Meijer Discounts iPad 2 to $429, New iPad 3 Coming Soon?
A lot of people have wondered if the launch of the iPad 3 would result in sales discounts for the iPad 2 devices that are already in the channel. Normally this isn’t the trend we have witnessed coming out of Apple, but major retailer Meijer is balking that tradition and selling the 16GB iPad 2 with WiFi for USD $429.00 until February 25, 2012.
This USD $70.00 discount is pretty significant and may encourage sales of the iPad 2, but it may also backfire and cause people (myself included) to wonder if Meijer knows something we don’t know –are the iPad 3 devices even closer than we’ve heard rumored?
Other deals are out there right now too. It seems WalMart is offering a USD $50.00 gift card to those buying the Amazon Kindle Fire for the regular USD $199.00 price. Moves like this may be necessary for the other devices to compete and not lose any ground with the launch of the much-anticipated iPad 3.
Lower priced devices like the Kindle Fire will always have appeal for those not looking or able to spend the bigger dollars on the iPad and the impending release and surrounding media hype may also work in their favor as well because more consumers will be window-shopping and may just be persuaded that the smaller units will do the job ‘well enough’ (in fact a current television ad campaign has a mother indicating that she was able to buy 3 Kindle Fire devices to satisfy all of her children for the same price as as single iPad).
Whatever the motivation it’s certain that Meijer will see a lot of traffic from this promotion. I would say that if you are interested in grabbing an iPad 2 at this amazing sale price, you might want to act fast. I can’t imagine stock will last with that kind of discount.
