The reality is that logistically It's easier and cheaper for at least most orgs to sell in bulk to a finite number of distributors to allow each to do what they do best, most economically, and at the highest efficiency. Beagle.org is in the business of design and production of small electronic computer boards. Companies like Arrow, RS Components, Mouser, Digikey, Element14, & Newark while one may percieve them as being in the electronics business are actually in the logistics and distrubution business, not electronics and they do an economic and efficient job of doing just that. the reality is that with minor adjustments they could probably do the same with next year's potato crop. Even the Rasberry Pi foundation realizes this and does not sell one offs directly. The point is it's generally best to allow each entity to concentrate on what they are best at. That said, It's probably best for beagleboard.org to concentrate upon excellence in board design and manufacture and allow the distributors to perform the logistical duties of distribution at which they excel. It provides a better, lower cost product that reaches the consumer faster by dividing things up this way. That's just business.
Eric . On Thu, Jan 23, 2014 at 11:23 AM, Venkat Bommakanti <[email protected]> wrote: > Interesting... > That link points to a $10 markup - a 22% profit margin (assuming they buy > for $45 like all of us :-) > There's also a link to an Amazon-based supplier, charging a $14 markup - a > 31% profit margin. > > Some markup is reasonable, but these above examples feel like outright greed > driven - on the backs of a non-profit org... Feels like these guys are > abusing distributor privileges. > > I think folks would rather pay those artificial premiums to > http://beagleboard.org/ towards supporting software dev ;?) Even a small $10 > premium, over say 30,000 future units would fetch enough to hire 2~3 > fulltime developers. > > Why doesn't the org setup a paypal acct or some such, and have individuals > directly buy from them - maybe charging a reasonable amount for S/H > overheads, even using the help of volunteers. > > /venkat > > On Thursday, January 23, 2014 9:02:42 AM UTC-8, David Anders wrote: >> >> ... >> https://specialcomp.com/beaglebone/index.htm >> ... > > > -- > For more options, visit http://beagleboard.org/discuss > --- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "BeagleBoard" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. -- For more options, visit http://beagleboard.org/discuss --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "BeagleBoard" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
