Argos - Sony e-readers and Ireland compared to UK

digitaldolf

I wanted to buy a Sony reader PRS-600 touch. It is a device for reading electronic books, for those who don't know what an e-reader is.
I looked in the Argos catalogue and saw it there for €368.
Now I knew that that was too expensive because I would be able to get it in the Netherlands for €299 without even looking for bargains.
I'm Dutch but live in county Limerick. I looked around and found out that Powercity was selling this reader for €249.95. There's no Powercity in Limerick so I phoned Harvey Norman and they had it in the shop for €286 but were willing to sell it to me for €249 after I told them about the price in Powercity.
Argos is selling the reader for €116 more than Powercity.
Argos is also selling the same items that are in the UK shops, at higher prices in Ireland. And I'm talking after the conversion from Pounds into Euros.
Rip off Argos.

the groutch

argos are definitely one of the uk companies who use a less favourable exchange rate between uk & ireland, but because I dont know how much extra it's costing them to operate over here I'll reserve judgement

btw, I'd recommend going for the PRS-300, it's not touch-screen but it's nearly €100 cheaper, and the PRS-600 supposedly has significant glare issues

digitaldolf

Thanks for your reaction.
I already bought the PRS-600. The glare is not an issue at all. Change the angle slightly and it's gone. I don't understand all these people griping about it on youtube etc. For 249 euros I think it's a good buy.
The lower contrast could give problems in low light situations but I didn't find that an issue either. I just made the font bigger and read Large font in low light. Works fine. The PRS-300 has a 5 inch screen. Personally I wouldn't go under 6 inch. the PRS-600 also has an inbuilt English dictionary. Because I'm Dutch but read a lot in English, the inbuilt dictionary was an extra reason for me to buy the PRS-600. I've just finished reading a book on it and it worked fine. I tested out all the other functions too. Writing on the screen is not that great but then: I'm lefthanded and my hand tends to touch off the screen causing lines to appear where I don't want them.
Might just need a bit of practise. So far I'm quite happy with the PRS-600.

the groutch wrote: »

argos are definitely one of the uk companies who use a less favourable exchange rate between uk & ireland, but because I dont know how much extra it's costing them to operate over here I'll reserve judgement

btw, I'd recommend going for the PRS-300, it's not touch-screen but it's nearly €100 cheaper, and the PRS-600 supposedly has significant glare issues

Ghost Train

i think you just have to accept that there will be different prices and shop around. i'm a fan of powercity as they're usually as cheap as anywhere, that being said i bought an ipod touch in argos a month ago because it was slightly cheaper than powercity.

91011

Repeat after me

"Argos are the most expensive shop in Ireland
Argos are the most expensive shop in Ireland
Argos are the most expensive shop in Ireland"

Repeat continuously for 60 minutes and you will be cured.

Though littlewoods.ie are certainly in with a shout of the title too!

doopa

91011 wrote: »

Repeat after me

"Argos are the most expensive shop in Ireland
Argos are the most expensive shop in Ireland
Argos are the most expensive shop in Ireland"

Repeat continuously for 60 minutes and you will be cured.

Though littlewoods.ie are certainly in with a shout of the title too!

Argos as a company are a joke. I would guess that the reason their euro prices are so terrible is that fail to leverage losses in the exchange rate properly. Compare them to Sony (or Nintendo)- who also set prices on a long term basis (like to year to year) for each market (Asia, Europe, Americas) and you'll note Sony's prices aren't as shockingly different over the years when comparing dollars to yen to euro to pounds prices. Thats cos Sony understand the fx market is likely to fluxuate over the year. So they leverage the likely differences in the exchange rate by say buying large amounts of dollars one year, or euro or whichever happens to have particularly strong forecast for the coming year. That way they avoid getting stung and avoid massive differences in the prices of consoles, games, electronics in the different markets in a given year.

On the argos note - why aren't they dead yet?

witnessmenow

Do argos owe something to the Irish? What states they should charge the same in the Uk as here?

If your not happy with the way they do business dont shop there.

Personally what they charge in the UK has very little relevence to me what does matter is their prices compared to other retailers that I can realistically use, If their prices are competitive I'll get the item there, if there not I wont , simple as.

Panrich

Home cinema anyone?

http://tinyurl.com/ykxp4do


http://tinyurl.com/yz94wpu

astrofool

Panrich wrote: »

Home cinema anyone?

http://tinyurl.com/ykxp4do


http://tinyurl.com/yz94wpu

One is on offer, the other isn't?