Apple is misundertanding the "pro" market

[Riccardo Cagnasso]

I'm baffled by the pricing on the new macpro. 

The thing itself seems fine. Well at least usable from a professional perspective.

 

But the price? It seems like Apple is looking at the professional market like a kid entering

into an office and thinking "ooh these people have all the money they want".

 

That's just so stupid and a gross misunderstanding. In the professional market, every penny counts.

It's literally your job (or the job of the purchasing office) to save money and keep the costs down.

Yes, you can happily spend an unholy amount of money on professional equipment if there's no real alternative

because you will move the cost on the client. But if there's a significantly cheaper yet valid alternative, you are

practically forced to switch, because otherwise, you will lose competitivity and be pushed out of the market.

While the private user might have his own ideas, linkings, fetishes etc, in the professional market there's a clear

path on (ultimately economical) optimization that no one can escape least they fail miserably.
There's a reason if basically everyone switched to digital mixers even if every single sound technician swears that

the old analog ones sound and work a million times better.

 

Apple is acting like they think "pfft, these are the suckers that spend 100k on a camera and 50K on a video mixer, so let's

charge them double on the computers because lol". It's incredible that such an enormous company, with entire buildings 

full of people that should devise marketing strategies, operate on such a idiotic level.

[Fasauceome]

3 minutes ago, Riccardo Cagnasso said:

Apple is acting like they think "pfft, these are the suckers that spend 100k on a camera and 50K on a video mixer, so let's

charge them double on the computers because lol".

I mean, you hit the nail on the head. They're not acting stupidly, they're charging up the ass because they can get away with it. There's a sucker born every minute, seen those $1000 stands for their new monitor?

[Drak3]

6 minutes ago, Riccardo Cagnasso said:

But the price? It seems like Apple is looking at the professional market like a kid entering

into an office and thinking "ooh these people have all the money they want".

No, Apple is pricing accordingly for the features they carry. It's not out of line with Dell or HP alternatives. This is a market where the last 10% is 90% of the cost and the customer is willing to pay for that last 10%.

[star_pilot475]

I get where Apple is coming from, but I also understand why people are not happy about their prices too. I’m kinda neutral when it comes to this. I get that Apple is being a little greedy, but also it kinda makes sense for something with those ridiculous specs to cost that much.

[Riccardo Cagnasso]

1 minute ago, fasauceome said:

I mean, you hit the nail on the head. They're not acting stupidly, they're charging up the ass because they can get away with it. There's a sucker born every minute, seen those $1000 stands for their new monitor?

Ok sure, you are taking money from a single sucker, but you lose another client in the process. You lose the whole market like this.

Any sufficient big company has a person or a whole office that has the job of evaluating if what you buy is worth the money and what are the alternatives. You can use the "I will separate you from your money" approach with hipster and fanboys, but not in the pro market.

[jdubya421]

This again. There is a whole nother thread dedicated to this and people still just don't understand. I am one of those "pros" that uses computers like this. The computer on my desk cost upward of 40k and has nearly 1TB of RAM. I actually need those kind of resources to do my job. There is a market of people/companies who buy computers like this. If you go to Dell's website and spec a similar computer it actually costs more. The RAM options on the 40-60k computers cost ~40k alone. The pro market that this is aimed for is far far above what Linus' audience is. 

 

Edit: I will fully concede about the monitor stand - I can't find a way to defend that. 

[Radium_Angel]

6 minutes ago, Riccardo Cagnasso said:

idiotic level

There is an ancient saying:

 

"Who is the bigger idiot? The idiot, or the idiot that follows him?"

The MP is a status symbol, like a Bentley or Rolls Royce. It's a sign that "by god kid, you've made it to the big leagues!" and don't forget the "halo effect" that used systems will go up in price, because of the insane prices of these new ones, so it's another way to shore up prices on older systems.

 

Think about it this way: If Apple charges 1k$ *now* for a stand...what's next year's model going to cost? You can't drop the price, you'll piss off all those who got ripped off...I mean paid...for the current one....so it can only go up.

