I learned my lesson already in the photography world with tripods...just because it's cheap(er), doesn't mean it's good. Spend the money once on a good quality product and be done with it. Going the cheap route will make you end up paying more in the end anyway because if you're serious about photography, you will end up buying the better tripod and also have bought all the cheaper versions (that broke/vibrated too much) along the way in your lesson.

For my Brompton situation, I had never heard of it...I was just drawn to a small folded thing I saw in a website picture of a LBS store. It looked like a bike and I had to find out what it was. I researched, found out it was a Brompton, then read all the info I could on it and the other competition. In the end settled on a Brompton b/c it was a handmade piece of machinery (hard to find those these days unless you spend your life savings on an exotic hand built car) and I couldn't get over the design.