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Refurb IBM on Ebay

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9 Jul 2003

My ThinkPad A20m is a great laptop, but the screen is starting to go. I get strange pink spots on portions of the screen now and then, and yesterday the screen started to flicker on and off. So it’s time to start thinking about a new laptop. This is my third ThinkPad, and I’m insanely happy with them, so unless I switch to a PowerBook, I’ll probably buy another ThinkPad.

I popped over to Ebay to see what sort of deals were available there, and I discovered that IBM leasing sells on Ebay. They have returned and refurbished laptops desktops and servers for sale at pretty decent prices. You can save several hundred buy buying this way, and most of the laptops seem to have larger hard drives and more RAM than is normally included with new ThinkPads.

It’s a smart example of a company using alternate sales channels to reduce inventory, increase profits. They are taking advantage of their brand and sales expertise to move the products. The auction listings are beautifuly designed and have significantly more information in them than the average Ebay listing. As a result, the prices they are getting are slightly higher than similar Ebay items.

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