Nikon Sale - some new lowest ever prices

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Dave Stargazer

Dave Stargazer

A Tiger, apparently
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BH sent an email, and well personally, I didn't expect Nikon to re-up their sale so quickly. And some lenses lower prices than ever before. A non-comprehensive list, but ones that could be of interest to the group:

100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 $2300 - $500 off - first big sale of this lens
400mm f/4.5 $2800 - $450 off
600mm f/6.3 $3800 - $1k off
600mm f/4 $14000 - $1500 off
800mm f/6.3 $5500 - $1k off

I didn't get the 600mm f/6.3 before...will I now? 😎

If you buy be sure to use Steve's BH affliate link!
https://bhpho.to/461XgHx

Cheers!
 
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Is Viltrox about to announce competition to the PF glass? Maybe Nikons trying to sell as many of the PF line as they can before that happens.

With that Viltrox 135 1.8 it’s probably a matter of time before we see telephotos of that quality probably at half the price of the Nikon primes. They’re all made in China and the Chinese definately know how to manufacture first rate optics these days.

I own a Plena already but I’m really curious how that 135 1.8 stacks up against it for less than half the price. It already looks to outperform the Sony 135 1.8.

For now I would really like to pick up a 400 4.5 or 600 6.3. I tried the 180-600 but it just was not much of an improvement optically over my 150-600 Sigma, great in all the handling, motors and VR but the final output looked nearly identical.

I’m hoping the primes have a decent jump in optical/image rendering over the 180-600.
 
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Cameron T said:
Doubt it. Pf lenses are expensive and require a lot more work than knockoff Chinese lenses.
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That knockoff 135 1.8 is currently better than the Sony which is a $2000 lens, for half and likely will be extremely close or match the Plena when we see it on Nikon mount which is announced.

They’ve already proven they can do it.

I’m sure German lens manufacturers were saying the same thing as Japan stole most of the market out from them with “cheap knockoffs”.

It really looks like we’re about to see the same thing with Japanese lenses as the Chinese go after higher end lens markets.

They’re the ones manufacturing the PF lenses already after all.

The Japanese major brands showed them how to manufacture them by building factory’s there for the labor price to increase profits. The major Chinese brands, possibly with state subsidies, will be more than happy to build the same thing and keep less profit margin.

If Sigma can build in Japan still for way lower prices than Nikon sells for ( 150-600 is made in Japan for $900) then imagine the markup that Nikons got on made in China PF lenses and the 180-600 which is made in China as well.

The door is wide open for Viltrox to undercut them with an equal quality product any time now.

With the frequent deep sales Nikon keeps having I imagine they have really high markups over per item cost on these lenses and are trying to capture sales before this happens, because there’s no way they won’t lose a lot of PF sales to Viltrox or another who enters the market with a similar product at half the price as they just did with the 135 1.8.

Nikon may have this frequent sales strategy in place to try and ward off the Chinese brands. The recent 1.4s and the almost always on sale 28/40 inexpensive primes seem built for that purpose.
 
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That's weird. I looked at some of the sale prices on that website, and that's more or less what has been ongoing here since December or even earlier, without any interruption. Would Nikon be kinder to Europe, for a change?

That 105 mm macro is so tempting...

PS: If Canon does really start manufacturing its products abroad to reduce its costs, perhaps Nikon will have to make those sales more frequent. ;)
 
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Unscript said:
That's weird. I looked at some of the sale prices on that website, and that's more or less what has been ongoing here since December or even earlier, without any interruption. Would Nikon be kinder to Europe, for a change?

That 105 mm macro is so tempting...

PS: If Canon does really start manufacturing its products abroad to reduce its costs, perhaps Nikon will have to make those sales more frequent. ;)
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Maybe the PF lenses are not selling as well as they’d like. We’ve likely got a point where the majority moving to mirrorless have and already bought the lenses intended. My guess is the high priced primes sales have seriously slowed.

High price lenses like the PF are in a weird spot as the buyers of the “best” will probably go for the TC primes while the “good enough” crowd buy the 180-600 and stop there. The PF line is still really expensive for most camera buyers and the difference between the 180-600 and 600/400 is not night and day for a quality difference for normal people comparing. The average person looking at images from either probably can’t tell them apart.

I wonder just how big the pool of potential buyers for PF is given Nikons market share and the TC buyers who won’t bother with them and the 180-600 crowd who can’t becuase it’s a huge financial strain or won’t because they are just happy enough with that lens and can’t justify the price/performance difference.
 
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Larry S said:
…a bunch of new stuff coming from Nikon….🤔….house cleaning?🤣
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Probably sales have slowed as the majority have completed the DSLR switch and already bought the lenses they wanted.

Honestly the overall sales are probably going to decline as that transitions completely and we’ll see the actual steady state ILC market.
 
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Lee R said:
Probably sales have slowed as the majority have completed the DSLR switch and already bought the lenses they wanted.

Honestly the overall sales are probably going to decline as that transitions completely and we’ll see the actual steady state ILC market.
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Most likely Lee….and, as in most manufacturing, a saturation point looms from sales analysis that alters the production decisions…
 
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JoelKlein said:
Wow
What’s the purpose of such an aggressive sale?
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Cameron T said:
Because the US dollar is really strong and converts to more yen right now, so they can make the same amount of yen charging fewer dollars, and it moves inventory reducing their ongoing cost.
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Nikon's current financial year ends on 31st March, so lowering prices on hot items - including current and expensive telephotos - helps to increase their key indicators of turnover and total revenue and profit etc

Nikon has a history of raising it's prices, so they may go up later this year, which also persuades GAS sufferers to stretch to expensive products

I don't recall a 400 E or 600 E ever being on special pre covid ....these were special order items, although it was possible to try and negotiate a discount through one's local retailer where you were a loyal customer.

The market certainly is different today.
 
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Lee R said:
I’m weighing the 600PF or 400 right now as I don’t think the 180-600 is the one for me. So this sales got me tempted but it’s right after the holidays so terrible timing.
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The 600 PF is super though I’m intrigued to learn why the 186 isn’t in consideration? I’ve owned the 400 f/4.5 twice and have sold it each time. The MFD and CA ruined an otherwise good lens. Shoot a backlit scene once and you’ll hate this lens.
 
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ajrmd said:
The 600 PF is super though I’m intrigued to learn why the 186 isn’t in consideration? I’ve owned the 400 f/4.5 twice and have sold it each time. The MFD and CA ruined an otherwise good lens. Shoot a backlit scene once and you’ll hate this lens.
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I rented it and found optically the 186 was barely different than the Sigma 150-600 I already own. I’m looking for a decent bump optically to differentiate from that lens. I shoot that the majority of the time at 500-600 so the 600pf would make sense. This sale is very tempting.
 
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ajrmd said:
The 600 PF is super though I’m intrigued to learn why the 186 isn’t in consideration? I’ve owned the 400 f/4.5 twice and have sold it each time. The MFD and CA ruined an otherwise good lens. Shoot a backlit scene once and you’ll hate this lens.
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My guess is the 186 is a lower margin product for Nikon. If it's already selling well, they would have good reason to push other lenses that enjoy better margins. The idea of "mix" is important for manufacturing firms - not all products have the same margin, and if they can shift their mix in the right way, overall profit margins go up while selling the same portfolio of products.
 
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