More thoughts about a low end Mac, and marketing
Almost everyone agrees that Apple should release a low-end
desktop Mac to increase their market share in education. However,
I've noticed that some people don't seem to think it's a good idea
for Apple to venture into the low end.
They've compared it to car
companies for the most part, and it's true that high end car
manufacturers, such as BMW, are probably not very interested in
selling a "cheap" model in order to gain market share. BMWs aren't
exactly rare on the road as it is, so why would they need to do it?
As has also been said, when Cadillac tried to sell a "cheap" model
in the mid 80s, it failed miserably. Why? It was less than what you
would expect from a Cadillac. Sure, it was cheap, but its quality
and performance suffered.
Computers aren't cars, though. Computers are electronics.
I can bring in the radio analogy here. In the late 1930s and
early 1940s, Zenith Radio Corporation was able to do with radios
what Apple should be able to do with computers. Sure, it had some
high end sets - 15 tube Zenith Stratospheres with dials that would
actually move when you changed bands - but it also had a line of
inexpensive plastic and wooden table models that it sold to the
average consumer at an affordable price. It also had midrange
models, its 8, 10, and 12 tube large table models and midsize
consoles. These were priced competitively with other consoles at
the time, and Zenith was able to compete with other manufacturers
in the major markets.
They did it again with television, able to keep black and white
portables and table models available for those that weren't willing
to shell out the amount necessary for a large 21" color console
with built in radio and phonograph. And they were able to
successfully sell both types.
You'd think Apple would be able to do this. But all radios are
pretty much the same: they all tune in the same stations, they all
work in a similar way, so Zenith wasn't selling a completely
different product.
Since the Macintosh doesn't work exactly like the PC and needs
its own applications, Apple must be careful. Perhaps one way to do
this is to really push the message that you can do the same things
on a Mac and on a PC - but you can do things better on a Mac, like
so many radio companies tried to persuade consumers that everything
sounded better on their radios. So far Apple is doing this pretty
well with it's Switch ads.
But Apple needs to make the Mac more accessible to more people,
and a low-end desktop Mac would accomplish this and allow Apple to
compete in all areas of the market, not just the high end.
