Quote:
Originally Posted by badbob001
They may need to for competitive reasons.
I know they are a small company and can't survive with smaller margins like larger companies like Amazon but they need to find a way to compete. If they want to compete price-wise, then they need to match or better the competitors' pricing. Their manufacturing costs may be higher due to reasons such as lower volume, an inept product manager with bad breath, hand assembled devices by super models... whatever, it's not relevant to the consumer, who will generally not pay more due to loyalty or pity.
They can compete also on features, but IREX has problems on that front as well. The Iliad came out with so many features such as wifi, ethernet, multiple memory card slots, and sophisticated document viewing and management features. But with the newer products, they can't maintain their startup energy and had to cut back features so the core functions can be working fully.
If a reader had these values: - cheap
- featured
- reliable
and you could only choose two, which would they be? |
If I check the number of posts in this thread, interest in iRex 800 seems to be huge. And my gut feeling says, positive feedback seems to outweigh the negative one.
On the negative side, it's mainly about features they've had before. Not about features all the others have.
I guess, their concept is quite simple:
- "How many former iLiad or 1000S users may be disappointed because of lacking some features from former models" vs. "cost savings by sticking to the market level".
- Would they sell at least 3 times as many units when reducing the price by the 40% you suggested?
- How big is their niche of "high end" products and what does their competition offer in that range?
Some "exotic" readers actually seem to offer more for less. But I've had this before with Hanlin/BeBook: Phantastic features, but no "charm".
I guess in comparison to Sony or Amazon, which certainly are the big ones to consider, they've found their niche.
In comparison to Sony 900, the European price for iRex 800 seems high. But Sony 900 so far isn't available in Europe and I guess the number of people importing them from the US is relatively small. So, within their European "home market", there's not much of competition for touchscreen units. As long as this situation remains that way, they may be able to stick to that price level.
And in the US they seem to offer for a significantly lower price.
From a distance, their business model kind of makes sense.
BTW: I really don't understand, why most of the manufacturers don't offer WiFi. I really enjoy it on nook and that's the main reason why I rank it that high.
But as the clear majority of manufacturers doesn't offer WiFi, there seems to be a valid reason...