« Blu-ray Prices Spike, Give Oil A Run For Its Money | Main | iPhone Announcement Reaches Out And "Touches" iPod Prices – And They Go Up »
Saving On Summer Gas With GPS
Electronics | May 21, 08
Oil broke above $134 per barrel today, so this summer you won't want to waste a drop of black gold lost and wondering about. Fortunately, GPS prices are plunging.
Back in December of last year, when oil was only about a hundred bucks a barrel (ah, the good old days) I suggested that both budgetary and ecological imperatives might motivate the use of a GPS unit ("Why Al Gore Should Want You To Buy A GPS").
Since then, oil has continued to rally while the price of many popular automotive GPS devices has only continued to fall. The Garmin Nuvi 650 Personal Travel Assistant I mentioned in that piece was going back then for over $350. It may now be had for well under $250. Garmin's Nuvi 660, currently the most popular auto GPS on PriceSCAN, is going for under $340, a staggering 66% drop since we started tracking it in late 2006.
Time Period: 9/25/2006 through 5/19/2008
Each tick mark represents one week
Red = High Price, Blue = Average Price, Green = Low Price
Similarly, the lowest vendor prices on the Tom Tom One XL, that firm's most popular car model on this site, have also plunged, from around $250 at the time of my blog post (and $400 in April of last year) down to under $190.
Time Period: 4/30/2007 through 5/19/2008
Each tick mark represents one week
Red = High Price, Blue = Average Price, Green = Low Price
With oil up by more than a third since late last year, even hybrid-haters who care not a wit for melting glaciers and drowning polar bears may find themselves impelled to ease their hydrocarbon-based assault on the earth. Knowing where one is going is perhaps one of the easiest ways to save gasoline, and in an era when energy, food and even some tech goods are rising in price (see "Blu-ray Prices Spike, Give Oil A Run For Its Money", "Digital Cameras Capture Picture Of Emerging Inflation?" and "Flat-Screen Prices Still, Well, Flat; Some Even Rise") it's nice to know that one technology is dropping in price that just might help you save gas, and even make the world a slightly better place.
Posted by jeffrey.trester (Permalink)
Trackback Pings
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://blog.pricescan.com/mtsystem/mt-tb.cgi/202
