Home office products’ prices and availability – ANALYSIS

The consumer electronics industry is seeing a boom in the times of the pandemic. This category of products also includes equipment designed for working from home, such as, for instance, laptops, mobile phones, printers or headphones – preferably cordless. Let’s look at the prices and availability of these products during the lockdown, when most people are working remotely.

 

Electronics for remote work – prices and availability

We have already prepared two guides on how to effectively monitor prices of consumer electronics products: for e-shops and for brands. Since March we have recorded a major increase in the demand for products essential for remote work. During this period, entire offices were switching into the home-office mode, reorganising their work almost overnight. Because of the need to purchase the equipment quickly, the companies did not have time to put out tenders or negotiate prices with the manufacturers and simply bought the goods in online shops. Read our comparison and check how the prices changed in each of the categories.

 

Prices of laptops during the pandemic

The chart below shows a top-shelf laptop – ASUS FX505DV-AL014T AMD R7-3750H/16G/SSD512/2060. In February, the top retailers reduced its price due to increased discounting and an intense battle for customers. In March, when companies began to prepare for home-office work, there were first cases of product stock-outs, resulting in price rises. As more expensive goods usually correspond with a lower price sensitivity of the consumers, the lockdown did not cause a price war.

 

The next laptop, HUAWEI MATEBOOK D15 BOHRK-WAQ9BR RYZEN 5 3500/8G/256G/INT, is a popular mid-priced product. It was introduced to many stores during the increased demand for laptops before the lockdown. The chart below shows the price competition and increased sensitivity of the consumers to price changes – the lower the prices, the higher the demand.

 

The APPLE MVFH2ZE/A AIR 13 I5 1.6GHZ/128/8GB/617 SPACE GREY laptop is a premium product that serves as an example of goods whose prices went up shortly before they were radically reduced. The aim of this strategy was probably to lure the customers to buy the product by using the crossed-out price trick.

 

 

Prices of printers during the pandemic

The outbreak of the pandemic not only forced companies to work from home but also limited the business of print and copy places. This, in addition to home office, increased the demand for printers and other office equipment. Looking at the EPSON L805 printer, we can see that the increase in demand caused an increase in prices, with the exception of several promotional campaigns. During the lockdown, this product also appeared in some of the shops in which it had not been previously sold.

 

A similar situation could be observed with HP LASER 107 – an inexpensive laser printer. The chart below shows a significant growth in prices related to the increase in demand. The dashed lines indicate product stock-outs on the particular days. When the product was unavailable for some period, the consumers who waited for the prices to drop felt obliged to make a rapid purchase when the product was once again in stock.

 

 

Prices of Bluetooth headphones during the pandemic

In the comparison below, we focused on headphones with the Bluetooth function, which are the best option for working from home. Such products quickly lose their value – the choice is huge, innovations are constantly introduced, and products that have been present on the market for too long suffer from price erosion. New and more expensive products are launched regularly, which means that the prices of the old models are quickly reduced.

The chart below shows the sales of the JBL BLUETOOTH E45BT headphones. In this case, the price reduction was visible long before the coronavirus – the prices had been gradually decreasing since last year. Here, the higher demand does not increase prices, on the contrary – the prices are still decreasing. This is related to the fact that there are many similar products available on the market and the competition is fierce.

 

The sales of the next model, HUAWEI BLUETOOTH AM61, are much the same. In the chart below, we see that more shops have this product in stock this year.

 

The situation was similar in the case of premium headphones, such as the SENNHEISER BLUETOOTH HD 450 BT model. Here, the price variations were smaller and less frequent as it is a premium category. There is a lower demand for this kind of products, and they are available in a smaller number of shops. The risk of price erosion is also accordingly smaller, and in case of some of the premium products this effect is not even noticeable. The incidental price decreases are simply caused by one-time promotional campaigns.

 

The analysis was based on monitoring top Polish consumer electronics retailers.

Contact us, if you want to know the details related to the sales of particular products from your industry. At Dealavo, we offer a variety of tools for automatic and comprehensive price monitoring that will help you manage your prices and promotions more effectively.

 

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