I’m usually pretty good at guessing prices for new products, so when I wrote about the forthcoming Suvie last week, I expected the four-zone cooking appliance to come in around a thousand bucks. After all, the cooking box from the founder of Reviewed.com combines a whole bunch of functionality into a single box, including a steam oven, broiler, sous vide device and pasta/rice cooker. To top it all off, the uber-box will have a built in refrigeration compressor to keep food cool.
Based on what I’d learned, my internal price guesstimator pegged the Suvie at between $800-$1000 retail. Certainly high or a countertop cooking appliance, but I didn’t think it was crazy for a first-gen product with lots of functionality. So color me surprised when the price, announced yesterday, will be $599 retail.
If I had to guess, this likely means the pricing for the Kickstarter (Robin Liss, company CEO, indicated the Kickstarter will kick off on Tuesday, February 6th) is probably going to come in around $399-$499. Don’t bank on that though since, as we now know, my internal price guesstimator appears to be on the fritz.
Like another next-gen cooking appliance, Tovala, Suvie likely expects to increase their margins by selling food subscriptions for the box. The Tovala announced recently they will offer a discount of $100 off the full $399 retail for new consumers who commit to four meals, and will price their appliance at $199 for new customers who buy 24 meals.
The June Oven – one of the first smart cooking appliances to ship and a product that does not come with accompanying meal kits – is still priced fairly high at $1,495. If Tovala and Suvie are any indication, it appears companies pairing food delivery with hardware have an opportunity to be more aggressive with pricing since they can make some of it up on the back end.
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