Apple wants to buy your old iPad

Jeremy Hobson: Well forget the new iPad. What about the old one that some people just forked over hundreds of dollars to buy?

Here’s Marketplace’s Jennifer Collins.

Jennifer Collins: Apple is offering in some cases more than $300 to people who turn in their old iPads. Roger Kay of Endpoint Technologies says that’s designed to lure people who think the new device sounds cool.

Roger Kay: But in some sense, it’s not a quantum difference in experience. And so someone who has an existing one might say, yeah, I’d like a nicer picture, but I’m OK with this one.

The new iPad will run you at least $500. Creative Strategies analyst Tim Bajarin says the store credits give Apple a way to reward returning customers without going down market.

Tim Bajarin: Apple really doesn’t do discounting. No, it’s a loyalty credit, absolutely.

Bajarin says Apple will refurbish the old iPads and may resell them in places like China, South American and Africa where new iPads are extremely expensive. 

Bajarin: But if you take these refurbished ones, it introduces another layer of the population in these other countries.

And potentially creates even more loyal Apple fans.

I’m Jennifer Collins for Marketplace.