All true enough, but I'll still betcha that if we knew the facts in this
case, it still boils down to a very small Canadian market. I think you're
missing the mark on the washing machine illustration, though. Canadians pay
very much higher taxes on goods than do Americans and thus enjoy publically
funded medicare, amongst other things, which Americans don't. Hence, right
off the bat, we have a big price differential just because of taxes. There
is the matter of currency exchange rates and also don't forget that the
retail system is rigged so that the bigger markets get better breaks from
the manufacturers than do the smaller markets. Above all, I'll bet that if
the sales ratio for CP-CN plastic models here in Canada was on the same
ratio per capita in the UK that the Brits would be suffering considerably
less satisfaction. And again I say, the Brits are a bit paranoid about this
sort of thing - North Americans are less fussy on the whole and will still
buy the stuff where the Brits may be considerably less likely to buy
anything that isn't "just right." On second thought - that may be the nub
of the difference right there.
Joe Smuin
----- Original Message -----
From: "Roger T." <rogertra@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <cpsig@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Sunday, July 23, 2006 1:34 AM
Subject: Re: RE: [cpsig] HO Intermountain CPR FP7 and F7B
The trouble for modellers of CN and CP is
that we are simply lumped in with the much larger US market simply because
we don't account for enough sales and the general North American market
won't pay a premium for high quality - unlike the Brits - this is why we
have brass models for the North American perfectionists.
Good quality UK model goes for around UKP65, including taxes. That's
around Can$130.00 and would include taxes. We are expected to pay
Can$150.00, plus taxes, for a less than accurate "Canadian" model?
I once heard a Canadian appliance distributor, when asked by a CBC
interviewer why prices for washers and dryers were so much higher in Canada
than the U.S., when they all came from the same plant in southern California
say, "Of course, Canadians are conditioned to accept higher prices."
We also seem to be conditioned to accept lesser quality at a higher price
and are expected to be grateful for it.
Cheers
Roger T.
Home of the Great Eastern Railway
http://www.highspeedplus.com/~rogertra/
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