Yes, most glider sales probably don't need more elaborate marketing. We generally knows what we want, often because of seeing the latest examples on the contest grid or club launch line just because we like what we know or hear about a brand or a new model.

But...I've got to believe there are some sales on the margin: a pilot who might be hesitating over whether to go "all in" on a new glider. Or which manufacturer/model. At the cost/margin of today's gliders, it doesn't take many (one?) sales to cover the cost of better, more comprehensive images/descriptions.

There's also the question of which options/features to order. I know of more than one pilot who, after he/she discovered that his/her new glider could have included some obscure option he/she didn't know about or didn't understand, was annoyed. I actually faxed a series of questions to Schleicher when I ordered my ASW 24 many years ago...that were very well answered by Mr. Gerhard Waibel himself. He even sent a drawing of one part so I could evaluate it. I had several options on my glider than most U.S. pilots didn't even know were available.

Marketing isn't a bad word. Today's glider manufacturers all market their products. It's just a question of how. And unless they've somehow colluded to allocate fixed numbers of orders to each manufacturer at fixed prices, it's a question of how effective their marketing is.

Chip Bearden