No what I mean is that Apple pays import duties to bring the computer into the EU from its point of manufacture. This further increases the cost compared with the US or a duty-free zone like Hong Kong. 30% overall increase of price is what I would expect for import duties + VAT, so Apple isn’t overcharging here.
I suspect that's excluding VAT, which would add 25% where I am, making it a $1000 laptop. I understand Apple isn't responsible for VAT, but I still need to pay it. Still it's hitting the price point I think it should be at, it's just not really an offer that's available to me.
Yes, I just checked their example for the MacBook Pro, $1299 in the US, £1249 in the UK which is $1500, the extra is accounted for by 20% VAT which vendors must include in their prices in the UK.
However if I compare prices to the beginning of the year they are about 25% higher, an obvious affect of the currency movements.
Apple doesn't pay the VAT the consumer does. That is why Apple products costs roughly 30% (24% VAT + some extra due to fucking up the dollar to euro conversion) more in Finland when compared to US even though they ship directly from a factory in China.
If Apple thought they could charge more they would be already doing it, based on their considerable margins. If this makes you understand Brexit I doubt you really understand Brexit.
Agreed. I’m just pointing out that the price that Apple charged and the underlying price of the components is poorly correlated. Apple will charge what you’ll pay, not what it costs to produce.
> Still Apple prices in the EU are the same everywhere just as in the US, i always wondered how they manage to accomplish that
If I had to guess I would say near zero margins and fixed payments for each store with display areas meeting display requirements for design, size, placement in store, network connectivity, device set up, trained demonstrator availability, product ranging and possibly even store location. The rest would come from accessory sales. You can get away with a lot of terms when customers come into shops looking for an iPad or Macbook rather than just a tablet or a computer. I imagine there may be minimum sales numbers to get the fixed payments but that the profit would come from the fixed payments and the accessories rather than any margin on the devices themselves.
I was saying the opposite.. apple could charge even more imo but then leave the hardware free like others do , if you solder everything, firmware lock everything , sell upgrades at 5x the price (and compare the price of the baseline to say.. wow it's cheap ) then apply a tax on all software, now when we compare prices we should account for that also
That doesn't change the fact Apple chooses to have the customers pay for it to maintain its own margin. It is not wrong, but it does make it expensive.
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