Amazon is off to another abysmal launch with latest their flagship notetaking Kindle. I remember when Amazon first came out with the Kindle Scribe and they released it with half-finished software, and that gave it a bad reputation from the start that still hasn’t faded.
Now Amazon is shooting themselves in the foot again with the botched release of their new color model, the Kindle Scribe Colorsoft. Once again they rushed it to the market before it was ready, and now customers that want to order one can’t get it delivered in a timely manner, or even a reasonable manner.
Amazon just released the fig-colored Kindle Scribe Colorsoft last week and it’s already on backorder for the next 2-3 months. Amazon currently lists the shipping date as April 13 – May 13.
It’s the same story with the shipping date for the graphite-colored 64GB model, and it was released nearly 2 months ago. It’s not like they’re selling a ton of these; the graphite model is only listed as selling 1k+ units during the past month, which is super low for a Kindle (but the fig model hit 2k+ in under a week).
Why even bother releasing a product that isn’t available to ship for another 2-3 months? They announced the Kindle Scribe Colorsoft back in September for crying out loud. Amazon was in such a rush to get it on the market, they didn’t seem to care if they’d actually have any inventory to sell or not. What kind of way is that to do business? It’s just making the brand look bad, and people are going to be hesitant to take Kindles seriously.
I don’t know if Amazon’s plan is to create an artificial demand by making the new Kindle Scribes hard to get, but I don’t think that’s going to work. There just aren’t very many people willing to pay $679 for a Kindle. That’s why it’s puzzling they’d release it when they clearly don’t have enough inventory to fulfill orders. Give people time to think about it and they’ll likely buy something else instead of waiting another 3 months after it’s already been over 4 months since the new Kindle Scribes were announced.
On the positive side, the 32GB Kindle Scribe Colorsoft only has a 2-3 week shipping delay currently. Amazon has sold just 500+ units during the past month, so you’d think they could do better than that, but that’s what happens when you release a product that isn’t ready to ship yet. Maybe 8 months after announcing the new color Kindle Scribes they’ll actually have some in stock for longer than a week to meet demand. They still haven’t even released them internationally yet. Maybe a year after the announcement they’ll get around to that, and by then they’ll already have a new model in the works…
I am frustrated with Amazon too, and I don’t have any doubts they are at least partly to blame for poor situation with the new Scribes. However, I wonder how much of this is that there is just one screen supplier (i.e., E Ink). Other ereader manufacturers also appear to do foolish things at times, but maybe the underlying problem is with E Ink.
IF Amazon wanted screens from E-Ink THEN they would get them. No vendor says no to the largest retailer on the planet. If nothing else, Amazon could buy that company for pocket change. Your analysis doesn’t make a lot of sense.
BUT what DOES make sense is that Kindle is in the Amazon doghouse; on account of them losing money on each device; the hardware group is being propped up by the bookstore. SO they’ve got limited resources from the company and THAT means limited product runs.
The bigger picture is that it’s only a question of time before Amazon either sells the Kindle product line or it goes the way of the Fire Phone: Amazon doesn’t like losing money on a product line..
That their bookstore is now selling epubs is the first step in that bigger picture.
Just because Amazon has the money to buy E Ink doesn’t mean that they could. Even if Amazon could gain control of E Ink, this wouldn’t make any problems E Ink might have (e.g. manufacturing capacity or technical issues) instantly go away.
Major Key Alert:
Jeff Bezos, please come back.
And it’s not even out anywhere but in the US.
I’ve not seen such an amateurish looking launch in ages.
They just canceled my order for the 32gb scheduled for delivery tomorrow, saying that the shipper cannot ship to my address in Colorado. Cool!
They cancelled my order for the 64bg Graphite model. I ordered it on Jan 6. Customer service was no help at all, basically told me to go to the end of the line. Amazon is seriously decreasing in quality of service as of late.