Indeed. I almost used the Rolex watch analogy myself earlier! The point, as you say, is that it's very successful branding and marketing over actual substance. It's business.
I find this whole "Veblen goods" thing incredibly distasteful and the likes of Naim being able to take a huge slice of the hi fi pie for no other reason than a brand name even more so.
If the Quad 306 was still available it would be maybe £800. Nothing about it's design, construction, parts quality or reliability is any less good than a NAP250... nor, arguably, is the sound! Both were hand made in the UK (then). Naim get away with ripping people off for £4000 simply because it says Naim on it. That's what really boils my piss about them.... that and the way they brainwashed people, along with Linn and numerous dealers all riding the flat earth gravy train, into thinking it really is worth it, to the extent they will queue up on threads such as this to explain why a transformer in a box is worth thousands... and us plebs just don't get it... cos it's not just any transformer in a box it's an M&S erm Naim one
They could no doubt get away with selling an empty Naim shoe box case with just a power-on LED lighting up on the front for £1000 as a way of making your Naim stack look symmetrical
A&R are not defunct BTW. "Amplification and Recording (Cambridge)" shortened it to "A&R Cambridge" and then to "Arcam"