Equinox Sees Another Price Hike

[☠ Cipher]

I just happened to notice that both Equinox models went up another $50, from $949 to $999 for the 800. That makes a $100 price increase since it was launched at $899. I saw the first price hike as possibly a little opportunism, taking advantage of the popularity of the model, and lack of competition. This one I assume is related to the price increase and super high demand for chips. Garrett also raised their prices. Still, this would seem an inopportune time to raise prices. The Legend at $635 so far seems to be running neck and neck with the Equinox 800 performance wise, but with a higher build integrity. There are an awful lot of people talking about selling the Equinox they already have to buy a Legend. Prospective buyers now also have to consider a $364 price difference on top of it. The Equinox 600 now sits at $699, still $64 more than a Legend with less features and the same build quality concerns. Gas prices are up, inflation is soaring, and the competition has caught up. Seems like it would’ve been a better decision to give up a little profit margin, not raise prices, particularly where the volume of future sales is now in doubt. Garrett’s decision is also puzzling in light of the Simplex. They have to be feeling it right in the AT. It would seem that if the Simplex wasn’t the final nail in that series, the Legend might be.

The Equinox now also has competition from XP with the Deus II. Contact the right dealer and you could have a Deus II for as low as $1450-$1500. Buy an Equinox 800 at $1000 and you may have to invest another couple hundred to address build issues. The actual difference between the two may be less than it first appears, for a machine with 6 times the underwater depth rating, also so far running neck and neck performance wise, and at times with a notable advantage. That’s my take anyway. It just seems like bad business to make a key product less attractive by raising the price with no change or improvement to known issues. 

[phrunt]

I think a bulk of the Equinox sales have already taken place.  Most who wanted one already have one.  Sure there are always new to detecting people that may buy one, realistically sales of the Nox must have slowed significantly the past year or two after the initial flurry, it's over 4 years old now, current sales would be nothing like they were a few years ago.  A price increase isn't likely to change their sales much I would guess.  If someone buys one now it's more than likely because they want one, not because it's the current flavour of the month and they're being influenced by trending Youtube videos and reviews from the influencers that are generally always on the newer detectors to market.

The Equinox 800 price rises you're seeing are almost certainly due to shipping costs, it's $1099 in Australia in Australian dollars so that makes it about $825 USD for the Nox 800 in Australia.

The Legend is $949 AUD for the standard model in Australia, not all that much different to the Nox where as the XP Deus 2 is $2499 AUD in Australia, a big jump in price and not really even close to being in the same ball park although the CTX is still $2695 AUD so more in line with the Deus 2.

[mh9162013]

Presumably the price hikes are due to inflation, supply-chain and COVID-related pressures. But I agree that there's probably more going on, like the psycological effect it would have on potential customers or mainting a particular "image" with a certain price level.

I think Garrett's price hike is especially atrocious. I don't care if their costs of production have gone up...their machines were already overpriced by 50-200%. So these higher costs of production are just "economic karma" in my opinion.

[Rick N. MI]

With the sale probably going down on the Equinox you would think the price would come down. 

[GB_Amateur]

7 hours ago, ☠ Cipher said:

The Legend at $635 so far seems to be running neck and neck with the Equinox 800 performance wise, but with a higher build integrity.

Comparing the ML Equinox 800 value to the NM Legend value is viewing the glass as half empty, if you're Minelab that is.  Comparing it to the Deus 2 ("glass half full") and the price increase still seems like a bargain.

[phrunt]

Even the T2 Classic has secretly jumped up from $499 USD to $599 USD.

https://www.tekneticsdirect.com/products/detectors/teknetics-t2-classic#hikashop_show_tabular_description

The Simplex is the same detector with more features for only about $250 USD, including waterproofing.  Hard to justify such a price increase on the T2.  It becomes even more unrealistic they are charging $899 USD for the T2 with Boost and Cache mode, the same detector as the $499 T2 Classic with different firmware installed on it, incredible.

https://www.tekneticsdirect.com/products/detectors/t2-ltd

If it wasn't for the complete lies in the marketing they'd probably sell absolutely none of them.

The T²Ltd is unmatched by any other detector in its price range for gold prospecting, coin shooting and relic hunting. Its legendary performance is renowned worldwide. It has been a dominant player in the gold fields and has won prestigious relic hunting awards for a number of years. Find out for yourself why the best relic and gold hunters in the world use the T²Ltd. Put yourself in the elite class and move up to the T²Ltd!

[midalake]

On 3/27/2022 at 12:06 PM, ☠ Cipher said:

The Equinox now also has competition from XP with the Deus II. Contact the right dealer and you could have a Deus II for as low as $1450-$1500. Buy an Equinox 800 at $1000 and you may have to invest another couple hundred to address build issues.

I don't know many land hunters that had to address Equinox build issues? 

But beach hunters have had to address build issues on the Equinox.
Deus 2 beach hunters will have to address build issues too. 

Maybe Minelab is increasing their price due to their own crappy build issues of coil ears and drowned pods. Looks like the consumer is paying for that!