Re: why are old HP collectibles? Message #10 Posted by Allen on 19 Aug 2008, 11:07 p.m., in response to message #9 by Dan Grelinger
Dan,
No, I held the price relatively constant, and measured the elasticity of demand at various price points around the HP41CV release price of $325 given 'ample supply'. I do not doubt they would have eventually sold if the price was much higher or much lower, but it would not have yielded as much (or as interesting) data. By measuring the rate of sale (in days) at various price points during an 8 month period, I built a histogram. In brief, the rate of sale doubled by comparison when buyers were offered a price 10% below the $325 break point price (the release price of the HP41CV).
There were other factors that the data collected could not account for such as seasonal buying habits, foreign currency exchange rates (e.g. weaker US dollar in early 2008), effect of shipping costs on purchase decision, number of identical items listed at one time, competing or replacement items offered during the same period, effect of seller's availability to respond immediately to questions, times between successful ended listings and re-listing of similar item, etc... but I expect based on the data that these factors are a relatively small influence compared to list price.
Number 108
MIN 279.29
Average 306.51
MAX 361.45
Standard Deviation 20.43
I expect similar elasticity of demand curves (though not necessarily around the release price!) for other popular HP models: 15c, 42s, 48gx, should similar lots of NOS be found at some point in the future. It is unlikely. There is an old axiom that I believe predates the 'inverse law' of supply and demand. I read it in a college economics text book recently: "Without supply there is no demand".
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