On the 14^th May 2014 Statistics New Zealand reported that there had been a rise in retail spending in the first quarter of 2014. In this report Statistics New Zealand said that after adjusting for seasonal effects, the volume of retail trade sales rose 0.7 percent in the March 2014 quarter following a rise of 1.4 percent the previous quarter. (more…)

Treat Mum This Mother’s Day

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If you haven’t already heard of Vend, you will hear a lot about them this year. This cloud-based point of sale retail software company was launched in Auckland, New Zealand in 2010 and is set to be the next XERO type success story. With a recent investment round raising a huge $25 million of new capital Vend is now set to open offices in London later this year, with future expansion plans across Europe.

In a world where we’re bombarded with media coverage about diets and healthy living, we wondered if a lot of people have started to move away from buying Easter eggs, and instead choosing to buy Easter presents for family and friends?

Traditionally, families and friends have come together during this religious holiday to exchange Easter eggs and Easter hampers with such family-oriented fun activities as a traditional Easter egg hunt for the children etc. With an increased desire to keep ourselves and our children healthy,  many people are now opting for Easter presents instead of chocolate Easter eggs and hot-cross buns with lashings of butter etc.

A new outfit, new shoes, a game, a toy, a family DVD, something for the garden or even money – what gifts do you give at Easter?

To help you choose your Easter presents PriceMe has put together a selection of interesting Easter present ideas:

Gifts for her:    https://www.priceme.co.nz/Gifts-for-Her/c-1741.aspx

Gifts for him:    https://www.priceme.co.nz/Gifts-for-Men/c-1156.aspx

Experiences:    https://www.priceme.co.nz/Experiences/c-2128.aspx

Easter Gifts for Teens and Adults:

Easter Island Board Game

https://www.priceme.co.nz/Easter-Island/p-887401596.aspx

See more teen and adult board games: https://www.priceme.co.nz/Teen-Adult-Boardgames/c-2874.aspx

Easter Gifts for Kids:

Book – Peter Rabbit Easter Egg Hunt

https://www.priceme.co.nz/Penguin-Books-Peter-Rabbit-Easter-Egg-Hunt/p-886626649.aspx

Easter Cookie Cutter Set

https://www.priceme.co.nz/Wilton-6-Piece-Mini-Metal-Easter-Cookie-Cutter-Set/p-887682344.aspx

Fischer Price Mattel Little People Easter Egg

https://www.priceme.co.nz/Fisher-Price-Mattel-Little-People-Blue-Easter-Egg/p-886769514.aspx

Dora’s Easter Adventure DVD

https://www.priceme.co.nz/Dora-s-Easter-Adventure-DVD-GD10040/p-888552130.aspx

See all animation DVDs: https://www.priceme.co.nz/Animation-DVDs/c-52.aspx

Peppa Pigs Easter Egg Hunt Book

https://www.priceme.co.nz/Ladybird-Peppa-Pig-Peppa-s-Easter-Egg-Hunt/p-887584934.aspx

See all books: https://www.priceme.co.nz/Other-Books/c-73.aspx

Check out the most popular products right now, read reviews and compare prices on PriceMe to find the ideal Easter presents for your friends and family www.priceme.co.nz

Canon has consistently been one of the most popular brands on PriceMe over the years, and is beloved by Kiwis. 2012 has been a busy year for Canon so far and the launch of new digital camera models seems to accelerate. Here’s a summary of recent and planned product launches:
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The latest Samsung phablet, the Galaxy Note 3, has just been released.

Early reviews suggests that it lives up to expectations: it’s slimmer (just 8.3mm), larger and more capable than its predecessor the Samsung Galaxy Note II. The third generation Note’s screen is equipped with an a 5.7-inch HD screen, and the design looks really impressive. New features include a 13 Mega pixel camera and an upgraded pen.

The long-awaited iPhone 5S can now be pre-ordered on PriceMe. Currently only Top End Electronics takes pre-orders.

The question for many consumers right now is whether to wait for the iPhone 5S phone or to go with the existing iPhone 5. The iPhone 5S is rumoured to launch at the end of September.

The wait is over – we’ve just launched the latest version of our popular PriceMe iPhone app to help you find those great deals and useful shopping information on the run.

The new app has loads of new user-friendly features and a fresh user-interface. Just like the previous PriceMe iPhone app, the updated version is still free and is available from the iTunes App Store.

