Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
To All the people Bitchin about Pricing.
- Thread starter pandamonia
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Are you aware of the education discounts?
You get what you pay for and i don't miss cheap plastic notebooks from HP or Dell.
i have yet to see a notebook even come close to my MBP
Net Margins is used as a term for revenue, not for a specific product. My point was that they can charge a lot less for the product and still be profitable. Their users are willing to pay the premium.
I was watching TWITs live cast of the liveblogging. The funny thing these are all people who cover tech and, in some cases, buy 100s of 1000s worth of equipment annually. They were all oohing and ahhing over the Retina MBP features and guessing it would be in the high twos. When it was announced in the low twos they were floored it was so aggressively priced!
I agreed with them -- I was stunned too. I've bought my share of MB and PBs. Based on performance and features to price ratio the entry Retina MBP ranks among the best Apple laptop ever. The higher end ones are a bit spendy, but those that buy them will be making money off them so minor biz expense.
My guess is that those who are complaining are either professional trolls or just frustrated it's out of their price range. But the 13" is coming and I guess will sell for $1500, so everyone will be happy that wants to be happy.
I agreed with them -- I was stunned too. I've bought my share of MB and PBs. Based on performance and features to price ratio the entry Retina MBP ranks among the best Apple laptop ever. The higher end ones are a bit spendy, but those that buy them will be making money off them so minor biz expense.
My guess is that those who are complaining are either professional trolls or just frustrated it's out of their price range. But the 13" is coming and I guess will sell for $1500, so everyone will be happy that wants to be happy.
Pricing in general, historically has come down considerably so I dont understand all the negativity, although i understand its human nature to complain about pricing. But a little bit of perspective will show that we are getting a HUUGE amount of computing power for far less compared to say 5-10 years ago.
People mention other brands like HP/DELL being cheaper but if you paid attention to recent trends, they are also coming up with non-plastic alternatives like the Dell XPS with aluminium and carbon, HP with the spectre, they are certainly NOT cheap and does not OVERPOWER the MBP in anyway.
In fact the MBP retina has amazing specs, PER GRAM, its only 2KG and it has a 15 inch retina screen, quad core, and a decent mid range gpu. Im not a fanboy or anything and Im sure Apple is making great margins, but i dun see it as a rip off at all.
People mention other brands like HP/DELL being cheaper but if you paid attention to recent trends, they are also coming up with non-plastic alternatives like the Dell XPS with aluminium and carbon, HP with the spectre, they are certainly NOT cheap and does not OVERPOWER the MBP in anyway.
In fact the MBP retina has amazing specs, PER GRAM, its only 2KG and it has a 15 inch retina screen, quad core, and a decent mid range gpu. Im not a fanboy or anything and Im sure Apple is making great margins, but i dun see it as a rip off at all.
Gross margin is the worst possible metric of a business or product. EVER.
i know i do this for a living.
Just ask Sony how much Gross they make on their products... Probably lots.
Then look at how much they lose annually.
Yeah and the 100 dollars off makes it a bit more tolerable.
ASUS makes some really nice laptops btw.
But you may be right, but since I've never used a Mac I'm just looking at the specs and I don't see anything that great to justify the price tag. After I buy it I may agree with you. Just tough getting over the initial price shock of Apple products
I know they are expensive, but for what you are getting, it's worth it. You WON'T find another laptop like this for awhile. It's a remarkable machine. I was expecting it to be st least $3000 like the rumors. It is $2199! With education discount, rhats $2000. Maybe it will be like $1700 refurbished!
You may say they overpriced? I work for myself... ever heard of "you get what you pay for"? Anyway... as far as the pricing is concerned, you are paying for the technology and design NOT just because it is Apple. Besides that, if i hadn't updated my hardware in October last year, then I would be buying.... each to their own I guess...
Resale value is also important. i will sell my 2.66ghz Dual core MBP for around £800-£950 depending on market conditions. Ill keep the SSD i have for it which means i only lose about £600-700 over 2 years.
A macbook is not just a bunch of parts in a case with a keyboard and screen. It offers the best software & hardware integration of any notebook on the planet. Its of much higher quality and design than anything else.
I was first and now my brother and a friend all have a macbook of some kind, another friend is about to buy this new MBP with me included.
I don't know any other product other than the iPhone that has this effect on people who use it and experience it.
It makes other notebooks look and feel very poor.
When you have a legitimate point you aren't afraid to yell it in someone's ear. And when you don't have a legitimate point then you have no problem making up "facts" to support your case.
Nice strategy. I bet you win a lot of arguments.
It's the MAIN metric of product profitability. Sony probably loses money annually due to other costs. If you would like an analysis on that I can I can provide it to you compared to Apple.
I know I'm a CFA.
When you have a legitimate point you aren't afraid to yell it in someone's ear. And when you don't have a legitimate point then you have no problem making up "facts" to support your case.
Nice strategy. I bet you win a lot of arguments.