[Drak3]

2 minutes ago, Radium_Angel said:

The MP is a status symbol, like a Bentley or Rolls Royce.

Not really. It's actually one OF TWO that isn't.

[Fasauceome]

7 minutes ago, Riccardo Cagnasso said:

You can use the "I will separate you from your money" approach with hipster and fanboys, but not in the pro market.

What do you think the MacBook pro with the i9 was? The new iMac pro? All of their pro products have this mentality, because high end products come at a premium and apple customers understand that. Built an iMac killer for a client at half the price of their desired model and even better performance, that's just the way apple stuff rolls.

Edited June 12, 2019 by fasauceome

[Riccardo Cagnasso]

24 minutes ago, jdubya421 said:

This again. There is a whole nother thread dedicated to this and people still just don't understand. I am one of those "pros" that uses computers like this. The computer on my desk cost upward of 40k and has nearly 1TB of RAM. I actually need those kind of resources to do my job. There is a market of people/companies who buy computers like this. If you go to Dell's website and spec a similar computer it actually costs more. The RAM options on the 40-60k computers cost ~40k alone. The pro market that this is aimed for is far far above what Linus' audience is. 

 

Edit: I will fully concede about the monitor stand - I can't find a way to defend that. 

Yeah, some people needs 1TB of ram. And some people need a toughbook. Of course. But Apple is not the only producer of uber-level workstation. And their pricing is far off.

And yes, if you go to lenovo or dell site, you might find similar pricing. But if you go to the site of you actual supplier, you will see a 30% off on these. Not on apple ones.

[Princess Luna]

Why are people mad at Apple's pricing? did they secretly wished they could have their products but it's too pricey for them so QQ is the way to go?

 

If you disagree with the product pricing or have valid alternatives in the market that offers better value then just go with those and ignore Apple... Constantly QQ that Apple is too expensive just for the sake of complaining about something you're not even buying makes NO SENSE.

[jdubya421]

4 minutes ago, Riccardo Cagnasso said:

And yes, if you go to lenovo or dell site, you might find similar pricing. But if you go to the site of you actual supplier, you will see a 30% off on these. Not on apple ones.

Their pricing isn't far off you are just comparing it to gaming and pro-sumer level hardware. High density RAM modules are EXPENSIVE. Buying from a vendor also includes support, which for an enterprise level company is paramount. Some people at my job actually do have custom Newegg built machines and they work, but most of us don't. You pay a fee to receive a warranty, customer support, and something pre-built that works. Most companies also have contracts that let them buy these very expensive machines at a discount. 

 

Another edit: I will agree that Apple is up-charging you on the LOW END. I semi-agree with what Linus said, but I think its less nefarious. To not up-charge the high end they up-charged the low end, simple as that. 

[harryk]

44 minutes ago, Riccardo Cagnasso said:

But if there's a significantly cheaper yet valid alternative, you are

practically forced to switch, because otherwise, you will lose competitivity and be pushed out of the market.

There aren't really cheaper alternatives. Especially if you prefer or require Mac OS for your work. You're not just buying a CPU, memory etc. you're buying a complete computing experience. The better that works for you to more its worth. Personally I use Windows, Ubuntu, and Mac on a daily basis. If I could I would do everything in Mac OS because I just find it better. 

55 minutes ago, Riccardo Cagnasso said:

It's incredible that such an enormous company, with entire buildings 

full of people that should devise marketing strategies, operate on such a idiotic level.

Yes because all those people Apple hired are have clearly showed insufficient ability to determine pricing and optimize sales based on Apple's history of massive revenue and profits.

13 minutes ago, Riccardo Cagnasso said:

And yes, if you go to lenovo or dell site, you might find similar pricing. But if you go to the site of you actual supplier, you will see a 30% off on these. Not on apple ones.

Who do you think the "actual supplier" is? Real businesses buy from OEM's that provide a fully tested and working system with on-call tech support and good warranties all of which adds to the cost.

