Samsung introduced the Galaxy Gear smartwatch with great fanfare in Berlin, Germany, on September 4, 2013,. It was Samsung’s opportunity to prove once and for all that it is not simply a copycat of Apple. Initial expectations were high.
As critics got hold of the smartwatch, they almost universally panned it. The chorus of negative criticisms got the loudest when New York Times columnist, David Pogue (Pogue has since left the Times) eloquently chimed in, “Nobody will buy this watch, and nobody should.”
In spite of a marketing push by Samsung, Galaxy Gear by all reports appeared to be a failure. As an example, on November 18, 2013, BusinessKorea reported, “this product has cumulative sales under 50,000, with daily sales of only 800-900 units. These low sales values for the Galaxy Gear are far below the initial expectations of the industry.”
On October 25, 2013, Geek.com reported, “Samsung has found that more than 30% of Galaxy Gear purchases are returned in Best Buy BBY -0.18%locations, and they have asked that Samsung employees on site help try to figure out why this is.”
Yesterday was a shocker when Samsung announced that it had sold 800,000 Galaxy Gear smartwatches in about two months. So much for reading the tea leaves from media reports and the wisdom of well-known critics! More surprising was a statement by Samsung that Galaxy Gear sales had exceeded its own internal expectations.
Samsung now plans to increase promotions for the smartwatch during the holiday selling season…Read more at Forbes