Bose Acquires Skullcandy; New Couple Begins Difficult Conversation About How Loud Is Too Loud

FRAMINGHAM, Mass.—Bose, the audio company known for quiet airplane cabins and the soft voice of a man telling you noise cancellation is on, has acquired Skullcandy, a brand that by its own story was born on a chairlift in Park City and has never knowingly turned anything down.

Digital Commerce 360 reported the deal, announced Oct. 21. Terms and plans were covered in its report; The Daily SKU will stick to the parts that are mostly about feelings.

Early integration meetings were described by attendees as warm but tense. "Bose walked in and asked if we could all lower our voices," said one fictional Skullcandy product manager. "We did not know we were using voices. We thought we were using bass."

A fictional Bose engineer said the cultures were complementary. "We remove sound," he said. "They add sound. Together we can do both at the same time, which is a product we are calling silence, but louder."

"We remove sound. They add sound. Together we can do both at the same time."

Brand consultants said the deal follows a familiar pattern in which a premium company buys a younger, cheaper, louder brand to reach customers who are not yet ready for premium, and then waits for them to get older and develop back trouble. "First you have Skullcandy at 16," said one fictional consultant. "Then you have Bose at 41, on a plane, sighing. It is the circle of headphones."

Shoppers were broadly supportive. "I own both," said a fictional college sophomore in Salt Lake City. "I use the Skullcandy on the bus and the Bose when my mom calls. Now they can just talk to each other and leave me out of it."

At press time, the two companies had agreed on a shared volume level for the all-hands meeting, which Bose described as 3 and Skullcandy described as "basically off."