Best back to School deals on all the tech goodies you may need!

Back to School time!!

Sorry kids, but the silver lining? You might get some new tech out of all that learning!

Back to School sales are on! Here’s some deals we spotted for you guys!!

To start with, Apple has its 2019 Back to School deal – they’ll give students a free pair of Beats headphones (Beats Studio 3, Beats Solo 3, or BeatsX) when they buy an eligible Apple device.

If buying an iPad Pro or iPad, students can choose from either free BeatsX, free Beats Solo 3 Wireless, or a $199 credit against the purchase of Beats Studio 3.

To qualify for free Beats Studio 3 headphones, education customers can purchase any any iMac, iMac Pro, MacBook Pro, or MacBook Air.

This deal sits alongside the usual education discounts, whereby students can buy Apple hardware at 5-10% below the normal retail prices.

You can get your hands on the deal if you’re a K-12 employee, higher-education faculty, or students attending higher education institutions.

What else?

At Best buy: Students save up to $300 on select laptops, including MacBook Air. 

AND, you can save on chromeBooks at Amazon, as well as Apple AirPods with Charging Case (Latest Model) for $144.99 down from $15, and while you’re there, get a shiny new Apple iPad (Wi-Fi, 32GB) – Space Gray (Latest Model) for $249 ($80 off list price) or go large with a Apple iPad (Wi-Fi, 128GB) – Space Gray (Latest Model) for $329 ( down $100).

Let’s get to shopping, ammirite?

No more Bose

So we’ve been hearing about how Bose is now the official sponsor of the NFL, and how players have been banned from wearing any competitor headphones (such as Beats) on camera, how Colin Kaepernick and others have ignored that rule and how Beats has gotten a ton of cheap press for it all.

What you may not have heard is that not long after Beats was acquired by Apple, Bose actually filed a patent claim against Beats focusing on their ‘improper use’ of it’s noise cancellation technology. This case was settled out of court.

And now it seems like this tech company beef might not going away any time soon.

Apple has now officially stopped stocking Bose products for sale online or in-store. It kinda makes sense not to stock a direct competitor, however they do still stock other similar competitor’s brands such as Urbanears, Bang & Olufsen and Sennheiser. Seems like Beats might be wanting to stick around in their press limelight for a little longer and… wait for it… silence Bose. No way Bose…ay!

We’re here all week!

Another NFL player got caught wearing beats!

Beats Headphones have been getting the best marketing in their life in the past few weeks, all thanks to Bose. Say whaat? Yup, you heard us. See, Beats have sponsorship with some of the heavyweight players in the NFL such as Cam Newton and Colin Kaepernick, however with Bose becoming the official sponsor of the entire NFL, this has caused some conflict.

Conflict, which, whilst perhaps costing Beats some cash to the tune of a couple of tens of thousands of dollars has also bought them some great PR.

The NFL, after signing with Bose, has said that they would fine every NFL player that was seen wearing Beats headphones on camera during training camps, practice before, during, and 90 minutes after any game.

Colin Kaepernick has already broken their rule and been fined $10,000 for wearing a pink pair (for breast cancer awareness) after a game a few weeks ago. It has been unclear as to whether Beats or Kaepernick himself picked up the tab for that one, but we know what we would have done if we were Beats. (Picked up the tab.)

More recently Cam Newton was also seen wearing beats on camera during pre-game warm ups in Cincinnati. It hasn’t been concluded if Newton has been fined or not, but there’s certainly been a lot about it in the press.

If he was fined, and if Beats did cover it, we think $20,000 is a pretty cheap price tag for them to pay to have international press coverage WITH  controversy over players breaking the rules in order to wear their brand.

Fun Fact: Michael Jordan was fined $5,000 for each game he played whilst wearing Air Jordans, but he wore them every game, and the fine reached $410,000 for the season while his salary was $610,000 per season at the time. BUT he didn’t care – because Air Jordan’s picked up the TAB believing, rightly, that the money was well worth the press coverage of both the controversy and seeing Michael play in the shoes.

BAM Marketing lesson!