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Prices are crashing down

dave92029

New member
At B&H After $460 off,

Sony A7 Body – $1,238.00
Sony A7R Body – $1,838.00
Sony A7 with 28-70mm lens kit – $1,538.00

This must mean that a replacement is about to be released and Sony wants to blow out all remaining inventory on this five (?) month old camera?

I feel a like I was overcharged, and I haven't even needed to pay my credit card bill on my A7 yet!

Never purchased a "new" product and felt like I was overcharged so quickly.

Can I return my A7 with 1200 activations?
 

iiiNelson

Well-known member
There's supposed to be a high end "pro" FE model that is released later this year. It's still a rumor for now though. I think the cameras are priced perfectly but these deals makes them more attractive to those who were looking to high end cropped mirrorless sensors.
 

Jorgen Udvang

Subscriber Member
This probably means that Sony didn't sell as many as they expected. The bean counters have targets to reach, and don't believe in waiting for the cash to appear, particularly not in a cut-throat electronics market, so they do whatever is necessary to reduce stock. This is the way Sony and other electronics companies operate and those who want to be their customers better get used to it.

I bought my Panasonic GH3 8 months after it was launched, almost 40% under the original price. Same kind of company, same kind of product, same principle.
 

ryc

Member
Employees were offered the A7's, lenses and accessories at 50% off. I had a friend who helped me out. A7 kit with the zoom lens cost me 1000.00. 55mm 1.8 was 499.00 and the 35 was 399.00. I am sure they are still making money even after the employee prices. If they can offer this deal to employees they should just offer these prices to the general public and obliterate the competition. Sony would shoot to the top, get everyone hooked then they can jack up their prices.
 

Annna T

Active member
Employees were offered the A7's, lenses and accessories at 50% off. I had a friend who helped me out. A7 kit with the zoom lens cost me 1000.00. 55mm 1.8 was 499.00 and the 35 was 399.00. I am sure they are still making money even after the employee prices. If they can offer this deal to employees they should just offer these prices to the general public and obliterate the competition. Sony would shoot to the top, get everyone hooked then they can jack up their prices.
Or they are targeting "market leaders" : if one employee is happy with the camera, he can help selling many more. So selling one with a loss, or without the expected profit margin may end up being profitable if it brings more Sony customers.
 

philip_pj

New member
Sony are no doubt very keen to put the cameras in front of potential buyers, and they no doubt believe the products are good ones. However, particularly in respect of the a7r there has been quite a volume (putting it mildly) of contentious opinion disseminated on the web.

The makers are in a better position to know but it seems likely that such opinion may affect sales of such products - this matter not being restricted to Sony, of course...marketing managers must be a tough bunch generally. Price reductions are one way around the issue to some extent, so it may be a sound marketing move by them. They have a long term interest in a wide adoption of the FE 'system' in this early development stage, as do (happy) users.

For users with an interest in image quality as a higher priority than satisfying their particular idiosyncratic ergonomic preferences, a comparison with their current camera's output would (you would think) play well for Sony. I see this message repeated again and again in forums.

If you look at a breakdown of the (well-engineered) a7/r bodies, there is not a lot in there compared with the large volume of 'wrapping' in a typical DSLR, and what is there is mostly electronic components which benefit from volume production to a much greater degree.

Sony are of course chasing the DSLR segment of the market, not just mirrorless. Feedback from B&H sales and the promo there will provide valuable pricing data - where is the sweet spot and how price-sensitive are buyers? What is the optimum trade-off point between price and volume? These are brand new and very different products, a true niche product right now, not much is known about these issues.

I am pretty happy to pay the 'early adopter surcharge' for the big leap in image quality the a7r brings to the thousands of images it has pumped out lately. If I divide the gain in IQ by the # of images, it's pretty affordable! But I remember film buying and processing and the costs associated with that.

I'd like to see accurate sales volumes like we all would. Price reductions are a good sign, and we all benefit from this kind of 'deflation' in time. ;-) The other makers, not so much. Sony is a strong competitor, not to be underestimated.
 

ptomsu

Workshop Member
This price decrease was just to be expected. The A7/A7r may be great cameras especially WRT IQ from native lenses. But while there are lot of early adopters especially in this forum glueing third party glass on these bodies, this is NOT the mainstream - and thus from this clientele huge volume cannot be expected. And why would anyone already sold in another system (especially Canon/Nikon) just switch to Sony with all their history of launching a good product and then not following up as expected - just see the A-mount FF story ....

So they cannot ship/sell the volume they estimated and thus they are reducing prices to gain momentum. Another reason might be that A8/A9 or what else camera are just around the corner, so better to get rid of "old" stock.

