Your Apple Products Are Getting More Expensive. Here's How They Get Away With It. (washingtonpost.com)

An anonymous reader shares a report: Apple has never made cheap stuff. But this fall many of its prices increased 20 percent or more. The MacBook Air went from $1,000 to $1,200. A Mac Mini leaped from $500 to $800. It felt as though the value proposition that has made Apple products no-brainers might unravel. For some perspective, we charted out the past few years of prices on a few iconic Apple products. Then we compared them with other brands and some proprietary data about Americans' phone purchase habits from mobile analytics firm BayStreet Research.

What we learned: Being loyal to Apple is getting expensive. Many Apple product prices are rising faster than inflation -- faster, even, than the price of prescription drugs or going to college. Yet when Apple offers cheaper options for its most important product, the iPhone, Americans tend to take the more expensive choice. So while Apple isn't charging all customers more, it's definitely extracting more money from frequent upgraders.

[...] Apple says prices go up because it introduces new technologies such as Face ID and invests in making products that last a long time. Yet it has clearly been feeling price discomfort from some quarters. This week, amid reports of lagging sales that took its stock far out of the trillion-dollar club, it dedicated its home page to a used-car sales technique that's uncharacteristic for an aspirational luxury brand. It offered a "limited-time" deal to trade in an old iPhone and get a new iPhone XR for $450, a $300 discount.

Comments

Zombies.

[pecosdave]

Apple users want new well branded, logo showing bling the same way zombies want brains.

Re:Zombies.

[garcia]

I'm an Apple user but you're making sweeping generalizations of which I've honestly only heard from non-Apple users. The only people who care that someone has an Apple product seems to be those who use Android.

I used to use any number of different products across any number of platforms (OS/2, Debian, Windows, etc, etc, etc) but to say I want to use it because of the logo is objectively ridiculous.

I use it because I've used one for years and don't see any reason to change. I haven't had to pay anything (except standard mobile contract fees) for any of these phones and my laptops are solidly killing it years later.

Do your thing, by all means; but stop spouting off ridiculous theories of which have little basis in reality.

Re:Zombies.

[StormReaver]

I haven't had to pay anything (except standard mobile contract fees)

That's like saying, "I haven't had to pay anything for my house (except standard mortgage payments)."

Re:Zombies.

[amicusNYCL]

The only people who care that someone has an Apple product seems to be those who use Android.

People who drive around with Apple stickers on the back of their car would seem to offer a counterpoint to that argument. I've seen cars with 3 or 4 Apple stickers on the back in a neat row, apparently they want to make their car as attractive a target as possible for a smash-n-grab.

I use it because I've used one for years and don't see any reason to change.

There are better products for the same price or less, which is a reason to change. There ARE reasons to change, but once you get deeply enough into the Apple ecosystem then it becomes a burden to move to a different platform. Which goes back to the headline about how Apple gets away with making their products more expensive.

$1000 phones

[110010001000]

I never thought anyone would buy a $1000 phone that was built for $140. That is probably why I am not in sales.

Re: $1000 phones

[Anonymous Coward]

My iPhone 6 doesn't run the latest version of iOS.

But by refusing updates, my iPhone 6 will continue to perform to hardware spec for several more years.

Re:$1000 phones

[jellomizer]

The $140 isn't the true cost of the product either. There is a lot of money in the Administrative costs of such a device. The R&D probably factoring in hundreds of rejected designed and ideas that cost a lot money before it was rejected, staff from the executives down to the maintenance workers, who needs to get paid no matter how many units are sold.
Now Apple is one of the biggest companies in the world, they are making a good amount of profit off each unit sold, but the cost to build one unit, isn't the true cost.

Now that being said, there is danger in the Race to the bottom sales tactic. Where you sell your product less then your competitor, then your competitor cuts their prices to be below you and then you return back again. At first you may assume that this is good for the consumer, however it isn't long in this race to the bottom sacrifices are made to where the product gets crappier and crappier every price cut, because the company will still try to keep its margins, and will not sell at a loss.

If you look at historic Desktop PC makers back in the late 1990's
1995ish, Gateway 2000 was gaining a lot of ground, one of its biggest points was its product quality. Sure you will pay more for it but it is worth it. Then in a few years it tried to compete with lower cost competitors such as Compaq which then caused the quality to drop rapidly as your $2k PC is now $900 but the drives will fail, and 3rd party components would undoubtedly crash Windows rapidly because the drivers were never quite right.
1997ish, Dell begin to gain a lot of ground, one of its biggest points was its product quality. Sure you will pay more for it but it is worth it. Then in a few years it was trying to compete with eMachenes which then caused the quality to drop rapidly as your $2k PC is now $900 but the drives will fail, 3rd party components would crash win....

Apple isn't the perfect company and their products are not perfect. However they have mostly maintained a high quality in their products (with their share of duds) often the big scandals like the iPhones 4 antenna problem and the iPhones 6+ bending problems, are actually small problems, however people got angry because of the standard that Apple normally has. But if Apple would try to make their products cheaper it will only open the door for their competition to sell better quality products and take Apples spot.