Its a proven fact that a new introduction of SKU on to the market has a higher initial cost than 12 months later, the initial margin takes a hit on this and this is run down over time. The better the sales the faster this usually happens.
R&D and tooling are the biggest margin killers early on as you have to recover the expense.
Apple has taken a hit on pricing on this model and it also has more batteries and custom made parts including obvious R&D expense.
This is why my PS3 cost me £450 and sony made a loss on every one but now they make profit at £200
Due to the extremely expensive screen, I'm guessing that this is actually a relatively low margin product by Apple standards - they'll get the margin up on the next generation... I bet that screen is $300-$400even in quantity ( I saw a figure of $200 for the panel alone for a TN screen of that resolution, but Apple also went IPS). The processor on the higher end model is $350 or so, and on the speed-bump model, it's $550 ( amazingly, the speed bump is not ridiculously overpriced from Apple - Intel's processor pricing is high for the 2.7, but that's not Apple's fault).
For the $3000 MBP I'm after, here are the identifiable parts...
Processor -$350
16 GB of RAM -$200
GPU -$150?
512 GB SSD - $500 (the Samsung drives Apple's using cost $700 at Newegg!) Apple's FINALLY using a fast, current SSD!
Display - $350?
Battery - $150?
Thunderbolt controllers $50?
Ivy Bridge motherboard $125
Unibody case -$100
Power adapter -$50
Random circuitry - $50
Total $2075 before design, assembly and OS X.
I know Apple will get some of this cheaper due to quantity, but I care about its value ( if Apple negotiated a better deal than I could, that's profit I'm happy for them to have). $3000 for a beautifully engineered laptop sporting over $2000 worth of parts seems like a decent deal to me...
For the $3000 MBP I'm after, here are the identifiable parts...
Processor -$350
16 GB of RAM -$200
GPU -$150?
512 GB SSD - $500 (the Samsung drives Apple's using cost $700 at Newegg!) Apple's FINALLY using a fast, current SSD!
Display - $350?
Battery - $150?
Thunderbolt controllers $50?
Ivy Bridge motherboard $125
Unibody case -$100
Power adapter -$50
Random circuitry - $50
Total $2075 before design, assembly and OS X.
I know Apple will get some of this cheaper due to quantity, but I care about its value ( if Apple negotiated a better deal than I could, that's profit I'm happy for them to have). $3000 for a beautifully engineered laptop sporting over $2000 worth of parts seems like a decent deal to me...
Apple products do resell really well though, I'll give you that
lol, I'm not getting into the iphone part. Definitely going to check on the new one whenever it's announced but the past iphones haven't been anything special IMO but that's a completely different story.
It's just hard to believe that a Mac offers such a completely different experience than any other top tier laptop. But okay, I'm done venting for the day. I'll come back whenever I actually get the notebook to post whether my view has changed or not.
Gross Margin is phantom money until you take away your costs.
I couldn't tell you how many companies i have worked for that thought they was turning a profit only to lose a fortune and have to cut jobs because of it.
EBITA is a more accurate figure and this can be worked back to product level.
A company i recently left made 79% gross margin on a number of lines but still managed to turn £230m net loss and have to cut over 1000 jobs.
That is why it's a tool. You compute your costs first then associate what you want to charge for your product to cover said costs. The company you worked at was managed piss poorly. Since you're using Euros that wouldn't surprise me with no SEC regulations. EBITA is used on an internal basis (Managerial Accounting) Versus for investors. It also includes intangible values so it's disregarded by the street.
Gross Margin %
Revenue - Cost of Goods Sold / Revenue
Look at their SEC filings and do the math yourself. You compute your costs first then associate what you have to charge to cover those costs plus make a profit.
With the Edu discount mine was the same price as a standard mbp would have been with the third party upgrades I planned plus I got a retina display I'm more than happy with pricing.
i understand the principle.
By the way £ is not an euro its sterling GBP.
Also i don't place much faith in the SEC nor American finance accounting. Wasn't the world recession caused by a US banking collapse including the bailout of how many multibillion dollar companies in the US? AIG, GM, Fanny and Freddie...
Accounting trickery at its best.
Really? hard to believe some peopel still stuck in the 90s. PPC is dead and anyone who would choose a PPC over a new Windows laptop has Appleitis. I've heard it is fatal in some cases.
Your claim is that Apple is taking a significant hit (loss) with this new product. So if its a proven fact then produce your proof regarding this specific model that you are referring to because Apple tends to price for profit.
(And if you can't produce anything then why are you yelling at everyone for having individual opinions on what they feel a product should cost. That same argument was made for the iPad retina screen and how Apple must be losing money on it, but in the end they got a healthy profit despite new technology being included.)
it doesn't really matter what you "Feel" this product should cost.
Its not your product. its Apples.
You don't have to buy one.
Well, I have a macbook pro, Mini and other Apple products. It's not going to be my main machine...