@MJ Brother $32 for six? I imagine those strings were woven by hand, by some ultimate string-weave-master! I agree with @Congarranza, natty is a place you could get away with a fade string... otherwise its just too much. Though @RodDama has a CWCS dama with a really well-matched pink/blue tama and pink/blue string I've always liked. We need a pic of that one in here!
IIRC you are pretty close in your guess. I believe that the other part of their business caters to the kimono world with special rope belts and such for them, so yes these I'd imagine are quite time consuming/complicated to make. If the process is similar to that which my partner had to use to make something similar their is a complex loom/jig looking donut spindle thing with the colored strings going through a hole and then separated out at clock positions around the edge. Kind of hard to describe.