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'''— LB'''
=Many user groups see unprecedented growth coming their way=
If TI knew as much about marketing as it does about making home computers, assembly lines would be turning out the 99/4A today, and when E. F. Hutton talks people would be listening to the advice, "Buy TI."
This viewpoint was universally agreed upon by nine users' group presidents across the country interviewed by Home Computer Compendium.
Both advertising and pricing strategies were criticized as marketing mistakes of TI.
"Some very poor marketing of a very good computer," is the way Diane Kavanaugh, president of the MSP 99 User Group in Minnesota describes it, criticizing TI for "starting the whole price war."
Grayson Hudspeth, president of the Big Sky 99er's Computer Users Group in Montana says TI's biggest mistake was "trying to sell the computer as a game machine against the Commodore, the Vic 20 and the Atari. They weren't trying to point out the features it has as against the Apple or the IBM-PC until recently."
As a result, he notes, "nobody realized the computer was as much a computer as it was."
"Bill Cosby is neat. I like him personally," Bill Mills of the King's 99er User's Group in Hanford, California, says, while criticizing TI's "very, very poor ads" with their game machine orientation. He feels that the machines were not available in enough stores and "when they finally got in enough stores, they went out of business."
In addition to marketing, Ron Kuseski, of the Rocky Mountain 99ers, in the Denver, Colorado, area, feels that TI should have released the specifications on its software, disk operating system and the basic operations of the computer so that third party vendors could build up the computer system.
"I hope that now that TI's out they will release them so other people can keep it going," he says.
TI has been "not very consumer oriented," comments Bob Utter, president of the Central Iowa 99/4A Users Group. "They produce a very good product, they just don't relate well with the product. Most of what they did right was too late."
"That computer is so good, people
can't believe TI is going to do it,"
says Ota Jiroutek, president of
MUNCH in the Worcester, Massachusetts,
area, who comments that
selling the computers for $50 was
"ridiculous."
Don Donlan, president of the Hoosier
Users Group in Indianapolis,
Indiana, says he works with a man
who bought a 99/4A for $25.
By giving rebates and reducing the
computer's price, TI "gave the
image that this was a very cheap
pi·ece of hard.ware," Donlan says.
He suggests that ''instead of discounting
the hardware, TI would
have dcine better discounting some of
its software."
"Reducing the price below $300
was a mistake," comments :R,ik
Papagolos, president of the Tri-S!ate
Users Group. He also believes the
firm "pushed the command module
too heavily," giving the impression
