Sonos Announces 10% Price Hikes On Most Speakers (cepro.com) 58
CIStud writes: Sonos announces price hikes for Arc, Amp, Roam, Sub, Five, One and One SL speakers citing chip shortage and supply chain. Sonos Arc's price is leaping by $100 from $799 to $899. Not every product will be seeing a large jump in price, as some products like the Sonos Roam are seeing increases of just $10. Other products receiving only small price increases include the Sonos One and Sonos One SL ($20 increase), while others are not seeing pricing changes whatsoever like the Sonos Move and Sonos Port. Speaking of the far-reaching impact of the global chip shortage, Google and Indian telecom operator Jio announced this week they are delaying the launch of their affordable smartphone aimed at 300 million users.
Re:Everything going as planned (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem is logistics.
You know what's currently in incredibly short supply in China? Containers [reuters.com]. For shipping. The reason is actually a tricky one. Or rather, the reasons.
First, of course, Covid. But in a more insidious way than one may think. Because with Covid, shipping routes changed dramatically because suddenly there was MUCH more profit in delivering medical stuff than in shipping toys and gimmicks for the idle rich (read: us Westerners), so routes changed. You also may have heard about the Suez Canal clog. And then finally, with productions plummeting last year, shipping took a nosedive too.
Container ships cost LOTS of money if you keep them moored. So much, actually, that with all the (many, many... the majority of them, actually) ancient ones that were still kept afloat with the well wishes of the shipowners and even more the prayers of the crew, it was more profitable to scrap them.
And that is what happened.
Of course, this happened AFTER the last delivery trip to Europe or the US. So Europe (and the US) are currently sitting in a sea of containers, so many actually that they are now trying to get them scrapped (and I heard that some are actually literally throwing them away) because, well, how the hell do you get rid of a container if you can't find a ship to load it?
So what we're looking at right now is also a pretty severe logistics crisis, which means that the first things to be shipped are also the more profitable ones. Now, one should think that chips, being small and expensive, would make a pretty lucrative cargo. Nope. What's lucrative is to bring the stuff to the end consumer. Not taking them from the chipmaker to the manufacturer.
tl;dr: Everyone wants to transport the speakers, but nobody wants to deliver the chips to make them.
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It is already not really profitable to deliver them across sea, let alone land, air transport is completely out of the question.
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how the hell do you get rid of a container if you can't find a ship to load it?
Use them to build nonflammable housing in California. This is frankly a brilliant plan which I obviously did not think of* but which I continually champion.
* Using containers for homes anyway. I haven't heard many people suggest it as a partial solution to California's fire woes, though.
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If there's anything preventing businesses from forming, then the lack of demand.
But how would you want to demand something if you don't have money?
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However none of this has to do with Sonos, they're raising prices because they've locked in a lot of people into Sonos equipment that is only compatible wi
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it is not simply that there are fewer return trips. it is also that the freight charge for sending containers back is low and waiting to get them and load them costs the ship owner more than high tailing it back and grabbing another high fare load of containers heading to the US. both related to the constrained ship availability.
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You just made that "no factories were running at 100% capacity" up.
No business that wants to stay competitive and alive, keeps massive overcapacities around.
Yes they were not running at exactly 100%. But that is deliberately misleading, since they were in fact running at almost maximum capacity. For the predicted growth anyway.
COVID simply changed much more than those few leftover percent of capacity could compensate.
But hey, it's always nice to find a simple and easy solution that gives you a comforting sc
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Re:Everything going as planned (Score:5, Informative)
You don't run your multi billion dollar chip foundry at much less than 100% capacity if you can possibly avoid it. You take orders years in advance, and pack the schedule as tightly as you can.
If some dumbasses cancel their order, they go to the back of the line.
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Semi-OT:
If some dumbasses cancel their order, they go to the back of the line.
From what I read elsewhere, that is what happened to the automobile industry. When they were making less cars due to Covid, they canceled part of their chip orders. When they needed more of those chips again, they found out that the manufacturers had filled the schedule with orders from other customers.
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Yup. But the marketing department won't let you say "oops, we didn't think you'd all buy new cars during a disaster," so you go with "oh noes, global chip shortage!11!!!!" instead.
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Well, there is a global chip shortage. But the auto industry managed to put itself in a position where it hurts them more than others.
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Was planning on saying much the same.
We increased the money supply by 10% or so, which will, in the long term, translate into a 10%-or-so increase in prices across the board.
Yes, sometimes it's necessary to "just print some more money". The lockdowns and such associated with covid-19 were one of those times. But, even when absolutely necessary, it will still result in price inflation.
A word to the wise: even when you have to increase the money supply due to a disaster of one form or another, it's stil
Re: Inflation well above 10% (Score:2)
Re:Inflation well above 10% (Score:5, Informative)
Take a look at your grocery bills from last year and compare them to the current one for a real inflation. Nobody gives a fuck about the price of TVs or a new car, I can't eat either and I don't buy one every other month just 'cause they got cheaper again.
What matters is food. And the price here is skyrocketing.
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Well, it's only getting worse, with resources staying the same but humanity growing exponentially.
I told everyone to stop making children. But they didn't listen. Now enjoy your turd soup, humanity! I'll be gone pretty soon. I left no litter behind. That's your problem now.
