Is the K5 selling more than Pentax expected?

It seems a lot of shops are OOS. I wonder is that because they only keep few in stock or the demand is really high.

As a retailer you won't want to tie up capital in expensive, slow moving, lines if you can help it. The manufacturer needs to put the effort in to produce high quality goods that everyone wants, in which case retailers will stock them.

I see the occasional small Pentax advert; I see Nikon all the time. In the camera market if you can get them young with a great P&S, or superb entry level DSLR you've probably got them for life.

I think shops keep fairly low stocks these days and the stain issues haven't helped as all the new stock was going to replace faulty units up until recently.

Still think it has been a good seller for Pentax even with all the issues.

I see over on the other forum that Pentax have permanently reduced the price of the K5 in the US by $100, and there's an additional $300 instant rebate off the already reduced price until the end of November.

Wonder why?

Maybe Ricoh/Pentax have a new model for October.

Maybe demand is now tailing off and they want to catch the second wave of buyers.

Maybe it's just time for a reduction as the camera is coming up for it's first birthday.

Maybe its because Nikon have recently reduced the price of the D7000.


Maybe I have too much time on my hands.

As I said on another thread Pentax France are hinting at a new model, though if they stick true to form it won't be a K-5 replacement but a K-r replacement.
I think maybe it is just time to lower the price - it is a year since the K-5 was announced, and the initial rush has died down, so drop the price and get the doubters hooked, before the next one comes out next year.

My local shop had no stock yesterday, reported that sales had been strong in last month or so. They did have a LTD edition K5 at £1,299, will wait for srs tomorrow .

Davex.