I have a few Russian friends, and they have all become very interested in Apple products, and more specifically, Macs...

This is a good thing for Apple, because it is not very present abroad, except for countries like the UK or France...

F*ing Apple IMC is one and only reason why so small number of Macs here, in Russia. Just imagine - MacBook costs $1100 in US (street price) and near $2000 (dealer's price!!!).
Apple's best mistake is missing in Russia. This is a country of fans & revolutions. It's real Apple mentality

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Guest wrote:
F*ing Apple IMC is one and only reason why so small number of Macs here, in Russia. Just imagine - MacBook costs $1100 in US (street price) and near $2000 (dealer's price!!!).
Apple's best mistake is missing in Russia. This is a country of fans & revolutions. It's real Apple mentality

Aren't duties usually imposed by the importing country? What does this have to do with Apple?

It's not just the duties (which vary from country to country), it's also the markups that the representative applies which are often more than what Apple would apply itself.

I'm talking about you, Renaissance.

All Apple products are nearly twice more expensive in Russia. For whatever reason they're being re-imported via Europe. That is, all MacBooks, for example, are being shipped to Europe from China, and then from there - to Russia. Why not to ship it _directly_ to Russia, then? The duties would have been A LOT less, and the whole shipping cost would have gone significantly down.

Also not the latest factor in this plays the fact that Russian companies are usually super greedy and where American company would make 10% profits and would be happy about it, Russian companies like to make 50-100 and more per cent profits on each sold unit.

Scr@w the Russians

Starting with the nannies working in the U.S.

The Russian just killed a dissenter in London.

http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110009305

And deserve to be kicked out of the G8 and the WTO.

And they don't deserve to have Apple computers.

They would hack them, and develop malaware, and viruses for Macs.

F@ck Vladimir Putin and his nation of thieves and murderers.

The cold war ain't over -- and they are still the enemy.

Let them use Windows cr@p. And have them stay in the microsoft ghetto.

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Anonymous wrote:
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There are idiots in every village. Leave him to his prejudices - I bet he doesn't want to listen to anyone else's point of view. With a bit of luck, he won't come back. There's no arguing with fools like that.

As for the topic, I wonder how much influence Apple can, or wants to, bring over distributors with their pricing policys. Do they bother? It's different in countries that have a direct Apple presence, because there is natural competition. Where there's only one provider and nothing to cap them, the prices creep up.

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Please don't respond to his rants. And please, please don't quote his message again. If you want to go on about it, register with TMO and take it to another forum. But not here.

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LaurieF wrote:
Please don't respond to his rants. And please, please don't quote his message again. If you want to go on about it, register with TMO and take it to another forum. But not here.

It is not only in Russia prices are totally surreal. I have been to Brazil and it is the same there.
I am not so sure whether taxes, duties etc. play such a significant role. I read some place that companies often charge whatever they can until someone shout stop - or people stop buying the products. If that is the case, it is sheer stupidity since one wouldn't know how much they would sell if the prices were more reasonable.
If Apple is interested in increasing their global market share, I think they have to take a closer look into the deals they may have with others around this planet.
One should also take into consideration that the Mac ecosystem or whatchamacallit, is not as well developed around in various European countries as it is in the US, for instance, making it more difficult and more expensive to maintain a Mac, to look for expansion possibilities and replacement parts etc. At the same time, this is no problem on the PC-side.

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Anonymous wrote:
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At least russian kids do not go on shooting rampages in their schools, and Putin, while might not be the most likeable person, is not as dumb as Bush is.

Please keep political opinions out of the general threads. Put them in the appropriate forum if you feel the need.

Oh my... Such nonsense...

Anyway, more and more people wishing to buy Macs go and do it in the USA. In France, the prices are identical to those in the USA, however, they are in €s...

So basically 25% more expensive. And this is Apple's own prices, not those of some distributor.