PBH / Colombia / Forums (active) Travelguide Cheap hostels Pictures

Comparing prices of office stuff in Colombia vs. Amazon.com

Living in Colombia isn’t always as cheap as you might think: some things are more expensive than they might be in the USA. I went to Panamericana, a large office-type store today, which is supposed to be pretty cheap, and wanted to compare the prices of regular things with prices on Amazon.com. (All Amazon items have free shipping with a Prime membership.)

Here we go:

Wii: 700,000 COP (363 US$) Amazon.com: $199 Almost double!
LG 37 inch LCD TV: 1,700,000 (882 US$) Amazon.com: $550
LG 22 inch LCD TV: 800,000 (417 US$) Amazon.com: $277
Sony 32 inch LCD TV: 1,500,000 (778 US$) Amazon.com: $439
Any “For Dummies” book: 40,000 COP (20 US$) Amazon.com: around 15$.
Lego Power Miners box (8959): 90,000 COP (46 US$) Amazon.com: 19$ More than double!
HP Printer/copy paper standard pack (500 sheets): 10,000 (5 US$) Amazon.com: 3$
Acrylic paint 700g: 9700 COP (5 US$) Amazon.com: 1liter 5$
Pencils (12 pack): 10,000 COP (5 US$) Amazon.com: 15$ for a pack with 96 pencils.

Notes:

For the TV models, I choose the cheapest version on Amazon, so the comparison may not be 100%.

Conclusions:

Things like the Wii are MUCH cheaper in the US.
Lego’s are MUCH cheaper in the US.
TV’s used to be much cheaper in the US, and still are cheaper, but I’m not sure the comparison is 100% on (since I didn’t note down the exact models).
Amazon is always a great deal for books.
There are some awesome deals on Amazon (like the pencils) that you won’t find anywhere else.
A lot of basic stuff costs about the same (like the paint) in the US as in Colombia. I think that’s to be expected, with globalization and all. Still, in relative terms (compared with income), these items must be expensive for Colombians.
Good gifts to bring from the US for kids are legos and Wiis ;)

By Peter (Moderator) (Trustee board) (Dev team) on Oct 26, 2009, 06:34 in Friendly Talkzone.

Escape Artist says on Oct 26, 2009, 06:50:

F.Y.I. Office Depot is opening two stores in Poblado this week or next. It will be interesting to see the price differences between Office Depot's in the USA vs. Colombia

0 funny, 0 helpful.

BUSHWICK-BILL says on Oct 26, 2009, 06:50:

Thank you very much for this post. My friend Peter. I buyed the last week a camera (Kodak) for 400.000 pesos. I found a US website where you can get the same camera for 149 USD (285.000 pesos). But I prefer to pay a little bit moren then to have contact with people from thug country US and A.

CARDIFF SOUL CREW.......

0 funny, 0 helpful.

Miguel_Clavo says on Oct 26, 2009, 06:53:

BB...you pride yourself on being a thug, and call the USA a thug country....does that mean you really wish to be in the USA?

RVW orderded me to remove my tagline congratulating the PBH Mods New Golden Boys. Lame.

0 funny, 0 helpful.

Escape Artist says on Oct 26, 2009, 06:56:

Would it be possible to stay "on topic' at least once on this site, especially in one of the creators threads?

0 funny, 1 helpful.

BUSHWICK-BILL says on Oct 26, 2009, 06:59:

I agree with you Escape Artists.

cameras are a lot cheaper in the usa. But if you let them ship to Colombia you pay till 400 USD tax for impuestos......

I plan to import a "pop corn" machine:

Somebody has any idea how much they cost? They are from the US and A... Sundays and on celebration day I will got sell PopCorn at La Septimba or Plaza Bolivar.

CARDIFF SOUL CREW.......

0 funny, 0 helpful.

Miguel_Clavo says on Oct 26, 2009, 07:03:

Yes, Maam Escape Artist....Assistant Moderator, Maam..........

BB....look at www.costco.com ......they have them there.......but its from a Thug Company.....they look nice but a friend bought one.....more cosmetic than functional.

RVW orderded me to remove my tagline congratulating the PBH Mods New Golden Boys. Lame.

0 funny, 0 helpful.

pedro (☼Travelguide writer) says on Oct 26, 2009, 07:06:

Very true, Peter.

My contact lenses cost $50 (95,000 pesos) for 6 pairs when quoted on websites in the US. In Medellin they cost 240,000.

In Cartagena they sell hairdryers that are supposedly brand name, but are clearly Chinese copies. They sell that shite for more than twice the price of what a decent one would cost in the US.

People can bitch all they want about the big stores like Carrefour, HomeCenter etc. For me, they are dragging Colombia into the 21st century by taking the slack out of the supply chain.

Peter, are you back in Colombia right now?

"this may seem a strange post but it is not...when in colombia men need to be aware that colombia women may try to be seductive and entice a travelling gringo to have sex with them..to be forewarned is to be forearmed..." -- pow wow

0 funny, 0 helpful.

Miguel_Clavo says on Oct 26, 2009, 07:11:

Pedro, you are correct about Cartagena.....the highest prices for the crappiest quality in all of Colombia.

