refinish various products, including game consoles and PCs. But the end result is pretty slick and I think Sonos would do well with a black model, particularly for the larger ZP100's replacement, the ZP120, which usually ends up in a rack. You can tuck the smaller ZP90 or discontinued ZP80 behind a TV or wherever, so most people can live with--and maybe even like--the off-white. And I know it's a pain for companies to manage multiple SKUs, but I still vote for a black option.
Anybody else have an opinion?