New features include easy-to-use product filters for finding exactly the right product, maps to help locate nearest stores and their distances and informative product reviews and specs. There’s also easy bookmarking

Our user survey just finished, and great thanks to everyone that responded. You’re all helping us to improve  PriceMe. (more…)

Here’s a great chance to win a shopping voucher worth $250 from The Warehouse.

All you have to do is to participate in our annual user survey, so please check your inbox (for registered users only). The survey includes questions about online shopping preferences and behaviour and ends on the 7th of June.

Many users have requested us to offer comparison on mobile plans, especially for mobile phones. Here’s a first version of the new plans sub-section that we recently launched: (more…)

The Samsung Galaxy 4 smartphone was announced yesterday in the US by Samsung’s president.

Consumer’s worldwide have shown great interest in Samsung’s next flagshsip model. Samsung also promoted the announcement heavily this time, and that seems to have worked really well.

So what do we know about the S4? Here’s a summary of the most talked about features:

– Larger dislay (5 inch compared to S3’s 4.8 inch screen)
– Eye-tracking software. For example, the S4 detects when you’re looking at the screen, and will pause a video for example if you look away. How cool is that?
– 13 Megapixel Camera. Many of the popular cameras on PriceMe have less resolution (MPs).

The Samsung Galaxy phones are very popular at the moment among PriceMe users. The Samsung Galaxy SIII is the most popular product overall for several months now, and the Samsung Galaxy S2 the third most popular one. Hence, it’s likely that the Galaxy S4 model will join its predecessors when it launches.

The Galaxy S4 will launch  in the second quarter, and it’s believed that it becomes available in New Zealand at the end of June. It should be listed on PriceMe before this date, since parallel importers normally beats offical distributors for product luanches.

How much will it cost?

It’s rumoured that the phone wont undercut the Galaxy S3 model, which currently retails at $659 for the 16GB version on PriceMe.

Online vs the High Street
We all know how convenient online shopping is, but is it true that shopping online can save money too ?

We decided to test this by looking at a selection of the most popular electronic products for Christmas gifts this year, and found that if you purchased all of these gifts (total cost = $5,195) you would have saved almost $1,000 (18%) by shopping online !

Given that an average saving of nearly 20% can be achieved for many products just by checking online before hitting the shops, we’re amazed that anyone goes to shops anymore !

See below a few of this year’s popular products that we selected.
Logitech Wireless Bluetooth BoomboxSpeakersBest Price – elive – $226.40 (includes shipping)Average High Street Price – $299.99Online saving – $73.59Buy online: https://www.priceme.co.nz/Logitech-Wireless-Bluetooth-Boombox/p-886094938.aspx

Microsoft Xbox 360Game ConsolesBest Price – Mighty Ape – $373.89 (includes shipping)Average High Street Price – $399.00Online saving – $25.11Buy online: https://www.priceme.co.nz/Microsoft-Xbox-360-with-4GB-Kinect/p-886420020.aspx

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Samsung Galaxy Note GT-N8010 16GBTablet PCBest Price – IT Express – $715.84 (includes shipping)Average High Street Price – $799.00Online saving – $83.16Buy online: https://www.priceme.co.nz/Samsung-GT-N8010-Galaxy-Note-10-1in-Wifi-16GB/p-886781595.aspx

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Sony Bravia KDL40BX450 40inLCD TVBest Price – IT Express – $677.35 (includes shipping)Average High Street Price – $849.00Online saving – $171.65Buy online: https://www.priceme.co.nz/Sony-Bravia-KDL40BX450-40in/p-886168219.aspx

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Apple iPad 3 Wifi 16GBTablet PCBest Price
-Mobile Station
-$636.00 (includes shipping)Average High Street Price
-$779.00Online saving
-$143.00
Buy online: https://www.priceme.co.nz/Apple-iPad-3-Wifi-16GB/p-886182368.aspx

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Apple iPod Touch 5th Gen 32GBMP3 PlayerBest Price – Dick Smith – $374.00 (includes shipping)Average High Street Price – $459.00Online saving – $85.00Buy online: https://www.priceme.co.nz/Apple-iPod-Touch-5th-Gen-32GB/p-884271610.aspx

