If you are looking for one of Amazon’s lower-priced Kindle e-readers, you soon may only have to look as far as your neighborhood Staples retail location, the giant office supply company announced Tuesday. Staples’ 1,550 locations this fall will carry Amazon’s recently reduced-priced $139 Kindle, as well as the $189 Kindle 3G and $379 Kindle DX.
The Staples tie-up makes the second bricks-and-mortar retailer offering the Kindle. Earlier this year, Amazon announced its device would be sold by Target.
In response to Amazon, Borders said it will cut its Kobo reader to $129, down from $149. Additionally, the low-end Aluratek Libre reader will sell for $99, a drop from $120.
The Staples announcement, timed to take advantage of the upcoming holiday buying season, is just the latest jockeying by e-reader makers. In June, Barnes & Noble’s Nook fell to $149, a move matched by Amazon, which cut the Kindle from $259 to $189 – $149 for the Wi-Fi only version.
The impact of the price cuts may not be known. Indeed, earlier this month, Amazon touted the Kindle as one of its “best-selling product” but refused to offer any numbers to back up the claim.
[Barron’s, All Things Digital]
Ed Sutherland is a veteran technology journalist who first heard of Apple when they grew on trees, Yahoo was run out of a Stanford dorm and Google was an unknown upstart. Since then, Sutherland has covered the whole technology landscape, concentrating on tracking the trends and figuring out the finances of large (and small) technology companies.
