By Amy Gilroy and James Chevrette
Kicker (Stillwater Designs) sales are up despite the challenging year for most businesses. Founder and President Steve Irby said the company is seeing single digit gains in the aftermarket, in OEM car audio, as well as marine audio sales.
Irby, one of the pioneers in car audio, said the current environment is not the most challenging that Kicker has seen over its 52 years. That would have been back in 2008 and 2009, during a recession. “Our two biggest customers went bankrupt: Circuit City and Chrysler. This is nothing like that, and we survived,” said Irby.
“I’ve always felt that business to a certain degree is what you make it and to a degree the circumstances,” he said. There’s less money in people’s pockets, “but the truth is, if people want something, they often find a way to get it, which goes back to visibility, demonstrating in a store what it sounds like to have a great system.”
He cited the old adage, “They say when business is down to double your advertising. You have to continue to be visible and make your own path. We’ve been through tough times before.”
Some of Irby’s contemporaries are selling their businesses either to employees, to private equity or to other companies. Irby’ view on selling to private equity? “I’m not interested in selling out. To me, this is a community, and we have, you know, around 200 families [employees], and so that’s something that I really don’t want to change.”
Product
Research & Development is the largest department at Stillwater, employing 30 people. Speakers may not be the most technical product, but there is a balance of technology and art that keeps evolving.
Power now costs less in new amplifiers, and as amps get more powerful, subwoofers and speakers must keep up. Irby said this is a matter of refining the technology that’s already out there. For example, tweaking glues to handle more heat and refining cooling systems.
There’s also the matter of better fitment under the seats in trucks. “So thinner and more power handling on subwoofers are two key things that we focus on.”
MAP Pricing
Another Kicker area of focus is policing Minimum Advertised Prices online. Kicker employs a full time person to protect pricing on the Internet from discounting, and it has a law firm that works full time on the issue. Kicker also performs “mystery buys,” to check up on its sellers to make sure online prices don’t fall below MAP.
“You can ask our dealers. I think we do a pretty decent job of it. We’re not perfect, but we really have invested a lot in that, and we have a lot of ongoing monthly expenses just to protect that price. I think it’s absolutely necessary for anybody today,” Irby said.
Prediction
How will autonomous vehicles impact car audio? Irby says most of the impact will be in video, once drivers are no longer required to keep their eyes on the road. “I drive a Tesla and I’ve used Full Self Driving. I think they have a ways to go to make that safe and even further to make people trust it and buy it.” He adds, “Maybe in 15 years, I don’t know, you’ll have a big screen system in the car and won’t even look at the road.”
Advice
Advice to a smaller dealer on how to weather the storm? “We travel and visit stores. I still do that twice a year…I think the initial impression on the consumer makes a big difference on whether they want to shop there—the displays that work, a clean store, people that are technically trained, good customer service…and try to remain visible.”
Many consumers don’t know their car can sound better than the factory system or that they can enhance the bass. So the answer, again, is visibility. Kicker attends a lot of shows and is on the road in the summer interacting with a lot of customers, Irby said. “You have to make your own path and make it easy for customers to find you.”
Kicker held an old time sound off competition this year at its headquarters. Will it hold another? “I think everyone went away feeling like we wish car audio was like this all the time.. I think maybe we kind of resurrected something, a feeling that maybe we’d had even back in the 80’s…I think we’re going to do it again.”
source: https://www.ceoutlook.com/2025/12/30/kickers-mindset-heading-into-2026/
