“Apple will undoubtedly announce the availability and pricing of the new Apple Watch line at its media event next Monday (10 AM PDT),” J. M. Manness writes for Seeking Alpha.
“There has been a lot of speculation particularly on the Edition collection issue. Jim Suva with Citigroup sees a starting price of $950, Piper Jaffray’s Gene Munster sees $4,999, John Gruber of Daring Fireball writes: ‘I now think Edition models will start around $10,000,'” Manness writes. “That is quite a range. Of course, all realize that actual selling prices will depend on the band one chooses, and this will be particularly so for the Edition collection. So here we are referring to the base watch price, with the cheapest band available.”
“Gruber thinks the starting price will be $10,000. His argument is that this is what solid gold, luxury watches start at – which brings me to my point #3 – the Edition is not a true luxury watch,” Manness writes. “The internals of the Apple Watch Edition is no different from that in the Sport model. Here is something that will continue to differentiate what I call the true luxury watch from the Apple Watch Edition. Clearly Apple recognizes this. It is all right with them. But we also need to recognize this. That said, I think Apple is going to stick with its typical mark up.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Your guess is as good as ours. Under six days to go!
Related articles:
Apple Watch pricing predicted – March 2, 2015
Don’t focus on Apple Watch Edition pricing – February 25, 2015
Gruber: Apple Watch Edition will cost $10,000-$20,000 – February 20, 2015
This article gives the best analysis out there. Still a speculation, but at least with good reasoning!
That $10,000 price range is exaggerated and flawed; it is as flawed as the pricing of the Newton at the time. I believe Apple has learned from that mistake. I think $10,000 for the gold edition with the cheapest band or without it is just unrealistic, even if there’s some people out there that could buy it at that price; I would think that Apple is interested in selling many of these watches and would use the amount of gold that would not sky rocket the price of it.
The $5,000 range is still expensive for me but it’s a lot more moderate and accessible price for many more people; I could even pay for it if I wanted to without breaking my arm or my bank, but $10,000 is a deal breaker.
I think it will be $10K or more, for the simple reason that there are people who would gladly pay that, and actually *want* the price to be high.
Right now, the super rich, no matter how much money and power they have, can’t own a phone that’s any better than what you or I have. And that’s irksome. That’s not normal for them. They have a house we could never have, drive a car we could never have, etc. etc. etc. Except for the phone.
Now there will be a watch that only the “elite” can own, and so they can finally feel “special” just like they do with so many other things. For them, the higher the price the better, as it makes that club all that more elite.
The average iPhone owner is already somewhat better off than average, and there are hundreds of millions of those. And to the top 0.5% of them, a high price is still chump change. Some of them will get the Watch and some won’t, but for the ones who don’t, it won’t be because the price was too high.
For the rest of us, we carry on as if the Edition didn’t exist. We’ll choose either of the other two models. A crazy price on the gold one doesn’t matter at all.
Wow, that’s a pretty clear-thinking, well-thought-out point of view, Sharon. Good thinking.
Thanks 🙂
For the people who won’t buy the gold one, $3,000 or $10,000 doesn’t matter, they wouldn’t buy it anyway.
For the people who will buy one, $3,000 or $10,000 doesn’t matter, they’ll buy it anyway.
So the only group for which the price matters is that of the internet pundits, and attempting to please them is pointless.
I think the reason we expect the gold Edition watch to be so expensive is for two reasons. It has an 18k solid gold (not plated) casing, and Apple hired a bunch of fashionistas to market them.
Here’s where Apple wants to crush the opposition and doesn’t have to stick with the premium product pricing strategy.
My forecast:
with basic band, Sport: $349
with basic leather band: AppleWatch (stainless steel) $549
with basic leather band: Edition: $4999
That sounds like the most reasonable starting price so far. Let’s hope you’re right.
They’re going to (continue to) flex their economy of scale.
Edition: $1,795.
The pricing of the Edition is not really dependent upon economy of scale but more so the price of gold. Apple will price the Edition at fairly high margin to have a buffer against the fluctuating price of gold.
we really don’t know for sure if the internals will be the same in all watches. we also don’t know if apple will provide a way to swap out the internals as new versions are introduced. actually we really don’t know much of anything except $349 for some version of the sport.
Predictions…? OK 🙂
Sport – $300. “Pick your band” starting at $49. So, “starting at” price is $349. Fancier bands optional.
Stainless Steel – $1000 with the most expensive bands that are NOT gold. Less with other band choices.
Gold (larger) – $10,000 with the gold band. Much less with other band choices; I won’t guess how much.
Gold (smaller) – 20% less than larger version.
My other prediction is that for the Apple Watch, Apple will not use pricing that ends with “99.” Beyond the Sport version, the intended customers will think “$9999” (or whatever-99) is stupid. If they can afford it, they want to buy the “$10,000 Apple Watch.”
I HATE MACDAILYNEWS SITE FORCING TO OPEN DIE APP STORE EVERY SINGLE TIME!!!!
Beat the advertisers at their own game. If you’re auto redirected to an app thats free, download it and give it a one star review and delete it. Star reviews drive the app store.
I do the same thing with “rate this app” popups as well.
Nice to see that MDN publishers still do absolutely nothing about these App Store pop-ups.
$10,000 for a tiny square watch with the thinnest gold plating imaginable! Is this a joke coming from complete idiots? Buy the cheap model, have a tech savy person take it apart, get it gold plated, put it back together, and save oh… $8500! Oh wait, gotta have the sapphire screen, that’s where the extra $8500 comes in, Totally worth it. All the morons who would pay $10,000, your going to get what you deserve, it’s called robbed, and probably beat down in the process, if not worse, then you’ll start using your head for the first time ever, if you still can, and buy the cheap model, if it’s even cheap (coming from apple) and buy one of the hundreds of tiny little cases that are coming for these, and a screen protector. Idiots. I hope this stupid over priced watch not only fails, but I hope apple sticks to what they do best, somehow brick the functionality of their own device via a software “upgrade” in less than. Year, than never fix it.
These prices are ridiculous. The tech on this watch is out of date almost as soon as it is released. In a years time it will be virtually ancient. Anyone flashing thousands of dollars for a something that will be outdated so soon is crazy. Better spend the money on a traditional watch like Rolex or Breitling and buy the base version if you really must have a naff watch to pair with your iPhone.
It’s not gold plated. But then you already knew that.
Paraphrasing Gruber: Be prepared for the tech world to have the biggest flipout EVER when the prices are announced.
Looks like it’s already started.
Only suckers will buy the expensive ones. And there are plenty out there.
I just can’t see spending $350 for a watch. That’s $50 short of the cost of my 64 gigabyte iPhone 6. Ludicrous!
If I were to buy a smart-watch, I’d buy a Pebble Time.
Sure, I’ve read that the Pebble has connection issues, but the Time might be different, and preferable at $150 less than the Watch.
Your iPhone 6 actually costs about $750.