Vanatoo aims to create affordable, versatile audiophile quality speakers for today’s digital music enthusiast. Our goals are to create speakers with impeccable sound clarity and transparency, so your music is a faithful reproduction of the artist’s work, and with the flexibility to connect to the myriad of audio devices and networks available in the marketplace. By selling direct, we reduce costs, allowing us to offer features and sound quality typically found in higher priced speakers.
Vanatoo is a lifelong dream for two engineers with a love for audio and technology. Their expertise in acoustics and digital electronics, and experience in all aspects of product development and manufacturing is your assurance that Vanatoo products are impeccably designed and of excellent quality.
Gary has been building custom speakers and obsessing over the perfect speaker since the mid-80’s. When others were focused on “big hair”, he was writing his Master’s thesis on “Acoustic Radiation Characteristics of Short Horns”. Gary has over 25 years in the high tech industry, in both engineering and management. Gary’s amateur endeavors include a recent “Best in Show” award from the Northwest Audio Society for a set of custom speakers he built for a friend.
Rick also shares a lifelong love of electronics and audio equipment. For Rick, it all began back in a small town in Iowa, where, as a child, he would blast the Star Spangled Banner through his uncle’s PA system as loud as possible for the neighborhood. Rick has over 35 years of experience in microprocessor-based electronics and software design. His executive management experience includes positions in Research and Development, Manufacturing, Quality Control, and Factory Repair. Rick is also an accomplished woodworker who builds Arts and Crafts style furniture for his home.
Around the time Vanatoo was being named, the island of Vanuatu was picked as the happiest place on earth. Rick and Gary figured that the happiest place on earth to work would be a place that designed speakers so wonderful that their sound would make those places the happiest place on earth for their customers too. It's a bit corny, but true. So with a nod to happiness, and a twist on the spelling, Vanatoo was born.
