We may live in a globalized economy, but prices for travel gear - or anything else - are certainly not uniform around the world. (Good thing, cause otherwise my World's Cheapest Destinations book would cease to exist.
Every once in a while the Wall Street Journal runs a column called Arbitrage where they look at retail prices around the world for various items. Last week it was a pair of Kids Cayman Crocs shoes, bright yellow. After prices were converted to U.S. dollars from the local currency, here is how much they were in various spots.
Tokyo - $24.46
Shanghai - $26.29
New York - $29.33
Manila - $32.75
Sydney - $36.17
Bangkok - $41.32
Seoul - $42.47
Frankfurt - $41.27
London - $41.93
Paris - $48.22
Several interesting ironies here. The Crocs are not cheapest in the place where the company is based (U.S.) or where they are made (China). Instead they're the cheapest in a country known for being god-awful expensive: Japan. Although they are certainly not fashionable, they are most expensive in the city of fashion: Paris.
2 comments:
how much does it cost to manufacture them?
Good question, as I'm sure the shipping costs far more than the manufacturing. I've heard though that they have some kind of patented polymer nobody can figure out or copy (yet), which is helping them stay ahead of the knock-off versions.
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