There was a concerted effort to move folks away from the insanely popular Commodore 64. Commodore had it MADE. For example every mass retailer stocked the C64 and it's expensive amenities ($169 1541 Disk Drive?... in 1980's dollars...).
Their biggest mistake was not having a drop in replacement or "refresh item" or software compatible viable sucessor to the C=64 line. They would have needed more power at the same price, with full compatibility and scalability in terms of software.
The PC had this plus the precieved value. Meanwhile Commodore tried to capture the high end market. I remember teachers and casual consumers were like... "WHAT? That's a commodore, I ain't payin $600 for that" This was what i witnessed in 1987 when one person saw the A500 at software etc. They were amazed at the sound and graphics but they wanted another $150 Commodore.
YET... the same types were cool with buying a horiffic tandy pc clone at Radio Shack, after all it was a PC, I could bring home (free software) from work and school.(rolls eyes).
As painfull to type now as it was to watch back then.
Fast foward to today. Who do we have in the modern mass retail market that had it made only to be in trouble today?
Sony. They had the market leader at a good price point. What did they do? REFRESH with a high priced item that consumers were no prepared for.
Got to hand it to Apple, they overcharge...since the start..that's their story and they're stickin to it. Once you release a low cost item and want to upsell consumers on a higher priced items, well it's always a challenge.