 

 

[Riccardo Cagnasso]

 

 

 

2

21 minutes ago, jdubya421 said:

Their pricing isn't far off you are just comparing it to gaming and pro-sumer level hardware. High density RAM modules are EXPENSIVE. Buying from a vendor also includes support, which for an enterprise level company is paramount. Some people at my job actually do have custom Newegg built machines and they work, but most of us don't. You pay a fee to receive a warranty, customer support, and something pre-built that works. Most companies also have contracts that let them buy these very expensive machines at a discount. 

 

Another edit: I will agree that Apple is up-charging you on the LOW END. I semi-agree with what Linus said, but I think its less nefarious. To not up-charge the high end they up-charged the low end, simple as that. 

You shouldn't compare Apple prices with other manufacturers from the website. Companies will buy from wholesale suppliers which offer a discount compare to retail. This discount is usually slim to none on parts, decent on normal machines and huge on workstations. There are reasons for that that I won't run into. Couple of years ago a bought 12 leonovo workstation with a whopping 40% discount on the price tag. 

Apple won't do any of this, so you can't compare the prices directly.

 

 

 

1 minute ago, harryk said:

 

Who do you think the "actual supplier" is? Real businesses buy from OEM's that provide a fully tested and working system with on-call tech support and good warranties all of which adds to the cost.

 

 

See above.

[WkdPaul]

22 minutes ago, jdubya421 said:

Their pricing isn't far off you are just comparing it to gaming and pro-sumer level hardware. High density RAM modules are EXPENSIVE. Buying from a vendor also includes support, which for an enterprise level company is paramount. Some people at my job actually do have custom Newegg built machines and they work, but most of us don't. You pay a fee to receive a warranty, customer support, and something pre-built that works. Most companies also have contracts that let them buy these very expensive machines at a discount. 

 

Another edit: I will agree that Apple is up-charging you on the LOW END. I semi-agree with what Linus said, but I think its less nefarious. To not up-charge the high end they up-charged the low end, simple as that. 

I would be interested to learn about Apple support for business customers, here we mostly deal with IBM, Dell, Cisco and Fortinet, and would get a tech dispatched even for laptop repairs (had a CPU fan replaced not even a month ago on a business Dell laptop, under warranty of course). I'm just curious if Apple does the same thing.

[harryk]

4 minutes ago, Riccardo Cagnasso said:

 You shouldn't compare Apple prices with other manufacturers from the website. Companies will buy from wholesale suppliers which offer a discount compare to retail. This discount is usually slim to none on parts, decent on normal machines and huge on workstations. There are reasons for that that I won't run into. Couple of years ago a bought 12 leonovo workstation with a whopping 40% discount on the price tag. 

Apple won't do any of this, so you can't compare the prices directly.

See above.

Apple does provide corporate discounts. I know if you're buying one computer its not much, but I wouldn't be at all surprised to see a steeper discount if you were buying a hundred.

 

4 minutes ago, wkdpaul said:

I would be interested to learn about Apple support for business customers, here we mostly deal with IBM, Dell, Cisco and Fortinet, and would get a tech dispatched even for laptop repairs (had a CPU fan replaced not even a month ago on a business Dell laptop, under warranty of course). I'm just curious if Apple does the same thing.

This is something I am curious about as well. I do remember after buying my Mac Pro years ago I was automatically tagged as a "Pro" customer with my Apple ID. I learned this after a couple phone calls to Apple support regarding some software issues. I don't know exactly what this "Pro" status grants me but it was interesting to find out they do make a distinction. Separately, I recall hearing stories about some "Pros" receiving same day shipping on replacement machines when they suffered hardware issues which required repair.

[Mira Yurizaki]

1 minute ago, harryk said:

This is something I am curious about as well. I do remember after buying my Mac Pro years ago I was automatically tagged as a "Pro" customer with my Apple ID. I learned this after a couple phone calls to Apple support regarding some software issues. I don't know exactly what this "Pro" status grants me but it was interesting to find out they do make a distinction. Separately, I recall hearing stories about some "Pros" receiving same day shipping on replacement machines when they suffered hardware issues which required repair.

