[Sonic77]

A few weeks ago $199 Playbooks sold out instantly online in Canada.
Noticed this time around that's not the case, so far...

Staples Canada has had the $199 and $249 prices up
for almost 2 days now with both still in stock.
Bestbuy and Futureshop stock available as well.

What do you think?

[rotorwrench]

No idea, sold out here and the large city south of me, so I had to order. I know that retailers sold out earlier and were scrambling for stock, to the point of pushing the refurbs. But fear not, the bashers and trolls will have plenty of reasons and are more than happy to share their expert opinions.

[djenkins6]

A lot of the flyers are saying one per customer now so they must be expecting big demand tomorrow.

[robsteve]

Do you have a URL ? I checked Staples.ca yesterday and they were all sold out but the 64gb.

We will know in a day or so if they sell out everywhere.

[Sonic77]

Staples online stock is local to area, with a Calgary postal code, all 3 models available.

Future Shop and Bestbuy in Canada have all models available now as well.

[hpjrt]

I got my 32 gig during the first sale and now Hubby wants one so I placed an order on Futureshop.ca. The limit was set at 2 per customer I think, but since I only needed one more I didn't pay much attention.

I think that we will have acquired two powerful tablets for about the same price my son paid for the iPad I he got for his wife! I'm sure that we aren't the only family going for another Playbook on the Boxing Day deal.

I'm sure the trolls will try to turn an increase in Playbook sales as somehow negative! LOL

[jvictor77]

Best Buy online had 50,000 units so, as well as they're selling, I suppose that it would take a while. I wasn't taking any risks though - so I was bang on the button right at 8pm yesterday when the sale started and got the 16gb for the wife!

[KOOLWATER]

I dont know about online, but Staples and Walmart's stores in my town were sold out and best buy only had 6 and 1 of those were purchased as i was standing in line to purchase my wife's (I own one already)

[Sonic77]

If Bestbuy does have 50,000 and
Staples a similar number that would explain
the stock levels holding yesterday and today.

[bitek]

finally more inventory. people will buy them

[doxa sub750T]

I went to a few Bestbuy in St. Louis area over the past few days and they are all sold out! I ended up ordering 32GB from Newegg.com.

[howarmat]

you also have to remember christmas is over. Many people spent tons of cash over the last couple weeks. Before you could get them for gifts and such now the purchases are going to be more thought out and not as much on impulse.

[flash24]

I hope RIM keeps this price.

[Megacharge]

Sold out all around me too, so I have no idea. I'm guessing those sites are mostly sold out too, but maybe just haven't updated yet.

[Bob31464]

I got my 32gb at Staples last Monday for $250.00, they where out of the 16gb and I got the last 32gb and as far as I know, everyone is pretty much sold out around here now, including Bestbuy, Staples and Office Depot.

[downphoenix]

anyone who chooses the kindle fire over this, with knowledge of this existing, is an frankly. Yes the Fire has the advantage on apps, but thats it, apps aren't all that honestly. Of course, idiots are the majority of the population...

[Unsure2]

I don't think the stores had that many to begin with, this time around. In my Christmas shopping, I looked at and played with various tablets, but saw no particular interest in the Playbook. Of course, it's hard to see what is happening online.

[dugggggg]

Some people are theorizing that the price of the 16GB PB may fall to $149 or even $99 in the new year. That may well be a reality if RIM is still sitting on hundreds of thousands of unsold units, now that Christmas demand has evaporated.

[app_Developer]

anyone who chooses the kindle fire over this, with knowledge of this existing, is an frankly. Yes the Fire has the advantage on apps, but thats it, apps aren't all that honestly. Of course, idiots are the majority of the population...

This is why RIM needs to publish statistics on the actual number of downloads from their app store.

One theory circulating among my colleagues is that in the $200 price class, people are literally now self-sorting for us. All the people who want apps over in the Kindle camp, and the people who couldn't really care less about apps over in the PB camp.

All interesting data points.

[downphoenix]

Some people are theorizing that the price of the 16GB PB may fall to $149 or even $99 in the new year. That may well be a reality if RIM is still sitting on hundreds of thousands of unsold units, now that Christmas demand has evaporated.

I doubt that's the case. Maybe if RIM wants to call it quits, or they introduce a new product which will have the os2 enhancements built in and be cheaper to manufacture (maybe lacking the cameras, bring the memory to 8 gb like Fire, but still have rest of specs) then they may price it at that point. You fail to realize that demand doesnt really die down until mid january as a lot of people get gift cards and cash they will shop with after christmas, then demand will pick up again about march when people start receiving tax return checks. If people only bought stuff like this only for the holidays they would only be released during that window, but consumer electronics shopping is yearround, the holidays only account for 30-40% of total sales for items like this.

[downphoenix]

This is why RIM needs to publish statistics on the actual number of downloads from their app store.

One theory circulating among my colleagues is that in the $200 price class, people are literally now self-sorting for us. All the people who want apps over in the Kindle camp, and the people who couldn't really care less about apps over in the PB camp.

All interesting data points.

Not counting sales of kindle books, I really would bet that the playbook user spends more on apps than the Kindle Fire user. While the amazon appstore is very nice, the average user only downloads the free app of the day. I have downloaded over 150 apps for free on my android phone and have never spent a dime on apps through there, and if I have a Fire I would never need to. I see no need to rent movies to watch on a 7 inch tablet or 18 inch computer monitor when I can pay the same to my cable/satellite provider or sony or microsoft consoles to watch on a larger screen, and this holds true for most so I dont see instant video being a big draw. There's the prime videos, but the selection pales to netflix. The amazom mp3 store is pretty good, but tablets are too large to use as a portable music player, and you have to consider most people will use itunes or a subscription based service like Spotify which means amazon gets nothing.

So on amazon appstore, I spent 0.00 so far, and likely would still be that number if I owned a Fire. On PB, even though I spent nothing on movies, books, or music, I spent close to 27$ on apps and games so far, and I dont feel ripped off, as I acknowledge one of the costs of having a tablet like this is having a higher cost per download, though I still have found plenty of nice free apps as well as access to various flash based ones on websites that work good. Also app visibility is higher on here for smaller app developers, major apps like Angry Birds wont have any problem being highly profitable, but there are a few PB apps that saw great success on PB as far as attach rate that they might not have seen on the flooded ios and android stores.

Then you must consider that Kindle Books can easily be imported to Playbook, even for the uneducated person as long as they get the right app.

[djnshores]

The Amazon Fire became available in November - just in time for the holiday shopping season. Its $199 pricetag peaked interest in 7" tablets. The price of the PB dropped to $199 around Black Friday.

It seems to me that the holiday shopping season and Amazon's pricing of the Fire had a lot to do with RIM's marketing strategy for the PB.

Now that Christmas is over, demand for all things tablet will likely fall. OS 2.0's release in February may help with sales of the PB.

[PeterRei]

We had a firesale here in Germany (12/23; Media Markt): 209 . Missed it
They say it sold out VERY fast.

[Angus_CB]

A few weeks ago $199 Playbooks sold out instantly online in Canada.
Noticed this time around that's not the case, so far...

Staples Canada has had the $199 and $249 prices up
for almost 2 days now with both still in stock.
Bestbuy and Futureshop stock available as well.

What do you think?

They didn't sell out instantly last time.
I bought mine on the last day of the sale from Staples Online.

[III 4U2NV III]

When I bought a second PB last weekend seeing it was on sale @ BestBuy, I immediately bought it online for in-store pickup. When I checked a couple days later, many of the near-by stores were physically sold out and had to be ordered online.