Target Corporation (NYSE: TGT) issued a press release after the closing bell today that is confirming what has gone around the rumor mill for some time. The Kindle ebook reader from Amazon.com (NASDAQ: AMZN) will be sold at Target stores. If you wonder about this being an effort to undercut Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) over its iPad, you guessed it right.
Target will be first brick-and-mortar retailer to carry Amazon’s Kindle. You can bet that it won’t be the last. The Kindle reader will first be available at Target’s flagship downtown Minneapolis store and at 102 stores in southern Florida starting on April 25.
Kindle will then roll out to more and more Target store locations throughout the year. You can already hear Steve Jobs calling up its EMS partners trying to demand more and more iPad production.
Amazon.com has had itself at a disadvantage by not having Kindle out at physical stores. Sure, they want to sell these themselves online through Amazon.com. Meanwhile, more and more competition is coming. Not just from Apple.
The sale price is listed as $259.00, so even if the iPad is cooler, more useful, and in higher demand, the price of the Kindle is effectively half of the starting price of $499 for the base-model iPad.
Let the price wars begin.
JON C. OGG
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