AMEX vs. Amazon; Macs vs. netbooks
Here's a tale of two demographics.
If you list the five bestsellers in Amazon's "Computers and PC Hardware" category today, you get five netbooks — three ASUS Eees and two ACER Aspire Ones. That's been the story pretty much all year.
If you list the five most popular items in "Computers and Software" on American Express's shopAmex site, you get four Apple (AAPL) products — three MacBooks, one Apple TV and one Sony (SNE) Blu-Ray player.
The first non Apple computer on the AMEX site is No. 17, a Dell (DELL) Inspiron. The first Apple on the Amazon list is No. 14, a white MacBook.
Why the difference? The Amazon site is open to everyone and tends to attract bargain hunters. The AMEX site is open only to card members, and although it advertises 30% discounts, it's attracting a different sort of clientele — one that doesn't seem to be put off by Apple's premium pricing.
Here are those lists:
Phil,
Don't pay that guy any attention. Because he doesn’t know how Amazon maintains its lists, that makes you a “liar” (!?!?). It's folks like Tony who give Apple aficionados a bad name.
Anyway, I wanted to say that this is one of the most telling comparisons I've seen with respect to the markets which PC's and Macs occupy and, more importantly, seek out. The problem this illustrates for PC's is this: where are the premium PC's, the ones which have high ASP's and help sustain profitability? No where to be seen.
My advice to Microsoft and their cohorts: if you feel you can continue to live off the razor-thin margins generated by hordes of netbook sales, just keep on emphasizing price as your primary differentiator. Good luck with that.
Want to check that the Apple Macbook #10 on Amazon's list, go here: http://www.amazon.com/gp/bestsellers/pc/ref=pd_ts_pc_nav
NO NO NO NO… uhhh, the first Apple notebook is listed as #10, TEN NOT #17 as your article suggests. That's QUITE a misrepresentation!!!! Get it together will you, you PC people will stop at nothing short of lying about the facts of Apple products.
ex ped: You are pretty quick to call a stranger a liar, Tony.
FYI, those lists on Amazon are updated every hour. The MacBook was No. 14 (not 17, as you have it) when I took my snapshot. It is indeed No. 10 as I write this note.
I don't understand why the netbooks are always included in the PC category, but the iPod Touch/iPhone isn't.
The iPod touch/iPhone uses the same Darwin base OS that the mac uses, even an Agua interface, and developer tools.
For me, the ipod is my netbook, and the fact that it is fits easy in my pocket I have it with me all the time. Unlike the so called netbook that has an equal amount of compute power.
I did Amazon selecting Laptops (no netbooks in here now). Here 4 of top 10 are MacBooks ranging $894-1849. The rest are HP Pavilions and Toshiba Satellites at $639-699.
BUT what I find really interesting in this article is how popular (in AMEX site) is the Apple TV! This is a real surprise that it is number 5!