We have all had the temptation of buying a sleek new Macbook or iMac. But in these tough economic times the price is just too much. That's what most consumers think and it is certainly showing in Apple's sales. There are several things they that cause this:
1. They overprice for the apple logo. Most Apple products have a competitor just as powerful computing wise, but apple charges more because of the logo on the side of it. This is one of the main reasons people have stopped buying Apple. Why pay more for the same exact item?
2. They own most accessories for their products. With the release of the new shuffle, they have completely emphasized this marketing tactic. Apple has refused to release all but a few resources to third party manufacturers. If they were to sell the rights to their products (such as the shuffle's chip on the headset) they could make a killing from other manufacturers.
3. People get a good product but they have to pay for it. I'm not a Windows fanboy, but I do like Windows for their choices at the lower end of the price range. But what they don't do is add high quality programs installed on it. Apple is the complete opposite. They charge extremely high prices for a very high quality machine. While this sounds great, they haven't realized that people can't afford these machines at this time. This kills any chance of them gaining any new customers by scaring away anyone who is willing to invest.
Solutions:
1. Cut down the price of the apple logo. Stop trying to maintain the prestige of the apple logo. With the current economy it stands for nothing. That means that the lower end Macbooks as well as most of the iMacs need to come down in price. This would help tremendously when competing for sales with Windows at the lower end of the price range.
2. Sell out the rights to the accessories of products: By selling the rights to other manufacturers, it will probably make more money than relying on customers to buy the few pricey accessories that Apple has to offer. Not to mention, people will stop complaining about buying a $30 set of headphones for a $70 product that they already broke. This is possible because other manufacturers can sell cheaper versions of the product. People will be more willing to invest in the hardware, and bam, Apple have more sales.
3. Include computers with fewer features at a cheaper price. This could easily be accomplished by removing some of the software on a model and charging less. Then offering a package of the software just in case they want to upgrade. I have a feeling a lot more people would want a Mac if it wasn't such a big investment. The investment could be completely removed if some of the expensive features (such as the software included in the computer) and charged significantly less.
Apple has some serious decisions to take care of as far as pricing but until then I can see their sales dropping further, especially in the computer department. But this is just my opinion