Re: $1000 phones

[bkr1_2k]

To find things. I already know how to use a map, I just need to see where it is I'm going. They don't need my location to provide the location of something else.

It's pretty simple

[Brett Buck]

Apple can sell these for more money because everything else is treated like a knockoff. They are the dominant player, everyone knows that, and no one checks specs since they are all close enough to each other that it doesn't matter.

      I know we can expect a raft of posts to follow that explain the important technical and religious differences, but the vast, vast majority of the people buying these just don't care about that stuff, they want to have what is socially considered the best.

It’s True

[jittles]

What they’re talking about is 100% true. I have tons of Apple devices. Multiple Mac Minis, iPads, iPhones, etc. And I found that the plastic parts of my MacBook Pro (2011) are failing and the hinge for the laptop lid will soon fail entirely. So I started shopping for a replacement. What I found is that the MacBook Air is insanely expensive for the performance you get. And if I buy a MacBook Pro? Also insanely expensive. They solder in all the RAM and NVMe drives. The real kicker for me? Paying $500 for an NVMe SATA drive that I cannot upgrade when I can buy a 1TB NVMe PCIe drive that has WAY better throughput when dealing with smaller files. In fact, the throughput difference is so huge that switching from SATA to PCIe drops a compile time on one of my projects by 70%, So what did I end up doing? I ordered a Lenovo laptop that supports NVMe PCIe, has removeable RAM, AND weighs half a pound less than the MacBook Pro. Oh did I mention that it also has a better processor and almost the exact same battery life? And I am paying $1000 less out the door, including buying my own NVMe PCIe drive to upgrade it with. I will never buy another Apple computer again. The only reason I own an iPhone is due to Apple making its money off of hardware sales and Google making its money off of spying.

Sagging sales

[QuietLagoon]

Probably due to Apple's insistence upon a steeply-increasing price for its products because of the development costs of features that Apple tells its customer they want, as opposed to features that Apple's customers tell Apple they need.

Overpriced junk

[WCMI92]

Apple makes good but not great products. They sell based on their reputation which they haven't deserved in years.

Re:Overpriced junk

[ljw1004]

Apple makes good but not great products. They sell based on their reputation which they haven't deserved in years.

I think they have a reputation for protecting your privacy better than the alternatives, which they have and continue to deserve.

Re:Overpriced junk

[Moof123]

The contrast is the shit-show that is Android. It is a wild west scene of outdated OS versions, sporadic and unreliable security updates, non-removable bloatware, apparently rampant Chinese spyware, etc. Even otherwise good brands turn around and do this crap on their entry level and mid-range phones with just a few notable exceptions.

I have an Android phone, and I am amazed at the rampant pitfalls one has to navigate to pick a good phone at a low price. The safe ways to avoid this seem to be to get a flagship phone from the likes of Samsung or Google, or to get an Apple phone. I did not begrudge my rather non-technically minded wife when her iPhone 5s wore out and she wanted an 8. I've had to do ZERO to help her out. $800 was very cheap for marital bliss, and the phone will likely keep her going for a good 3+ years.

The peanut gallery will tell you to just root your android phone and load Lineage OS, or similar. For 99% of the buying public that is useless advice.

Re:Purchase price is the least important part

[ranton]

Apple understands that the purchase price of a device is in fact pretty much the least important things about it.

It isn't different than any other luxury device like an expensive home, car, clothing, etc. Once someone reaches a level of income where their time has significant value, the cost of luxury items is not nearly as relevant. The difference between a $1000 phone and $200 phone purchases every other year is $1 per day. It is the difference between a small fry and a large fry at McDonalds. If you have enough income where you aren't struggling to pay the mortgage, pay for car repairs, and feed yourself, how trivial is the difference between a small fry and large fry when eating fast food?

If someone is having trouble balancing their budget, buying an expensive phone every other year probably won't even make the top 20 things to fix in their spending habits.

You know you can....not buy their products, right?

[Uberbah]

Summary not just written and powered by smarmy Hatorade, its a honey pot for the same. You know Zombie Steve isn't holding a gun to your heads, right? You are perfectly free to buy an Android phone - even if it comes with a notch and costs just as much as an iPhone XR.

Re:Moving on...

[fluffernutter]

When my mother in law has a problem with her iPhone and I plug it into my PC which is set up with my iPhone it does not 'just work'. It tries to erase the second phone. When I don't want to accept an upgrade or register my Apple ID it does not 'just work'. It nags me with no way to stop it. Apple fans tend to say 'it just works' without realizing that it just happens to work for them.

Re: Off the backs of exploited workers.

[UnknowingFool]

You do know that Foxconn makes devices for almost every manufacturer right? That means your ire covers Dell, Lenovo, HP, LG, etc.