Finally there are number of issues reported with A7/A7r which is also not helpful to increase sales. And the lens lineup of native glass is just far from mature. Maybe in a year from now this could have changed - hopefully. And then a A8/A9 would also be available without (almost without) any issues. But this is just future and currently there can be only hope to get there.

So no big surprises.
 

raist3d

Well-known member
At B&H After $460 off,

Sony A7 Body – $1,238.00
Sony A7R Body – $1,838.00
Sony A7 with 28-70mm lens kit – $1,538.00

This must mean that a replacement is about to be released and Sony wants to blow out all remaining inventory on this five (?) month old camera?

I feel a like I was overcharged, and I haven't even needed to pay my credit card bill on my A7 yet!

Never purchased a "new" product and felt like I was overcharged so quickly.

Can I return my A7 with 1200 activations?
No. To me this means Sony wasn't selling as much as they thought and/or mirror less market just got very competitive. The hype baton is now on the Fuji X-T1... who would go for the Sony given the price difference and all that is being said on the X-T1 (note: I am not saying I agree with then hype or think the Sony is all that or the Fuji is all that, just commenting).

- Ricardo
 

ptomsu

Workshop Member
No. To me this means Sony wasn't selling as much as they thought and/or mirror less market just got very competitive. The hype baton is now on the Fuji X-T1... who would go for the Sony given the price difference and all that is being said on the X-T1 (note: I am not saying I agree with then hype or think the Sony is all that or the Fuji is all that, just commenting).

- Ricardo
I think you are actually very right - just think about the last year - hype was shifting from EM1 to XE2 to A7/A/r and now to XT1.

Just wonder when XT1 will get "old fashioned" and when all the currently very happy A7/A7r users sell their gear to jump to the next hype ;)
 

iiiNelson

Well-known member
I think you are actually very right - just think about the last year - hype was shifting from EM1 to XE2 to A7/A/r and now to XT1.

Just wonder when XT1 will get "old fashioned" and when all the currently very happy A7/A7r users sell their gear to jump to the next hype ;)
I don't think the majority will if IQ, adapted lenses, and a FF sensor are the concerns.
 

Ben Rubinstein

Active member
It's a shame, it means that a number of issues with the A7/r will not be addressed in firmware rather will be fixed in a new camera.
 

pegelli

Well-known member
In my mind early adopters to new technology always pay more than people who wait for some time. Secondly I think the more "step-out" the new technology is upon introduction the faster the price decline will be. I think we see both these effects in practice here (in economics it's referred to as the "experience curve")
 

johnnygoesdigital

New member
It's the FF for me... I had the Fuji X pro and really liked the images, but it had quirky issues. The XT1 is still a cropped sensor, so I'm not going to compare. The XT1 is taking pre orders @ BH, so I think Sony's astute marketing is to keep prices for A7/r's in line or better with the XT1. Full frame ML cameras is the new hype, much like megapixels were. Sony's got them both.
 

fotografz

Well-known member
This is exactly what I predicted, and why I got the A7R and will wait to get its replacement … with the A7R then acting as backup. I knew Sony's track record … although this is faster than usual even for them. I thought it'd be mid-summer before such reductions.

It may also mean even steeper reductions a few months from now … making this the best value deal ever.




- Marc
 
J

JohnW

Guest
Maybe it's the same business model as inkjet printers - give the printers (bodies) away so you can sell inks (lenses). Maybe the margins are really in the lenses.

Then again, it's a super competitive market and the average photographer probably doesn't care much about full frame and stepping into a world of $1K lenses. Sales numbers show that the mirrorless share of the US is small. FF mirrorless must be VERY small. What else can a company do but lower price? But it does feel like a de-valuing of the product line.
 

JoelM

Well-known member
Personally, even at retail price, I think that the A7r is an awful lot of camera for the money. What else is out there? I'm very satisfied with my purchase and try to never be upset if/when prices fall.

Joel
 

Godfrey

Well-known member
Good prices! I wouldn't have paid the price for my A7 if I didn't think it was worth what I paid for it. And it wasn't retail list anyway. So I am only happy to see that if I want to buy a second body, either A7 or A7r, it will cost me less.

G
 

bipbip

Member
Methinks that until they cut the exorbitant price of the RX-10 by 50% the three who fell for it at 1150€ a pop deserve a medal.

Nice camera, mind you. Just not buying, see?
 

nostatic

New member
I don't see the $460 off either. $300, yes (took advantage of that for both A7r and A7 purchases).

This price break is a bit early but totally fits with the current model of pretty much all of the companies. Fuji is discounting XE-2 (not that old of a body) and discounting lenses heavily to push the XT1 adoption. Panny cut the GX7 prices quickly after launch, then raised them back up, then dropped them. About the only one that hasn't gone that route is Oly with the EM1
 
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