It is still based on the price that the market will stand, wherever
it is Simon, Belgium or USA.
For instance, in Belgium (and the Netherlands and Scandinavia) the
tax on cars is much higher than in the UK. To keep prices at a
market level in those countries, the importers set the pre-tax price
lower than the pre-tax price in the UK. Before the EU allowed
(forced) it to happen, buying cars at tax-free prices in Belgium and
the Netherlands was very difficult because the importers (car makers
generally). Even in 1999, the Ford garage in Roermond, NL, would not
quote my wife for a right-hand drive Ford Ka. In the event she
bought a VW Beetle, LHD, from another garage in Roermond. Now that
the EU has forced the car makers to provide any spec of car to any
garage in the EU, the differences in tax levels (NL now has a VAT of
19%, presumably to pay for its very expensive social welfare
payments) expose the continuing problems.
Now our friends in the USA will not pay the sort of prices that we
do, partly because sales taxes are lower, partly because they can get
stuff made (I assume) in other parts of NAFTA. If these factors do
not apply, the lower prices in the USA are supported, at least in
part I suspect, by higher prices elsewhere in the world. I am sure
that the UK's prices play a large part in that. Remember also that
the USA is a huge market and economies of scale (and scope some might
argue) will allow lower prices there.
For the OM prices, since they are entirely artificial (there is no
development cost to take into account is there?) they will set the
prices that they think the market will stand for "luxury items". The
only logic to the differences is the pricing strategy that Olympus
decides on... nothing else matters for this sort of product. I
cannot explain Ian Nicholls' experience in Cyprus - perhaps the
Greeks have a special deal with Olympus Germany - but since the
sudden increase in British prices in the late 1980s, we have paid
through the nose for OM gear.
I cannot speak for bike prices... my wife won't let me look at
another bike even though I could have had remarkably low tax-free
prices when I worked for NATO.
Cheer up Simon, at least you're not a livestock farmer somewhere in
the EU. Speaking of which, why are we in the EU?
Chris
We're still paying over the odds for cars etc, and everyone knows it. It's
just that no-one with any clout wants to do anything about it. It was the
same with motorbikes, and when Triumph's Daytona 955 (made in England) came
out a few years ago it was cheaper to buy a bike re-imported from Belgium -
after it had been exported there - than in the country of manufacture.
Bloody ludicrous. When the 'grey' dealers started charging 1,500-2000 quid
less than official list, the importers went on the offensive: "inferior
spec", "may not be safe for British roads". What absolute bullsh*t! It
brought the prices down in the end, but it was a struggle, with threats of
legal action.
I might write to Olympus UK about their ridiculous prices (as if they care).
Perhaps I'll threaten the suggestion someone made - to import new OM gear
and sell it on... nah, can't see me making a living out of that. New OM gear
is priced so high in the UK now that _very_ few consumers will pay for it,
I'm sure.
Simon E.
--
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Chris Barker
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