Reply from Sony Singapore

[wil 0]

" Dear Sir/Madam

 

Thank you for your interest in Sony products.

 

With regard to your enquiry, we regret to inform you that the Sony

Headphone MDR-SA1000/3000/5000 is currently not available in Singapore

and we do not have information pertaining to its availability in

Singapore.

 

As soon as announcements regarding new product introductions are made

available to the public, they can be found at http://www.sony.com.sg/

 

For your information, the decision to sell a particular Sony product is

determined not only by the local market conditions, but by the demand

for that product as well. Safety legislations in Singapore have to be

taken into consideration also.

 

Should you require any further assistance, please do not hesitate to

contact our hot-line at (65) 6544-8600, our Customer Service Agents will

be glad to assist you further.

 

We look forward to your continuous support for Sony products and

services.

 

Best regards "

 

Oh well...so i guess that's a no then

 

[idkfa 0]

That's not even a no. That's a "I don't know"...LOL I seriously doubt they'll bring in such a luxury class act into singapore. Market is simply not there.

[wil 0]

"Safety legislations"

 

[Rameish 0]

 

Dont they know about flagship marketing??

[wil 0]

too bad they dont know about our little community.

[Absolute0 0]

I reckon they think it's not worth the trouble. Even if they bring them in, the prices might not be as competitive as those of online stores.

 

The "safety legislations" part comes across as a standard reply format, though irrelevant in this case.

[renesis 0]

Just to let you guys know, I sent an enquiry to Sony Sg asking about the new Sony hdd player hd5, and I got exactly the same response. The copy of the message is below:

 

Thank you for your interesy in Sony products.

 

With regard to your enquiry, please be informed that we currently do not have information pertaining to the availability of Network Walkman NW-HD5 in Singapore.

 

As soon as announcements regarding new product introductions are made available to the public, they can be found at http://www.sony.com.sg/

 

For your information, the decision to sell a particular Sony product is determined not only by the local market conditions, but by the demand for that product as well. Safety legislations in Singapore have to be taken into consideration also.

 

The part where it says availability of.... is exactly what I typed into the form. So I think it's a standard response they send out. But considering the HD3 only came out not too long ago, I'd doubt they want to release the HD5 so quickly.

 

But given the time the SA series may be released, as there are lots of products that aren't released in the normal channels, that's atleast what I think, but correct me if I am wrong.

[idkfa 0]

Cut and paste answer.

[Blues 0]

[av98m 0]

This reminds me of the fact that most of my expensive consumer items are purchased online. For the very simple reason that local retailers think the items I want are not feasible/too troublesome to bring in. And many of them complain that sales are bad. I wonder why.

[idkfa 0]

Well, do you think it's worth bringing in the SA5000 if only 2 persons gonna buy it and 64 other will only fiddle with it? Sometimes I think the local sony doing the market analysis somewhat already knew ppl are not going to spend their singapore dollars on such items. And I don't think their focus group consists of even of one member in SGheadphones. How to convince them? Unless the Marketing director for sony is a head-fier and is a fanatic here in SGh.

 

 

OR, we could keep spamming Sony with the same email Wil wrote? 1300++ members=1300++ emails. That'll surely provoke some response.

Edited May 5, 2005 by idkfa

[av98m 0]

Marketing analysis is not my area of expertise so I'll not comment on it. I really have no idea how local distributors do their research, but let me illustrate the point was I making earlier with some examples:

 

I have stopped buying cds locally for a while because local stores are very reluctant to order titles they do not have and in many cases even if they agree they end up forgetting to inform you when items arrive, or even forgetting to order the items (This has happened to me numerous times with HMV, and a few times with Gramaphone. I know the high staff turnover at HMV ensures that confusion will reign). Instead I simply order from places like amazon.com. Speed, convenience and decent service. To spread out the cost of shipping, I also include titles that I could have bought locally. So, because I cannot get 1 or 2 cds that I want, I also avoid buying say, the 6 other cds that I want that are available, and purchase the whole lot from someplace else.

 

I also remember back during the days when I was an MD user(from 1996 onwards), all the really nice looking players by sony and other brands were never available in Singapore, only the butt ugly ones made it here. Same with the blank MDs. Nice ones with interesting color schemes never made their way here. My friends and I had to depend on some mutual friends who travel frequently to get our stuff from either Japan or Hong Kong. Not sure what the situation is like currently. MD is almost dead right?

 

Same thing with toys and collectibles. To get the really nice and more sought after items, you could never ever depend on the Singapore agent and again had to go through overseas sources (e.g. Hasbro Singapore sucks big time. the local specialty shops usually deal with Hasbro Hong Kong or some other agent).

 

I could go on ad nausem, but I'll stop here.

Edited May 5, 2005 by av98m

[idkfa 0]

LOL. I get what you mean. It's sad to know that the higher percentage of the local market are based on practicality and function, and not so much of design and luxury. How many japanese cars can you spot in a day? But this is very contradictory to the ipod disease. Anyway, I do agree with you that online purchase is a more personal and offers you more choices. I will never want to wait for the local to bring them in. By that time, it's already so passe.

 

Hasbro??=] I know those people. Perhaps they are too small an office to handle such things. They just bring in whatever the local department stores demand. I could go on with whatever goes on behind the company but that's just out of point. So, what toys are you into? Hasbro eh? Transformers? G.I.Joe? I hope not StikFast.

 

Btw, MD is still so hot here in japan. They form the higher percentage of the CD, Cassette and MP3 players.

[Rameish 0]

av98m,

 

Unlike you I happen to be in advertising (the major marketing tool) for many a year (more than a decade - lets leave it at that). In all my years in advertising only twice did I encounter a client (company) every doing market research - once back in 1989 for a cigeratte brand. And another when Mac Donalds decided to do localized advertising and not slavishly using the american ads.

 

Most other companies do straw polls, or very limited interview with exisiting customers "research".

 

Most however depend on their marketing team's guesswork. Often this team will "discuss" at a meeting with their senior VP on the relative merits of one strategy or the other. At the slightest hint that the boss' opnion is going one way. The rest of the team from VP to senior managers to execs will have a race to the finish to agree with their boss' opinion and publicly declare that that has been their opinion all along - even if they were arguing a different opinion 10 mins prior to their boss' arrival into the meeting room. I have never seen such beautiful backflips and 180 dregree turns even in the Olympics.

 

As part of the advertising agency team it used to surprise me, then ammuse me and towards the end of my advertising career we use to take bets before going into the meeting room on which of our clients (ie which manager, VP or exec) will be the first to the 180 degree turn.

 

[av98m 0]

LOL. I get what you mean. It's sad to know that the higher percentage of the local market are based on practicality and function, and not so much of design and luxury. How many japanese cars can you spot in a day? But this is very contradictory to the ipod disease. Anyway, I do agree with you that online purchase is a more personal and offers you more choices. I will never want to wait for the local to bring them in. By that time, it's already so passe.

 

Hasbro??=] I know those people. Perhaps they are too small an office to handle such things. They just bring in whatever the local department stores demand. I could go on with whatever goes on behind the company but that's just out of point. So, what toys are you into? Hasbro eh? Transformers? G.I.Joe? I hope not StikFast.

 

Btw, MD is still so hot here in japan. They form the higher percentage of the CD, Cassette and MP3 players.

I like starwars and various japanese toys.

 

What's wrong with Stikfas?

 

P.S. Believe it or not, most of the first stikfas diorama photos that appeared in the magazine Toyfare were taken by me!