That's probably what it is. You get better treatment when it comes to support. It's like a lot of other "premium" products or services I've seen.

 

Maybe another way to look at it is companies who buy this stuff see it as insurance. Sure it may suck paying the extra money but when poop hits the fan, they'll be glad to have it because it means minimal downtime.

[Riccardo Cagnasso]

3 minutes ago, harryk said:

Apple does provide corporate discounts. I know if you're buying one computer its not much, but I wouldn't be at all surprised to see a steeper discount if you were buying a hundred.

Negligible for what I can tell. I've no idea what happens if you buy a hundred. But I wonder who actually buys high level workstations by the hundreds.

[harryk]

6 minutes ago, Riccardo Cagnasso said:

Negligible for what I can tell. I've no idea what happens if you buy a hundred. But I wonder who actually buys high level workstations by the hundreds.

Fortune 500 companies

[WkdPaul]

10 minutes ago, Riccardo Cagnasso said:

Negligible for what I can tell. I've no idea what happens if you buy a hundred. But I wonder who actually buys high level workstations by the hundreds.

Big companies that do commercial prints for exemple, my cousin is working for a big print company in my province (they deal with calendars, books, pamphlets, magazines, etc... only thing they don't do is news papers, business cards and other small things like that). She manages ONE team of 10 designers (can't remember what they are in charge of but I think she mentioned calendars and school agendas), when they renew machines, it's often by batches of a dozen or more.

 

Though they have inside support, so I'm not sure how they deal with Apple when it comes with warranty support, she told me their IT switch the whole machine with a "loaner" when a catastrophic failure happens and IT takes care of getting it fixed.

Edited June 12, 2019 by wkdpaul

[jdubya421]

3 minutes ago, harryk said:

Fortune 500 companies

This. Fuck. My company isn't a fortune 500 company (although we generate billions of dollars of revenue) and we buy computers by the hundreds. This is the target audience for computers like this. 

[Mira Yurizaki]

11 minutes ago, Riccardo Cagnasso said:

Negligible for what I can tell. I've no idea what happens if you buy a hundred. But I wonder who actually buys high level workstations by the hundreds.

Considering my main work computer is a 6C/12T Xeon with whatever the Quadro equivalent is of a GTX 680, and every engineer has one...

[jdubya421]

2 minutes ago, Mira Yurizaki said:

Considering my main work computer is a 6C/12T Xeon with whatever the Quadro equivalent is of a GTX 680, and every engineer has one...

Exactly, I am an electrical engineer. All the engineers at my company have computers with "insane" specs and sometimes they are still slow at what the tasks we do. 

[WkdPaul]

1 hour ago, Riccardo Cagnasso said:

I'm baffled by the pricing on the new macpro. 

BTW, just thought of that, but there are quite a lot of other equipment in the enterprise market that are quite pricey (obviously, Apple is closer to the consumer market than the enterprise market, but they obviously have enterprise equipment they are also trying to sell).

 

Just look at enterprise level network solutions (for exemple, a managed LTE modem), some of that stuff sell for 2-3k. Even if it's 'just an LTE modem', it doesn't mean it overpriced!! There are markets for these things and reasons they are priced that way. Same goes for the new MacPro. At that price, it's obviously not meant for the retail market even if it's available for the regular Joe!

[Riccardo Cagnasso]

31 minutes ago, Mira Yurizaki said:

Considering my main work computer is a 6C/12T Xeon with whatever the Quadro equivalent is of a GTX 680, and every engineer has one...

That's what is sitting under my desk also. But that's not a "uber pro". It's a medium range workstation. 2000$ after discount? Depend on the vido card.
Quite different from 5000$. Also tens is quite different from houndreds. Not many companies have hundreds of engineers I reckon.