It’s expensive being Australian
Posted: June 19th, 2010 | Author: wade | Filed under: Gear, Technology | Tags: Australia | 1 Comment »
Australian photographers are getting ripped off by global manufacturers who set dramatically different prices for different regions. In many cases we’re paying through the nose relative to our American friends for the very same goods and services and I would like to know why.
For instance Adobe Photoshop CS5 is thirty per cent more expensive if you buy it from adobe.com.au than it is through adobe.com, the US site.
And a Canon 1D Mark IV is well over $1,000 cheaper in the United States right now than it is here.
These are just two examples but if you’re a photographer in Australia you’ll know of plenty more.
Multi-national companies like these will tell you that they are in fact individual businesses in each of the countries they operate in, and that they set their prices in response to “local market conditions” and “individual circumstances”.
Well I for one do not think the corporate structure of a particular vendor should be something I need to account for in my purchasing decisions. Couldn’t Adobe set a global pricing standard where the only variation would be as minor as that caused by the currency exchange? The Apple App Store can manage it, and so can small to medium sized software developers the world over. Look at OmniGroup or Panic Software for instance.
The madness of this disparity is such that at various points in recent history a photographer setting themselves up for business in this country could, for argument’s sake, fly to New York, buy a couple of cameras and half a dozen lenses, spend a few days sight-seeing, then fly home and still have change when compared to the Australian RRP for the very same equipment. The United States is infact a perfect place to shop because there are so many high volume camera resalers that put huge pressure on prices to our collective benefit.
A Canon executive once tried to pacify me with that same old line about “business structures” and “market forces”, topping if off with the threat that a US-bought camera wouldn’t entitle you to local warranty or membership of the Canon Professional Services programme.
Well given that it’s often been the case that the price of one pro-camera body in Australia could buy you two of the same in New York, I’d be happy to console myself in the knowledge that if the worst did befall me, I could buy a brand new one to replace it and still be no worse off.
I often find I can import a lens from Hong Kong for a considerable saving. I think that Canon lenses are covered by a worldwide warranty, while bodies aren’t. I don’t have an explanation for that, though.