The Product Life Cycle of the Walkman

Paper Summary:

This paper reviews the Sony Walkman product and discusses where the product finds itself in the product life cycle. The paper discusses how advanced age shapes the marketing approach to any item and whether or not the decision on the part of Sony to re-launch the Walkman as the MP3 in 2005 was a good idea. The paper concludes that the Walkman has entered the decline stage and is a tired and rather obsolete brand name hopelessly mired in the early 1980s.

From the Paper:

"Presumably, product placement for the Walkman has also changed drastically as the product embarks upon its final steps before complete obsolescence. For one thing, because profits have dipped so significantly since at least the middle 1990s, there is not exactly a demand for the Walkman in movies or in popular magazines; one can reasonably infer that this was not the case at the start of the 1980s and, indeed, throughout most of that decade. At the same time, it is hard to find an ambitious marketing campaign anywhere which features the walkman prominently. For all intents and purposes, the product survives now as a quaint reminder of a by-gone era."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Sarma, Gopal. (n.d.). Walkman: The 'doomed' tape recorder. From mind to matter: inventions of the twentieth century. Retrieved February 24, 2007 from <http://library.thinkquest.org/21798/data/tqmainsite/walkman/>
• Smith, David. (2006, September 10). Why the iPod is losing its cool. The Observer: UK. Retrieved February 24, 2007 from <http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1869042,00.html>
• Sony Walkman D-NE518CK Personal CD Player. (2007). Shopping.com. Retrieved February 24, 2007 from <http://www.shopping.com/xPO-Sony-D-NE518CK>

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