Let's take a moment to look at where things stand in the US with interchangeable lens Nikon cameras at the moment:
- J1--US$400 with 10-30mm lens
- J2--US$550 with 10-30mm lens
- V1--US$350 with 10-30mm lens
- V2--US$850 with 10-30mm lens
Anyone else notice something strange about that list? Yeah, the V1 is completely out of place in pricing. Nikon must have an awful lot of those in the warehouse.
- D3100--US$480 with 18-55mm
- D3200--US$600 with 18-55mm, extra stuff
- D5100--US$450 body only, US$550 with 18-55mm
- D5200--not available in the US
- D7000--US$900 body only, US$1299 with 18-105mm
- D300s--US$1700 body only
- D600--US$2000 (plus extra stuff), US$2500 with 24-85mm
- D800--US$3000 (plus extra stuff)
- D4--US$6000
I've noted before that Nikon's pricing model for DSLRs is a fairly regular curve (green is with kit lens, blue is body only). Indeed, take the D300s anomaly out of the current data and it's as regular a curve as usual, just lower at the starting point.
What's strange to me is the Nikon 1 versus DSLR pricing. The Nikon 1 models are very low cost to produce compared to the DSLRs. We're talking 300 parts versus 3000, we're talking about parts that scale significantly in price with size (sensor), and we're talking about simplified manufacturing using Nikon's lowest cost manufacturing plant. So why are the Nikon 1 models priced so high compared to DSLRs?
The simple fact of the matter is that US$500 to US$1000 is the sweet spot for camera makers. They've trained you to expect "serious cameras" to be in that price range, and they get healthy product margins when they can sell in that range.
But we're entering into a strange new world now. The 24mp D3200 is a darned competent camera. It's getting tougher and tougher to deferentiate at the bottom of the DSLR curve. Worse still, all the major online outlets seem to have moved to a 2% back in future purchases strategy, plus are sweetening deals with things like cards and cases.
Thus, this Christmas we're seeing the lowest effective prices yet for brand-spanking new, latest-and-greatest DSLR gear. Strip out the lens and resell it, subtract the sweeteners and the future discounts, and the effective body price of a D3200 is US$450 and that of the D600 is about US$1850. Those are, I believe historical lows for the latest-and-greatest in DX and FX from Canon or Nikon.
If we're already pressing hard on discounts now, what will the first quarter of 2013 look like? Hard to say, but as I've noted before, once heavy discounting is in place, it's difficult to get rid of it. The market basically has been trained to expect discounts now. Enjoy that as you shop for Christmas.