U
Robert Uhl wrote:
>
> Would you have bought that Mac if it cost thrice as much? Would Apple
> have even sold it if the market were as small as it would be for a
> trebly-expensive computer?
>
Why should it cost three times as much? Given component costs,
automated assembly and so on the cost would probably have been less
than another hundred pounds and yes I would have been willing to pay
such a realistic premium. My last Mac was assembled in Ireland and it
certainly didn't cost 3x the price of my current one.
Unfortunately I think consumers have played into the hands of the
corporations by always looking to the price and not thinking about the
wider picture. The same can be said of the failure to look at other
ethical issues associated with manufacture such as the methods used in
factory farming, the impact production and use has on the environment
and so on. It seems that the selfish society is self-propagating and
people which is why people not only choose huge dangerous and polluting
4x4's they no longer really care if their purchasing decisions put
other out of work.
Yes, that work might be created elsewhere but the answer to that is for
companies to develop products aimed at the market the item was produced
in. I would think there are many electrical products that could be
produced in China that would be more accessible to Chinese buyers than
£1000 computers destined for the west.
For a good example of the folly of letting price drive the market
consider the UK bike manufacturing industry. This is all but dead now
due to manufacturers moving production overseas and the import of
products from India, Vietnam and so on. Those Indian companies could
have developed products ideally suited to the home market but instead
produce millions of these £60 'mountain bikes' for western companies
which you see everywhere. I totally fail to see how this reduction in
prices for bikes has benefited anyone other than the importers. The
bikes are bad beyond belief, unreliable, heavy and almost guaranteed to
convince them that cycling is both impractical and hard work. In fact I
would argue that the failure to develop a 'better bike' and to instead
concentrate solely on price has helped to ensure the decline of cycling
in the UK. The fixation on price has also led the man in the street to
see the bicycle as being a low-cost, low value item in every way.
(Tales abound in the bike trade of punters who go into shops and demand
to buy the cheapest bike in the shop, totally resisting any suggestions
that spending another £100 or even £50 would be a good investment.
The shop owner then helps the customer to take the bike outside only to
see them load the bike into a £30,000 Land Rover...).
What was needed was for the importers and manufacturers to focus more
on quality, practicality and so on. Ok this might have been a harder
sell than just selling on price but if they had done the Uk bike
industry would still be booming. Look at countries such as Germany
where quality has always being a selling point for bicycles and look
at the quality items they produce- and produce in Germany (Rolholff,
Schmidt, etc etc).
Even with a quality-orientated outlook is is still possible to
manufacture truly quality bikes at very realistic prices. OK so you
might have to spend 3 times the cost of some fully-suspended MTB
look-alike monstrosity from Vietnam but the customer would still be
getting better value for money. This hasn't happened because UK
manufacturers for the most part have been interested in one thing only,
profit. (And usually short term profit- hence the sort of failure to
invest which lead to the death of the British motorcycle industry).
What's more when profit is the only motive no real consideration is
given to how a company might be able to better serve the customer or
society as a whole.
>
> Would you have bought that Mac if it cost thrice as much? Would Apple
> have even sold it if the market were as small as it would be for a
> trebly-expensive computer?
>
Why should it cost three times as much? Given component costs,
automated assembly and so on the cost would probably have been less
than another hundred pounds and yes I would have been willing to pay
such a realistic premium. My last Mac was assembled in Ireland and it
certainly didn't cost 3x the price of my current one.
Unfortunately I think consumers have played into the hands of the
corporations by always looking to the price and not thinking about the
wider picture. The same can be said of the failure to look at other
ethical issues associated with manufacture such as the methods used in
factory farming, the impact production and use has on the environment
and so on. It seems that the selfish society is self-propagating and
people which is why people not only choose huge dangerous and polluting
4x4's they no longer really care if their purchasing decisions put
other out of work.
Yes, that work might be created elsewhere but the answer to that is for
companies to develop products aimed at the market the item was produced
in. I would think there are many electrical products that could be
produced in China that would be more accessible to Chinese buyers than
£1000 computers destined for the west.
For a good example of the folly of letting price drive the market
consider the UK bike manufacturing industry. This is all but dead now
due to manufacturers moving production overseas and the import of
products from India, Vietnam and so on. Those Indian companies could
have developed products ideally suited to the home market but instead
produce millions of these £60 'mountain bikes' for western companies
which you see everywhere. I totally fail to see how this reduction in
prices for bikes has benefited anyone other than the importers. The
bikes are bad beyond belief, unreliable, heavy and almost guaranteed to
convince them that cycling is both impractical and hard work. In fact I
would argue that the failure to develop a 'better bike' and to instead
concentrate solely on price has helped to ensure the decline of cycling
in the UK. The fixation on price has also led the man in the street to
see the bicycle as being a low-cost, low value item in every way.
(Tales abound in the bike trade of punters who go into shops and demand
to buy the cheapest bike in the shop, totally resisting any suggestions
that spending another £100 or even £50 would be a good investment.
The shop owner then helps the customer to take the bike outside only to
see them load the bike into a £30,000 Land Rover...).
What was needed was for the importers and manufacturers to focus more
on quality, practicality and so on. Ok this might have been a harder
sell than just selling on price but if they had done the Uk bike
industry would still be booming. Look at countries such as Germany
where quality has always being a selling point for bicycles and look
at the quality items they produce- and produce in Germany (Rolholff,
Schmidt, etc etc).
Even with a quality-orientated outlook is is still possible to
manufacture truly quality bikes at very realistic prices. OK so you
might have to spend 3 times the cost of some fully-suspended MTB
look-alike monstrosity from Vietnam but the customer would still be
getting better value for money. This hasn't happened because UK
manufacturers for the most part have been interested in one thing only,
profit. (And usually short term profit- hence the sort of failure to
invest which lead to the death of the British motorcycle industry).
What's more when profit is the only motive no real consideration is
given to how a company might be able to better serve the customer or
society as a whole.