Re: 12C, 11C, 15C Message #24 Posted by Ex-PPC member on 22 Aug 2001, 7:55 a.m., in response to message #23 by Tom (UK)
The arguments about production costs vs. projected sales
of such calculators as the HP-11C/15C do not hold as much water as it seems, imho.
First of all, as stated before, production of HP-11C/15C could use fully the existing facilities for HP-12C production, with just the minor steps of repainting the keyboard labels and including an IC or ROM or whatever with 11C/15C code. I can't see that this would be significant cost at all, more so a better utilization of an existing
production line.
Second, there actually is a significant demand for those calculators. HP has been educating a whole generation of leading edge engineers and professionals on the advantages of RPN and the quality of their calculators, and suddenly those people are left out in the cold. This has generated a lot of demand for those old models, as can be seen in eBay, in adds worldwide, in newsgroups, and everywhere. Besides many of those choice professionals wouldn't care to pay high prices for such items new in box, and would even buy several spares, just in case, because they can afford it provided the goods were available on the first place. You could easily sell several thousands that way with minimum effort.
Third and last, HP made much more money in the past from one of their excellent, state-of-the-art calculators than the mere cost of the machine itself. Lots of those students
and professionals who bought their machines were so pleased with them and their quality, that would actually buy and recommend a lot of much more costly HP items, later in life, for their own use and their company's, friends and relatives.
I'm pretty sure that many people who bought an HP-67 or an HP-41C, say, at a cost of a few hundred dollars, later bought still more HP calculators and accesories for them
(say a printer, a wand, more memory, solution packs), and later on their careers they also bought HP computers (HP-85/86/87, HP-9816/26/36, HP Vectras), HP disc drives, HP printers, HP scanners, HP CD writers, the works.
So, you see, just because of a small, $200 well-made, quality calculator, perhaps HP got many thousand of dollars worth of additional sales. And it's not a fictitious case
nor wishful thinking: it's been my case during the last 25 years, and it's the case of most of my friends, and it's probably the case of most of you. HP calculators' quality
was one of their best publicity assets and customer fidelization resources, but it seems they never realized that. They never discovered or valued the relationship between sales of a calculator to some customer and further sales of other HP hardware items to that very same customer (not to mention word-of-mouth extra sales or sales to the customer's company).
Do you think that 'hooked for life' scenario can be generated now by actual HP products ? Not me, I've crossed HP from my list of preferred hardware provider when I
realized the high-quality company and products I knew were no more.
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