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Apple MacBook ProLaptopsBest Price – Expert Infotech – $1586.00 (includes shipping)Average High Street Price – $1899.00Online saving – $313.00Buy online: https://www.priceme.co.nz/Apple-MacBook-Pro-MD101X-A-2-5GHz-500GB-13-3in/p-886571215.aspx

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Canon EOS 1100DDigital CameraBest Price – Expert Infotech – $605.95 (includes shipping)Average High Street Price – $649.00Online saving – $43.05Buy online: https://www.priceme.co.nz/Canon-EOS-1100D/p-884785963.aspx

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Logitech Wireless Bluetooth Boombox -Speakers
Best Price – elive: $226.40 (includes shipping)
Average High Street Price: $299.99
Online saving: $73.59
Buy online: https://www.priceme.co.nz/Logitech-Wireless-Bluetooth-Boombox/p-886094938.aspx

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Microsoft Xbox 360
Game Consoles
Best Price – Mighty Ape: $373.89 (includes shipping)
Average High Street Price: $399.00
Online saving: $25.11
Buy online: https://www.priceme.co.nz/Microsoft-Xbox-360-with-4GB-Kinect/p-886420020.aspx

PriceMe.co.nz is all about empowering the consumer with information so that they can buy online with confidence. Here our top 10 ways to stay safe when shopping online this Christmas: (more…)

Apple fans in New Zealand and all over the world are excited:  The iPhone 5 has arrived! It hit stores in New Zealand on the 28th of September. We’ve seen a strong interested for the iPhone 5 phone on PriceMe compared to the launch of the iPhone 4S.

PriceMe lists three different iPhone 5 models:

• iPhone 5 16GB – buy from $1,499
• iPhone 5 32GB – buy from $1,699
• iPhone  5 64GB – buy from$1,749

We did it ! We were very excited to be announced last week as a winner in the 2012 Red Herring Asia 100 Award. This prestigious industry award recognises the top 100 private IT/Technology companies in Asia/Pacific each year that display innovation, growth and potential value etc. Thanks to all the PriceMe team who worked hard to make this happen and to our large community of users who support us each day by using PriceMe for their pre-shopping research.  Great effort !

PriceMe has just been announced as one of the five finalists in the 2012 Eset NetGuide Web Awards for Best Shopping Site. These annual “peoples choice” awards are democratically voted on by the public, with the site that receives the most votes becoming the winner of its category.

The winner will be announced at the Eset NetGuide Web Awards on 20th Sept 2012 at the Hilton Hotel in Auckland. (more…)

We’re very pleased to announce that PriceMe has been selected a finalist by the Red Herring’s editorial team, which has evaluated the growth potential and innovation for a large pool of private technology companies accross the Asia business region. (more…)

Congratulations to Andrew Smith for winning the lucky draw prize of a $250 online shopping voucher (courtesy of our friends at The Warehouse) for taking part in the 2012 PriceMe User Survey.

Many thanks Andrew and well done once again.

The PriceMe Team

We have just released our newly developed Android app, and you find it on Google Play

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=PriceMe.Android

The app is ideal if you want to access PriceMe on your Android device. You can find local stores and distances to all the major shops in New Zealand, read expert reviews and search for more than half a million products available online.

We’re looking forward to your feedback.

We released a new version of PriceMe recently. Here are some of the highlight’s: (more…)

We just sent out our Christmas newsletter to retailers. It contains some news and announcements. Please check it out here:
https://www.priceme.co.nz/newsletter/Christmas-2011-Retailer-Newsletter.html

The PriceMe team wishes all retailers and users a Merry Christmas! Thanks all for your support in 2011!

The PriceMe layout has been revamped in the latest 4.2 version released earlier this week. The main change is that we now employ a fixed width layout instead of the liquid one that we previously used. It’s easier to control the layout of fixed width pages, and we can also ensure that the pages look OK on most devices including smartphones. This is basically how PriceMe looked like until May of 2008 (for those of you that have been using PriceMe for a while). There are still a few minor issues with the new layout that we’ll resolve shortly. (more…)

We released a new version of PriceMe.

Product page:
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– Offers from the same retailer grouped together for products that have many retailers.The ‘see all’ link has therefore been removed since it isn’t needed anymore.
– Product page status bar. (more…)

It has been a productive month for the PriceMe development team: yet another version packed with improvements was launched earlier this evening. Here are some of the new features: (more…)