HomePod Mini Magical Price Puts Apple in the Smart Speaker Game
Welcome to the smart home race, Apple
My excitement built as Apple ticked off the new HomePod mini’s features. Small, portable size, excellent acoustics, Siri smarts, intercom, and even the ability to pair up two HomePod minis for home-filling sound.
The Magic 8-Ball-esque design already has its detractors, but perhaps that design departure is a signal that this was not just a mini HomePod. As Apple execs described it, the HomePod mini sounded smarter and, perhaps, more accessible than the audiophile-friendly $300 HomePod Apple released in 2018 (for $349). As of 2019, the HomePod accounted for less than 5% of the smart speaker market.
However, in order to compete with Amazon and its ever-expanding array of Echo devices, Apple would have to do something it’s generally shied away from: make it affordable.
The right price
15 years ago, during the launch of the $199 4 GB iPod mini, Apple founder Steve Jobs called $199 “the magic price point” as if a sub-$200 price was secret password for every consumer wallet. That may have been true back then, but not now and not with Amazon Echo Dots and Google Nest Minis selling for $49 or less.
