Sure they do - they just buy it in a JIT fashion. Someone orders the app, Apple supplies them a copy. The 'stock bought' is the payment to the wholesaler.
If you buy ten shirts from a wholesaler, they get paid for ten shirts. If you buy ten apps from a wholesaler, they get paid for ten apps.
I don't think a department store would necessarily take 30% of all sales made within it.
A department store has different expenses, but yes, a good quality department store will take that cut and higher.
Apple and Google are not just providing market space. They also provide quality review and payment processing. It's not like your Sunday market where you pay a fixed price, take a fixed amount of stock, and then spend your own time hawking your wares and dealing with payment. Instead it's a market where you supply your stock once and take royalties on it. Apple/Google take over some of the advertising and all of the payment processing. You don't have to worry about bad credit cards. Or making the payroll. Or keeping the servers up.
In fact, that's the better way to look at it - rather than a bricks-and-mortar store comparison, apps are more like music or prose. You do the work once. You can rerelease the work if you like. It's in your own interest to help market the work, but you don't have to. But once the work's done, you can just sit back and let someone else deal with making money for you if you like. That sounds more like royalty-based industries than brick-and-mortar shops.
And compared to other royalty-based industries, in this case it's the artists taking the corps to the cleaners!
Seriously though - they've sunk heavy investment into the product, why should they go for cut-throat margins in a booming industry? Besides, it comes off as whining for suppliers to have to pay a very normal fee for services supplied
>Sure they do - they just buy it in a JIT fashion. Someone orders the app, Apple supplies them a copy. The 'stock bought' is the payment to the wholesaler.
That's not a valid comparison. The retailer's markup includes the risk that they won't be able to sell the product.
Sure they do - they just buy it in a JIT fashion. Someone orders the app, Apple supplies them a copy. The 'stock bought' is the payment to the wholesaler.
If you buy ten shirts from a wholesaler, they get paid for ten shirts. If you buy ten apps from a wholesaler, they get paid for ten apps.
I don't think a department store would necessarily take 30% of all sales made within it.
A department store has different expenses, but yes, a good quality department store will take that cut and higher.
Apple and Google are not just providing market space. They also provide quality review and payment processing. It's not like your Sunday market where you pay a fixed price, take a fixed amount of stock, and then spend your own time hawking your wares and dealing with payment. Instead it's a market where you supply your stock once and take royalties on it. Apple/Google take over some of the advertising and all of the payment processing. You don't have to worry about bad credit cards. Or making the payroll. Or keeping the servers up.
In fact, that's the better way to look at it - rather than a bricks-and-mortar store comparison, apps are more like music or prose. You do the work once. You can rerelease the work if you like. It's in your own interest to help market the work, but you don't have to. But once the work's done, you can just sit back and let someone else deal with making money for you if you like. That sounds more like royalty-based industries than brick-and-mortar shops.
And compared to other royalty-based industries, in this case it's the artists taking the corps to the cleaners!
Seriously though - they've sunk heavy investment into the product, why should they go for cut-throat margins in a booming industry? Besides, it comes off as whining for suppliers to have to pay a very normal fee for services supplied