RVW orderded me to remove my tagline congratulating the PBH Mods New Golden Boys. Lame.

0 funny, 0 helpful.

kingfish5515 says on Oct 26, 2009, 07:25:

My opinion on this matter is that Colombia and other latin countries charge a lot of import tax because they cant collect income tax from citizens as do first world countries. The citizens are a captive audience as far as buying goods, and almost all exept food and a few locally made items must be imported. Food, coffee and other in country manufactured items seem to be cheaper than the usa. Since I have never bought a car in Col, I wonder if the Renualts are cheaper as they have an assembly factory there. Sure are a lot of Renaults on the road and I dont think there would be if they were not cheaper than the jap/ korean cars. But I would assume the parts to build them with are imported and may have a tax on them, but possibly lower or exempt. So, my thinking is that the people may not pay income tax but get screwed anyway when they purchase all the things one needs to live exept food ect. This is a good subject to investigate and I wish there were more threads like this about the things we face living there vs all the stupid argumentative crap that goes on here. mi dos pesos!! KF

0 funny, 0 helpful.

Peter (Moderator) (Trustee board) (Dev team) (☼Travelguide writer) says on Oct 26, 2009, 07:29:

I think part of the reason is simple market efficiency: the US represents a huge market, and thus a lot of stuff in the US is incredibly cheap (clothes, food, goods, ...). Remember they are the country that have Wallmart. If you are a large company, you can sell large quantities of goods in the US and so you can keep prices very cheap. Everything is optimized, from import taxes (through often rather unfair international treaties), to internal transport etc. The only thing that's expensive in the US is manpower, but they've spend the last 100 years optimizing that away.

In Colombia, probably only 5 or 10% of the population would go to stores like the one I mentioned, so it's a really small market. That plus import taxes that you mentioned means they have to sell things much more expensively. It's funny: the poor pay more for the same goods.

Poor but snappy

0 funny, 0 helpful.

theflatline says on Oct 26, 2009, 09:36:

Renault and VW were vying to have a plant in Colombia at one point in time, and Renault paid the biggest bribe. They were there long before the Japanese and Korean cars, that is why you see so many.

Legaleez for Complete Morons - A book for gringos in Colombia for who think they understand the nature of the law in a country where they cannot speak the language.

0 funny, 0 helpful.

teeo9111 says on Oct 26, 2009, 09:45:

Peter is spot on about this. Purchasing power and much lower import taxes in most instances brings lower prices in the USA.

0 funny, 0 helpful.

larryrn says on Oct 26, 2009, 10:13:

LG is about the same price here. The TV might be 500 bucks in the US but shipping and taxes to bring it here would be another 250-300 dollars - and the TV here would have no warranty. Buying a LG here comes with a 3 year on site warranty. Your American TV (purchased in the US) has no warranty here - plus will not work when Colombia goes high def since Colombia will be on the European standards.

Your Source for Nursing CEUs - www.RN.ORG - www.RNCE.US - www.EnfermeriaSite.com - www.Enfermeria.US

0 funny, 0 helpful.

gamm2 (☼Travelguide writer) says on Oct 27, 2009, 15:05:

I heard a rumor that Best Buy is opening across from Unilago in Bogotá.... I wonder what that would mean for electronics prices....

0 funny, 0 helpful.

theflatline says on Oct 27, 2009, 15:08:

Best Buy is super expensive in the states if you are buying parts or memory.

Legaleez for Complete Morons - A book for gringos in Colombia for who think they understand the nature of the law in a country where they cannot speak the language.

0 funny, 0 helpful.

La_Huella says on Oct 27, 2009, 18:24:

Panamericana is super expensive here... did you look at the corner papeleria??

0 funny, 0 helpful.

kramer says on Oct 27, 2009, 21:35:

I live part time in Asia and Colombia, and visit the USA twice yearly in-between. Colombia is the most expensive place to buy "stuff", by far.

And I still can't figure out why restaurants are so expensive in Colombia. One would think that lower labor costs would come into the picture for Colombian restaurants, which would be far less affected by high import taxes on manufactured goods, but they really don't.

Also, if taxes are higher in some sectors (import taxes, VAT on purchases), one would expect them to be lower in other sectors (like income taxes on workers), but that does not really seem to be the case in Colombia either.

My best guess is simply that the commercial sector was not able to develop in Colombia due to the internal wars in the 80s and 90s and early 2000s. There continue to be high taxes to fund the government to maintain security, there are high private security costs for businesses due to high crime levels and foreign investment is only now coming around now that the country-wide security picture has brightened. There is also an immature banking sector that desperately needs more foreign competition and I think this holds back both foreign and domestic business.

I have spent a lot of time in many developing countries. The culture in Colombia seems to be more advanced than the economic situation -- people are more educated, more worldly, have better attitudes about work than one would expect (believe me, compared to the Philippines, it is like night and day!). This also leads me to believe that the wars are really behind this and it gives me hope that things may change for the better, eventually . . .

Kramer

0 funny, 0 helpful.