this post was submitted on 30 Jul 2024
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Exactly.
And they sell like hot cakes and are a sustainable market segment full of boutique houses and specialty retailers.
You can absolutely substitute luxury and design for feature innovation in tech accessories and make money.
This is a niche. Logitech doesn't make its billions in revenue selling a handful of specialty keyboards. And that trend will subside soon, too.
Logitech makes money by selling hundreds of millions of generic mice, keyboards, webcams, etc. That's where the money is. And if these devices don't break, why buy new ones? A 20 years old usb mouse is still perfectly usable (I'm using one right now), that's not good for business. So either you have to cater to fads like mechanical keyboards, which don't really add anything, or sell crap like subscriptions.
They already don't break, is the thing. When was the last time you replaced a mouse because it broke?
The last maybe three mice I bought were for ergonomics or to color-coordinate a setup. And once to see if a light one would be better than a tall one for my particular damage. It was not.
So if I'm already buying mice for reasons other than durability, why not sell me the most expensive one you can sell me?
Also, not sure how much of a "niche" mechanical keyboards are, considering that Logitech will happily sell you one right now for 250 bucks. Best selling one in its segment, too. I was eyeing a Corsair one for almost 400 recently. Asus has a refresh for its 500 dollar Azoth Extreme coming up, I believe.
Expensive peripherals may sell fewer units, and I don't know how the margins compare, but 500 dollars is a lot of 20 buck membrane keyboards.