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Where is 'here'? My grocery bill is basically identical to what it was at the start of COVID.
Also I'd note your logistics post above is relevant here. NPR ran a story recently about how American growers are struggling to get their crops to export because of the container shortage. It's more profitable for shipping companies to ship back empty containers to China immediately so they can be filled there than it is to fuck around loading them with American produce - even if it's going to China! - and e
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great news (Score:2)
Re: great news (Score:2)
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I already bought a true smartphone for $50.
Its limitation was its 2GB RAM, which made web browsing a pain. But that was more a flaw of the insane bloat of the inner-platform effect of the modern web. The thing would have had no issues with the information content alone, not even full-res video, if streamed.
And of course its camera was quite crap. But only in terms of resolution and color balance and maybe contrast. It was good enough for "hey,l look at this!" snapshots.
Its battery life got you through the d
Re: great news (Score:2)
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You already can. Just buy tracfones. They have quad-core, 2GB phones for that kind of money. They're not speed demons but they are functional.
I wouldn't want to use their service, and the phones are nontrivial to move to other carriers, but if you just need a little tablet for something they have a decent price on a decent moto phone most of the time.
The price of luxury goods is arbitrary (Score:2)
Anyone paying those prices will pay 10% more too. Price can't be an issue for them or they wouldn't buy those overpriced things anyway.
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Yes and no. For Sonos specifically, the price increases just might be enough to keep some people from the mistake of buying them. I have a large system, and really wish I had something else. I love having music everywhere, but the fact that they (and so many similar systems) rely on a flat network topology causes so much pain.
can anyone tell me? (Score:1)
Thanks Sonos! (Score:5, Insightful)
Now we have even more incentive not to purchase speakers that brick themselves.
(yes, I'm aware that Sonos no longer bricks "recycled" speakers, but they could easily bring back the policy at a future time)
Re: Thanks Sonos! (Score:5, Interesting)
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Whadya mean? That's the entire Meraki range and they *still* do that.
Get a cheap AirPort on eBay, craigslist, etc.? Also has 1/8" line-out sockets for streaming audio from iDevices.
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You can buy used Meraki gear just fine. You just need to make sure the company properly de-registers them from their account, otherwise it will be locked to their account and you won't be able to manage it.
The thing is, deregistering them means they stop working, so you'll have to buy a service plan with it when you register it on your account.
We've found them cheaper to run than a standard Cisco with a support plan, so they're slightly ch
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Hmmmm. What's the going price for bricked Sonos speakers on eBay? Should be easy enough to make a new board with a bluetooth chip and solder it in. That and a sharpie and you could launch your new "Sanos" brand.
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Translation (Score:2)
What they mean is, although the parts for the product cost $50, they see that there are some shortages and are using that fact to increase the price whilst having something to blame other than their corporate need to increase profits as currently the product is popular.
They are not increasing the price because they have to, they are increasing the price because they can.
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Capitalism without sufficient controls is fundamentally unsustainable. It is a broken system because of external costs and future costs. Partial fixes would be to reduce the power of lobbying, deal with external costs, increase quality education and improve democracies a lot, first-past-the-post is pretty low down the democratic scale.
Re: Translation (Score:3)
Free market isn't another word for non-profit, selling goods at cost is not anyone's definition of a free market.
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Don't be silly. Sonos sells expensive speakers at a big profit. Good for them. They've successfully convinced idiots to buy them. It's not like there isn't competition in the speaker market. You can get something functionally equivalent for a tenth the price at a discount store or a fiftieth the price ordering online.
This is capitalism at its best: people who want to pay for what they consider status get to do it, and the rest of us get subsidized toys.
If you'd like to engage in some zero profit "free marke
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The test for their price increase justification will be this: does the price of Sonos equipment drop similarly once chip supply parity is achieved?
Nah, I didn't think so either.
I just want OSS access to the mic (Score:1)
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Wait, so you buy ${literally most locked down speaker on the planet}, and then complain that it's locked down?
Dude...
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[Camel case and words with underscores are not "ascii" art, but variable names, you stupid fucking Slashdot filter!]
Sonos... sonos... why do I know that name (Score:3)
Oh right, Sonos, I remember them because they are a bag of lames [slashdot.org].
I'd rather roll my own solution than fuck around with something created by gross incompetents.
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Sonos is pretty lame in a lot of ways, but there aren't really any good open solutions out there. I like to keep as many of my devices from requiring cloud access and ideally communicating through open APIs, but for speakers there aren't many options. Best seems to be making something pretend to be a Chromecast or Apple speaker device, but even that has its own issues
To be clear (Score:3)
Price increases are now valid subjects for /.?
And that someone is working on an "affordable smartphone for 300 million poor Indians" is also news?
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And that someone is working on an "affordable smartphone for 300 million poor Indians" is also news?
OLPC was news for a long time on Slashdot, so it might as well be.
vendor lock (Score:3, Insightful)
Why would you buy an expensive proprietary system where the hardware will be discontinued from under you in a couple of years? The physical product will last much longer than you'll ever be able to use it. The biggest issue with Sonos is the software that limits how you can use your 'speaker', its really spyware.
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There are ways of getting their app out of your system, but it is painful. The biggest problem with them is that any network complexity makes using them painful.
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If the product keeps selling, what's the motivation to improve it?