Large flat-panel TVs remain in short supply

I haven't had much to say about flat panel TVs since the Consumer Electronics Show. Why? Well, for one reason, they've been scarce. Today's Wall Street Journal has an article titled Where the TV Bargains Are, which has a very telling comment in it:

I still have no 50-inch plasmas to speak of," says Chet Flynn, president of New Resource Inc., a Massachusetts distributor of high-end TVs and consumer electronics. Inventories of the sets were depleted in December and should remain tight through May, helping mute further price drops, he says.

The panel goes on to note that after a year in which flat panel TV prices fell 50 percent, prices needed time to stabilize. But the real issue is just plain old supply and demand:

Right now, "we're all struggling to bring enough panels into the market," says Bob Scaglione, a senior vice president of marketing at Sharp, the largest seller of liquid-crystal TVs. "Once the new factories open, including ours in the fourth quarter, things will get exciting again from a price perspective."

Fortunately, LG and Panasonic have new plasma manufacturing plants coming on-line in 2006, and Sharp has its own LCD facility starting production this year also. But for the next few months in flat panel TV marketing, the price you see is the price you get.

Technorati Tags: 1080p, 720p, Consumer Electronics, Flat-screen TV, LCD, Marketing, Plasma, TV