Apple iPad clearly a failure in the UK—it’s already sold out
The media had a field day when UK iPad preordering arrived. The low-end iPad came in at a wallet-busting £429, way more than the US price of $499 after a swift currency conversion. What nasty people Apple are, yelled lots of people, ripping off anyone outside the US. All true, unless you take into account triffling little matters like VAT (added by default to UK prices, but not to US ones, since taxes there vary by state), after which point the UK’s being ‘ripped off’ to the tune of $13–$41, depending on the iPad model you buy.
Still, said analysts, the device will be a failure! It’ll be a niche product, they yelled, utterly failing to explain why if this was the case everyone and his dog’s announcing they’ll have an ‘iPad killer’ out at some random date in the future that, for some reason, they can’t confirm just yet, because, presumably, all iPad killers currently amount to CEOs having written ‘Get proles to make an iPad killer’ in biro on a to-do list.
Whether the iPad becomes a success in the UK remains to be seen, but one thing’s for sure: the ‘high price’ clearly hasn’t put that many people off. Already, the shipping date for new orders has shifted to June 7, meaning the initial batch has sold out.
My advice? If you don’t have £429 (or more) to spare, avoid the iPad at all costs. You might not think you want one, but you sure as hell will once you start playing with one.
Crashing pound is driving that disparity up further. I saved $53 getting my 64Gb Wifi model in the US, after taxes are factored in, or about 7% of purchase price.
You have to consider that Apple tends to fix prices for 6-12 months and that the pound is at a five year low against the dollar; if it recovers even a little the disparity will become quite large.