Adobe still at it …
April 16th, 2010
by Gwyn Headley
Managing Director
Tags: Adobe, Creative Suite, over here, overcharging, overpriced, rip-off
… ripping off UK customers, that is.
They’ve just announced Creative Suite 5, the top of the range version of which retails in the UK at £2,303 and in the US at $2,599. That’s £1,685 at today’s exchange rate.
Why should this product — which is software and therefore can be delivered in identical packages anywhere in the world at no additional cost apart from local taxes (not included in these prices) — cost an astounding £623 more in Britain than in America? That’s a 37% hike. There is no way any company in the world can justify such an extortionate, exorbitant pricing decision.
So they don’t. No one at Adobe will lift his cowardly, avaricious head over the parapet to defend the reasoning. “We have established what is effectively a monopoly. If you’re in the image business, you need Adobe Photoshop. So fuck the Brits, we can charge what we fucking well like.”
It’s a wonderful product, but the officers of the corporation who decided on this price differential are shits.
And I bet it still strips metadata. Because Adobe doesn’t own the system.
I absolutely agree with Gwyn.
It is difficult to see the reasoning behind this pricing policy other than one of greed. I know that many companies have a ‘Skimming’ pricing policy when they launch a new product. And, I understand that this is to get back all the initial R&D investment before they can start making a profit. However, if that is the case how come they have not adopted that policy in the States?
Finally, and without offering any excuses for Adobe, it should be said that Adobe are not the only organisation to do this. It is the same with Nikon, the dollar retail price in America is GBP price in the UK, and I’m sure many other companies are doing likewise.
It would be interesting to find out if this phenomena happens in other European countries.
Regards
Mark
It is an absolute outrage… the only thing we can do is find a tame under 18 and by the educational edition.
I bought CS3.. still use it, how can I justify upgrading? It is crippling. I hope it gets pirated to hell.
Whilst I agree the different pricing structures across countries is bizarre, there are many issues involved other than just making a direct price comparison between the product itself in different countries. Adobe run a UK presence which is vastly more expensive to run than a similar facility in the US (that’s a fact as anyone who employs staff and pays rent on premises will know).
Further, no-one makes you buy Adobe products. There are dozens of image editing products out there some of them free but most substantially cheaper than Adobe.
Finally, may I respectfully suggest you refrain from using such unpleasant language in a blog that can be read by people of all sensibilities and ages. It is extremely unprofessional and totally unnecessary when trying to make a point
I absolutely agree with Gwyn.
It is difficult to see the reasoning behind this pricing policy other than one of greed. I know that many companies have a ‘Skimming’ pricing policy when they launch a new product. And, I understand that this is to get back all the initial R&D investment before they can start making a profit. However, if that is the case how come they have not adopted that policy in the States?
Finally, and without offering any excuses for Adobe, it should be said that Adobe are not the only organisation to do this. It is the same with Nikon, the dollar retail price in America is GBP price in the UK, and I’m sure many other companies are doing likewise.
It would be interesting to find out if this phenomena happens in other European countries.
Regards
Mark
That’s a clever spam. The last comment by “Bruce” bypassed all our spam filters, passed my glance — it was relevant to the blog posting — so up it went. Only when I read it again to make a response did it strike me as familiar; that’s because it was simply a copy of Mark Godwin’s posting a month earlier.
And of course Bruce had something to sell, some enlargement ointment or whatever. They’ve built a robot which trawls well-read blogs, finds a comment made a month or so earlier and reposts it with links to their grubby little commercial operation.
I guess it must work for them. I’ve now disabled “Bruce’s” links, but they’ve been up here for six days. Well done, “Bruce”. I’ve been well and truly had.
I’ve left the post up as an awful warning.
[…] I am less enamoured with Adobe, the corporation. It’s well known than I and many others abhor their commercial decision to charge 37% more for their recently released Creative Suite 5 in the UK than in the USA, as I argued in a recent blog. […]
I always look on eBay for my software bargains. The American version is always cheaper. The downside, it is hit or miss with the HM Customs, but still worth it!