Three years ago, I did a big, bulk buy of CFLs to replace all the incandescent bulbs in my house, all at once. Roughly 10% of the bulbs were DOA. Now, three years later, I've seen maybe 10% that have burned out or died under modest load (1-2 hrs/day). I'm not really all that impressed with CFLs.

However, you're absolutely right on LED pricing. The initial market is the commercial world, not the home. When you're running a light 24/7, longer operating life and lower power consumption is a big deal. Also, consider the heat output. A typical small retail store could easily have 40 MR16 halogen bulbs. At 50W each, that's 2KW of power consumed, and then you need to run an air conditioner to remove all that heat (perhaps another 4KW). If the retail outlet is paying $0.10 per KWH and turns the lights off at night, then that's ballpark $6/day or $2200/year. If LED replacement bulbs are $40/ea ($1600 for the whole store), consume 10% of the power (200W vs. 2KW), and allow the air conditioning to run at half its previous duty cycle, then the LED replacement becomes cash positive in just over a year.

CFLs aren't currently available in the MR16 form factor, so they're not an option in a case like this...