Lens price fixing? No package deals to be had anywhere!

Dave Lively wrote:

Package deals on high end gear like the lenses bought have always been pretty rare. Even with consumer grade cameras and lenses you usually have to buy a body as part of the package.

When stores were trying to get through their E-M5 stock, there were bundles that included various non-kit lenses (like the 17mm or 45mm F/1.8), although the only bundles involving the "pro" lenses were the (presumably) Olympus-sanctioned "elite" kits.

MAP (Minimum Advertised Price) is to blame for all the prices being the same. If you are a camera store that wants to carry Olympus products you have to play buy their rules and that includes letting them set the minimum price.

That sounds like a highly dubious, if not technically illegal, practice.

Meanwhile, here in Norway, one of the major retailers (let us call them "JP") clearly tracks the price of the other (let us call them "SP") and then lists any products that the latter has just discounted for 1 NOK less, obviously to get listed first in price aggregators and the like.

(Interestingly, having hiked their prices for the Sigma lenses back to the higher level - following their competitor closely, of course - those lenses still sit at the position in JP's price-sorted list of products that they would have if the price was still discounted, which is either a bug in their site software or reveals some kind of special price used for sorting, perhaps used to promote products. Or maybe it does indicate a willingness to haggle. )

I have read people that claim this is just the minimum advertised price and you can negotiate a better deal but without a "click here to bicker over price" button on their websites if you order online the MAP price is what you pay.

At least prices are low now due to the exchange rates. I am pretty sure that 12-40 you bought was close to $1000 not that long ago.

If your currency is strong and if the retailers don't intend to soak up the benefits, I guess you can get some good prices. Maybe there are benefits to going to old-fashioned stores after all. Indeed, I recently found that to be the case.