i don't know how much of the goods IKEA sells in Australia are manufactured in Asia.

it might be true that shipping container from China (i doubt there are that many from Indonesia) to the US is cheaper than shipping it to Australia. less ships, so higher prices. same as with flights, there are more factors than just distance.

but the ships are insanely cheap anyways. the cost of transporting it overland to the stores and warehouses is a bigger factor.

Probably most of them, other than the ones made locally.

They do their pricing as 'what-we-can-get-away-with' .... in other words...if there's not a lot of equivalent product they put the price high enough not to get people thinking 'rookery'....until the WWW bites them in the arse because you could get a desk sent from the US cheaper all up than bying it local....and both options have the same manufacturing source - in this case Indonesia.

No, it is the same absurdity that could see an Aussie airmailing himself some Nikes from America....cheaper than they are sold here....and they too are NOT made in the US OR AUS.

The Internet means this bullshit pricing will eventually be a thing of the past.

Well Jafo that's the whole point. I don't agree with gun control either. I think we should be able to own whatever gun we like (with the exception of those weapons made for our military) without these stupid laws that try to control our guns.

Anyhow that's all I will say.

Er....the US idea of 'Gun Control' is an oxymoron.

Back a little [bit] closer to topic....at one stage the US was prohibited to export high-tech equipment [getting into the wrong hands crap] that saw the UK animators of Bab 5 having to SMUGGLE out the Amiga 3000s they used to do the Lightwave graphics...;)

it's by far not as easy as you think.

see, you live on an island (technically a continent, but the number of people living there makes it smaller) and are culturally very close to the US (maybe closer than to the UK nowadays?).

but come to Europe (or any other continent than North America) and things will get a lot more complex when you have different societies with different income levels and different cultural values. 

for example it would be impossible to sell goods in Switzerland or Norway for the same price as in Germany or Australia (sic!), as it would be impossible to make a profit with the costs of labour there. 

or look at how the French value their food. they are willing to spend a much higher amount of their income for food than other societies. that's why their supermarkets are so expensive (and provide much higher quality stuff than everywhere else). in Australia i hear ALDI is the place to get food. i pity you if that is really the case. there are companies that sell worse junk than ALDI in Germany, but it is still a place that feeds the lower class (and Germans do by no means consider their food as valuable as the French).

transport costs depends mostly on how much taxes a country's government puts on gas and toll roads and ports.

etc, etc ...

it's far more complex than "it's cheap there, so it should be cheap here is well"

Another example saw the same product half the price in Sweden and a third the price in the US.  It's PURELY local market-driven, and not as complex as you are trying to make out.

ANY LEGITIMATE discrepancy re transport...labour OR cost-of-living would see a MAXIMUM variation of around 20 to 30% .... not 300%.

Believe me....cos even IKEA now believes it...they got caught with their pants down treating their respective markets as ignorant savages.

A global economy [as that's what we are ending up with...like it or not] cannot tolerate such usury.

this is what i said.

those local markets are pretty complex

it doesn't really matter anyways. if the consumer thinks "Indonesia is closer to Australia than the US, so it should be cheaper here" it is hard to communicate with him.

they basically would have two choices:

- either lower the price of those particular items mentioned in the media and slighty raise the price of all other items.

- or just don't give a fuck, as they are now labelled as the evil foreigners. they are probably still cheaper than the "good" local competitors which likely import from exactly the same suppliers. and in the long run that is all that matters (sadly).

and the comment quote function on this site is a total mess.

Shan't be one then.  Least not with you.

moshi...this isn't rocket science.  Irrespective of the source of a product there is NOTHING differentiating the US from AUS that can justify a 300% markup.

"market-driven"....means they charge as much as they can get away with for each local market...not what it's worth...or what it costs - factoring in delivery charges etc.  As much as they can get away with....until they were caught and faced public backlash.

Just to be clear.... THREE HUNDRED PERCENT, not THREE, not THIRTY.  If you cannot get your head around the inequity then I give up.

i did not follow those case as obviously furniture prices in Australia are not news-worthy here.

there might be more reasons for that specific product being so much cheaper in the US like a fire-sale because of a change of sortiments, but i can't say anything for that.

one thing is for sure though. they would not charge that much, if it wouldn't be a competitive price. so let me ask you: how much do their Australian competitors charge for a similar product? do they have American prices? 

There is no effective 'competitor' so they charge as much as they can until purchasers say..."fair suck of the sausage you thieving scum...it ain't worth it"... and go without.

That's the simple reason for their pricing...not value...just what they can get.

No, it wan't dissimilar products....dissimilar sales/whatever....same product...same shop/company...different price.

The exact same situation exists with Nike.  Again there is no LEGITIMATE  reason for their shoes to be twice the price in Australia than they are in the US ...they come from the same factory.

Difference is... I can buy a dozen pairs here in Oz...or I can fly to America myself...buy a dozen pairs...and fly back again....

WITH CHANGE.

That is simply wrong, and is under threat of extinction as a practise as more and more people simply buy via the Net...;)

But that's the very definition of value: 'what they can get'.  Just look at your average NBA or NFL player, as an extreme example.  It's not rational to apply our personal value judgments to what the market will support.  Certainly we are all entitled to our personal opinion of the value of a thing or person, but we shouldn't begrudge the value the market ascribes to it or them, or begrudge it or them for accepting it.

Also, the Australian consumers set those high prices too since they were the ones buying them at such a markup.  As soon as the Australians stop buying overpriced shoes and furniture, the prices will start dropping.

IKEA has 7 stores in Australia, their competitor Fantastic Furniture has more than 60.

i had a short look and the prices look pretty much the same. quality seems equally crappy. IKEA's stuff has better designs though.

i wonder why Fantastic Furniture doesn't have cheaper prices then, especially as Indonesia is so close?

and why is Billabong at least as expensive as Nike?

what i forgot when mentioning cultural differencies: prices in some countries are fixed (by law), while in other countries the are open to negotiations. even sales periods can be regulated by law.

moshi....give up.

I didn't realise you were such a fan of IKEA that you must cook up as much argument as you can in their defense.

If they hadn't been screwing the AUS customers they would not have bowed to the backlash of public disgust and magically lowered the prices.

Again, the difference in pricing of the IDENTICAL product from an IDENTICAL source was 300 percent.

There IS NO reason for that other than to ensure IKEA's founder remains one of the richest people on the planet.

no, actually i'm a fan of the local carpenter. only bought at IKEA when i was at university.

i dislike all those chain stores that make every inner city (or malls in the US) look alike. 

the only thing that i think is weird, is that in a country one of the world's highest standards of living, one of the cheapest stores gets hate for being to expensive. if costumers get screwed in your country, your local companies are worse. they set the price level before IKEA entered the market.

Yikes!

In the PC I have that has a UEFI Mobo, the UEFI is not accessible from Windows. Only at boot.

Its just an enhanced interface for otherwise keyboard only Bios, or basically I can use a mouse...which, in itself, is better.

I love it though, lots of features, and plenty of variables to tweak.

SS

Who made the MOBO?

Now finally the 'Microsoft is trying to destroy their competition in illegal ways' FUD can stop.

...not that it will, but it can.

This weekend, the Linux Foundation finally released its way to boot up Linux on a UEFI secure boot system, which Windows 8 uses. The files were launched late on Friday on the blog of James Bottomley, who has led the development of this project. The plan was actually announced in October, but technical issues had kept the files from being released until this weekend.

http://www.neowin.net/news/linux-foundation-releases-its-solution-to-boot-linux-on-windows-8-pcs