The good times for Apple fans are about to end

Consumer technology, for some reason, lends itself to passionate, heavily partisan disagreement. And one of the most common arguments among tech fans centers on Apple’s prices, and whether or not they’re fair.

Here at Macworld Towers (a home for open-minded skeptics rather than fanboys), we’ve generally held the belief that the Apple Tax is a myth. Apple products tend to be at the upper end of the price range for their category, but they deliver a quality experience that justifies this. In recent months, the company has even learned the meaning of the word bargain.

That’s not to say Apple never pushes its luck, price-wise. High-priced wheel kits, dongles, and polishing cloths are all good examples of its fondness for the high-margin add-on, a strategy which can sometimes look rather cheap. But on the big-ticket items, at least in recent years, Apple consistently delivers solid value for money.

Apple’s ability to do this while simultaneously making historic amounts of cash quarter after quarter is dependent on a great deal of logistical know-how. It’s no surprise that the CEO who has guided the company to unprecedented financial success came from the operations side, not product development. Apple’s success is built on the power of its supply chain and on its ability to secure the very best deals with suppliers, both strengths of Tim Cook.

Those deals, and that operational efficiency, are how Apple has managed to resist the effects of the ongoing RAM crisis for so long. While other companies have pushed up prices or simply run out of stock, Cupertino has largely held steady. In some cases, it’s had to withdraw certain product configurations, but through it all, Apple has managed to avoid the price rises which customers feared.

Until now.

Last week, Tim Cook, that very same operational wizard, gave an interview in which he discussed the RAM crisis. He compared it to a “hundred-year flood” and said he hasn’t seen anything like it in 40 years. And if that sounds like the sort of thing someone says to prepare you for bad news… well, it was. Apple price rises, Cook admitted, are unavoidable.

Now that we know price hikes are inevitable, the big question is when. According to Bloomberg reporter Mark Gurman, the answer is soon, and maybe very soon. His rationale is twofold: firstly, Cook has no reason to talk about this gloomy subject unless it’s both imminent and unavoidable, and secondly, Apple can use its summer back-to-school sale to tie in with the changes and somewhat ease the blow for customers. Last year, the school sale started in the U.S. on June 17, so we could be looking at price hikes as early as this week. (In fact, one of my colleagues suspects that the sale may have been delayed so that Apple can update prices across the board.)

It’s worth mentioning that while Gurman has an excellent track record as a leaker, he doesn’t seem to be basing this prediction on inside sources. He just seems to be thinking out loud based on the rationale above. But the thinking makes sense.

When the CEO admits that a company is about to do something that customers won’t like, it can be very disruptive. Shareholders will be unhappy, share prices will probably fall, and there will be pushback, gloating, and unhelpful chin-stroking commentary online. You can decide where to categorize the article you’re currently reading.

In the short term, a warning of upcoming problems may actually boost sales, as customers rush to make their purchases before the Bad Thing happens. (This may indeed turn out to be a blessing in disguise for a certain third-party retailer planning a slew of discounts on Apple products for Prime Day this week.) But this won’t last for long, and it makes very little sense for Cook to reveal the bad news, then have it hang over the company for months on end. If it’s got to the point where Cook feels he has to spill the beans, realistically, Gurman is probably right that price hikes are coming very soon.

The consolation for Apple customers is that, just as we were spoiled in the early phase of the RAM crisis, we’re likely to do better than most when it comes to an end. Those preferential supplier contracts haven’t evaporated overnight. Suppliers simply can’t deliver components at the same prices, even to their most favored clients. But when stock levels recover, it’ll be Apple at the front of the line for business-as-usual pricing.

So yes, the good times are about to end for Apple fans. But hopefully it won’t be too bad, or last too long. And for those who are angry about the global component shortage, at least we have the consolation that the RAM is going where it’s really needed: vast, environmentally damaging AI datacenters. Three cheers for that.

Welcome to our weekly Apple Breakfast column, which includes all the Apple news you missed last week in a handy bite-sized roundup. We call it Apple Breakfast because we think it goes great with a Monday morning cup of coffee or tea, but it’s cool if you want to give it a read during lunch or dinner hours too.

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