RIM Offers Black Friday Exclusive by Dropping PlayBook to $199 for Holiday Season
RIM decided to drop the price of its tablet, the BlackBerry PlayBook, by a significant amount to just $199 exclusively for the holiday season.
The Canadian company broke the news through their Twitter account, confirming the many rumors that a price drop was imminent for the PlayBook. The Android-powered tablet was suffering at the hands of various other Android tablets and losing to the iPads 1 and 2 in sales.
The company, though most famously known for their BlackBerry smartphones, made a foray into the tablet market earlier this year, debuting the device at a steep $499. A drop followed that to $299 to boost lagging sales, and now, another cut to $199 just in time for Black Friday.
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The price cut has not gone into effect yet; however, so there is further evidence the tablet will not be available for the cheaper price until after Thanksgiving.
Not just every retailer offers the PlayBook for the reduced price, either. The PlayBook website lists a number of popular retailers, like Best Buy, Wireless Giant, Staples, OfficeMax, Office Depot, Radio Shack, and of course, Walmart.
RIM has a minute portion of the tablet market share at just 3.3 percent. Apple’s iPad has a commanding 61.3 percent. However, there are indicators that the more economically priced tablets will sell quickly.
Online retailer NewEgg managed to snag a batch of PlayBooks and sold them for $199 this past weekend; and, they sold out extremely quick.
The PlayBook had a host of problems that contributed to its dismal sales numbers.
The first of these is RIM’s puzzling decision to not include email and calendar applications for the tablet. Many users criticized the company for this controversial decision, especially because no BlackBerry smartphone debuted without those features in years, if ever.
RIM’s response to consumer complaints is OS 2, to be released early in 2012 and is purported to have email, calendar, contacts, and a BlackBerry Messenger application.
Another reason for low retail numbers is the sheer amount of competition.
Along with RIM, Acer, Dell, Motorola, Samsung, Sony, Toshiba, have all jumped on the Android tablet bandwagon, making all the technologies tough for buyers to distinguish between. Add that to a lack of startling differences between the tablets, and a market emerges with no clear winner.
RIM’s hope is that their price reduction to $199 will improve their profits, and for that momentum to continue into 2012 as it launches a brand-new system for the PlayBook.
