If there’s anything that we at PreCentral love to see, it’s two giant retailers going after each other’s price tags in the quest for customer wallets. Lately, mega-box super retailer Wal-Mart and ecommerce monolith Amazon have been going at it, slashing prices back and forth in a battle that shows just how efficient these two companies’ distribution systems are. And with the western front battle over iTunes all sorts of quiet between Palm and Apple, we need some other fight to cheer on, right?
The beneficiaries of all this back-and-forth price cutting is clearly you, the potential customer. Not satisfied with having just matched pricing with Amazon, Wal-Mart has lowered its pricing on both the Sprint Palm Pre and Sprint Palm Pixi be a few dollars to best their online competitor. A Pre will set you back $74.99, while a Pixi from Wal-Mart now costs $22.99. Wal-Mart’s contract renewal and off-contract prices remain unchanged. We can't say for sure how long this pricing will last; the cheap Pixi deal at Wal-Mart only stayed around for about a week.
Amazon, the ball’s in your court now.
UPDATE: Game, set, match. Amazon has matched Wal-Mart's prices on the Pre and the Pixi.
Thanks to Eric for the tip!
Comments
Now only if some would would fix that calender or hack the centro calender into pre!!!
Amazon has already matched.
Amazon prices were already that over the weekend. I suspect that Wal-mart reacted to amazon.
A shame, however understandable, it's only for new customers.
But thanks to member dslunceford's tip in the comments on the Best Buy Pre Black Friday sale, I'm a Pre carrying member of the PreCentral club now! Didn't even have to go Black Friday hunting. ^_^
What makes the anti-current-customer bias understandable? As an current Sprint customer, the fact that Sprint tries to charge me $100 or more than a new customer for the same phone annoys me. (I've told them so, and all they seem to say is "Sorry.")
I could have picked up a Pre over the weekend from Best Buy, but I opted not to add $50 to my monthly phone bills for it.
Sprint doesn't charge any more or less to customers eligible for their upgrade than they do a new customer for a handset. Yes, they make you wait out your two years, but they have to recoup their losses. They also make direct customers endure mail-in rebates instead of the instant ones that retailers subsidize, but they do that to new and old customers alike.
Retailers, however, likely get a commission for converting people to Sprint. They also make most of their money off of accessories, not the phones/contracts. So with them there are a whole lot of other numbers to play with that Sprint doesn't have.
I ordered a Pre'(for me) and a Pixi (for my wife) last Tuesday, the last day Sprint waived the activation fees on Amazon. Both shipped over the weekend and should arrive tomorrow. Good-bye AT&T!
Even with Walmart's current price reduction (and Amazon's match), the better deal was last week... although I wouldn't be surprised to see something better before Christmas.
Looks like the deal is gone. I saw it the first time and told some friends...when I went back to the page, the price went up to 117.99.
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