I like Michael Ephraim. The SCE Australia boss seems like a super-nice guy. But man can his mouth get him into trouble. The Age's Jason Hill managed to corner him and ask why, oh why in the name of baby Jesus is AustraliaPS3 bundle when the US 60GB model just got its price slashed. His long-winded responses contain few answers and much wind. getting stuck with an AUD$1000
Well, let's work through that. The US is $499, right? And we're giving $280 worth of value which brings the unit down to around $700. Then take the exchange rate of 20 per cent, their $500 is now looking more like $625. And our offer, when you look at the value in it, is $700. Do you see my point?No. We do not.
For starters, we're not being given the option of removing the $280, because this is a forced bundle. Secondly, the exchange rate at the moment is ten percent (AUD$1 is getting around USD$.89), so an American PS3 is not AUD$625, it's AUD$565. Worse, that exchange rate has the 80GB American bundle at only AUD$680. You can always explain a little mark-up on hardware for things like taxes, shipping, etc, and yes, the Aussie bundle comes with some extra stuff to make up for the smaller HDD space. But an AUD$320 difference? Smelling the bullshit Hill presses him further about the lack of a compelling "entry" pricepoint:
I appreciate your point about an entry level price point, but purchases at retail when consumers have been buying PS3, they haven't stopped at $999. They're buying a game, a controller, a Blu-ray movie. They're walking out spending $1300-1400 on average is what we're hearing from retail.
Michael, just a word of advice: you might want to think about the people who aren't spending AUD$1400 at the register. They're the ones who don't have a PS3. Might want to look into sorting them out, because AUD$1000 is just taking the piss. And by the looks of your "responses" to Hill's questions, you know it is.
In case you were wondering, the PS3 Starter pack, which goes on sale on August 2, retails for AUD$999.95 (USD$878.90) and includes a 60GB PS3, two Sixaxis, Resistance and MotorStorm,
