Where to buy Nikon 18-200mm VR II?

I've been searching for weeks now, and no vendor carries the 18-200mm
Nikkor lens in stock. Ebay is selling it way overpriced! Does anyone
have any leads?

xkinetic wrote:

I've been searching for weeks now, and no vendor carries the 18-200mm
Nikkor lens in stock. Ebay is selling it way overpriced! Does anyone
have any leads?

Buy on ebay or get on a waiting list. Check B&H every morning and if you
see it then buy it immediately. The 18-200 and the D200 are very popular
items and Nikon is having trouble meeting demand.

--
--John
to email, dial "usenet" and validate
(was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)

xkinetic wrote:
I've been searching for weeks now, and no vendor carries the 18-200mm
Nikkor lens in stock. Ebay is selling it way overpriced! Does anyone
have any leads?

I got mine in December from B&H. Just get on the waiting list.

J. Clarke wrote:
xkinetic wrote:

I've been searching for weeks now, and no vendor carries the 18-200mm
Nikkor lens in stock. Ebay is selling it way overpriced! Does anyone
have any leads?

Buy on ebay or get on a waiting list. Check B&H every morning and if you
see it then buy it immediately. The 18-200 and the D200 are very popular
items and Nikon is having trouble meeting demand.


Nikon is either having production troubles or they are intentionally limitting
supply to keep the price point on this lens. At this point, I am beginning to
suspect the latter.

--
Thomas T. Veldhouse
Key Fingerprint: 2DB9 813F F510 82C2 E1AE 34D0 D69D 1EDC D5EC AED1

Thomas T. Veldhouse wrote:

J. Clarke wrote:
xkinetic wrote:

I've been searching for weeks now, and no vendor carries the 18-200mm
Nikkor lens in stock. Ebay is selling it way overpriced! Does anyone
have any leads?

Buy on ebay or get on a waiting list. Check B&H every morning and if you
see it then buy it immediately. The 18-200 and the D200 are very popular
items and Nikon is having trouble meeting demand.


Nikon is either having production troubles or they are intentionally
limitting
supply to keep the price point on this lens. At this point, I am
beginning to suspect the latter.

Or they just plain didn't anticipate the demand. Limiting supply to the
extent that there is a 4 hour period each month in which one can actually
buy it suggests something more than market manipulation--I doubt that the
price would go any lower if you could buy it one day a week all day.

--
--John
to email, dial "usenet" and validate
(was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)

J. Clarke wrote:

Nikon is either having production troubles or they are intentionally
limitting
supply to keep the price point on this lens. At this point, I am
beginning to suspect the latter.

Or they just plain didn't anticipate the demand. Limiting supply to the
extent that there is a 4 hour period each month in which one can actually
buy it suggests something more than market manipulation--I doubt that the
price would go any lower if you could buy it one day a week all day.


That more would be a production problem. I think it is more than anticipating
demand. Unless they make these things by hand, they just don't have an
explanation that I have seen. I am suggesting that if it isn't a production
problem, then it is an intentional limit of supply. I have a tough time
believing that they still have production problems more than seven months
after its release, which leads me to believe that they don't want the demand
satisfied and the price to go down (as happened with the 18-70 ... a known
bargain).

--
Thomas T. Veldhouse
Key Fingerprint: 2DB9 813F F510 82C2 E1AE 34D0 D69D 1EDC D5EC AED1

Bill wrote
(in article ):

Rita Ä Berkowitz wrote:

Nikon is either having production troubles or they are intentionally
limitting supply to keep the price point on this lens. At this
point, I am beginning to suspect the latter.

Yes, Nikon is having a hard time keeping up with world demand. No, Nikon is
*NOT* intentionally limiting supply to artificially inflate the price of
this lens. After talking to the owner of a local photography supply house I
deal with, I sense the problem is Nikon selling in shipping container lots
to the likes of Best Buy, Circuit City, and various other scumbags. This
nonsense is hurting the little shops while the big mega-chains are getting
the pick of the litter.

Funny you should say that since a friend of mine who uses Nikon is still
looking for the 18-200, so I checked and found this info...

US sites:
Bestbuy.com - out of stock
CircuitCity.com - out of stock
BHPhoto - out of stock

CDN sites:
Bestbuy.ca - not listed
TheSourceCC.com - not listed (same as CircuitCity)
Henrys.com - out of stock

sarcasm
Wow you're right...the big mega-chains must be hoarding them so badly
that they don't even want to sell them.
/sarcasm

Perhaps you could point us to a few mega-chains that have them stock?

I finally found one at buydig.com. They got a bunch in, and
they were all sold within 2 hours.

I'm not sure why chains that buy large lots of camera equipment
are 'scumbags' in Rita's book.

--
Randy Howard (2reply remove FOOBAR)
"The power of accurate observation is called cynicism by those
who have not got it." - George Bernard Shaw

In article ,
Randy Howard wrote:

I'm not sure why chains that buy large lots of camera equipment
are 'scumbags' in Rita's book.

Clue for the clueless, they buy these at the lowest dealer net (below
Camera stores and possibly even B&H) Then raise the price to reflect the
MSRP or slightly below thus generating a profit of at least 30% above
net which most Camera stores are forced to charge a 1% profit on all
cameras and lenses so you and others can shop and buy elsewhere.

Next comes employee wages (shall we say more).

I think that says it all whatyathink Rita?

--
Would thou choose to meet a rat eating dragon, or
a dragon, eating rat? The answer of: I am somewhere
in the middle. "Me who is part taoist and part Christian".

Thomas T. Veldhouse wrote:


Nikon is either having production troubles or they are intentionally limitting
supply to keep the price point on this lens. At this point, I am beginning to
suspect the latter.

Nikon says that all their plants are running at full capacity. This
does not bode well for the introduction of any new products, including
the long rumored D90 and D3, not to mention any new lenses. They can't
produce anything new without taking some other very popular item off
the line.

On Mon, 17 Jul 2006 22:35:23 -0400, Bill wrote:

Funny you should say that since a friend of mine who uses Nikon is still
looking for the 18-200, so I checked and found this info...

US sites:
Bestbuy.com - out of stock
CircuitCity.com - out of stock
BHPhoto - out of stock

CDN sites:
Bestbuy.ca - not listed
TheSourceCC.com - not listed (same as CircuitCity)
Henrys.com - out of stock

The camera world is a lot bigger than North America.

Don www.donwiss.com/pictures/ (e-mail link at page bottoms).