Business as usual yields nothing unusual
They call it “pay per view”, something like a superstore charging shoppers for no more than a bottle of milk because the buyer does not have to pay the price of the whole cow that produces the creamy stuff along with the beef, bones, hides and manure.
Good people, MultiChoice Malawi has feted Malawians with good news for the first time in many years.
Not long ago, the company, which commemorates its 20th anniversary this year, seemed to have mastered the art of traumatising lovers of digital satellite television (DStv) with endless price increments.
In the client’s eyes, the company was almost akin to skyrocketing prices raining like Fools’ Day jokes.
In a culture where April 1 is a day to quip and send beloved friends and relatives into easy laughs, there has not been many pleasant titbits coming from the DStv dealers who appeared to have hijacked the day of silly jokes to fool people into paying more for a service that is becoming increasingly unattainable due to worsening power blackouts.
This is why DStv customers will never forget April 1 2016.
This year, the brains at MultiChoice broke the tradition and let the day of small things pass without announcing any price adjustment. This was good.
But the better news arrived on Tuesday when the firm gathered reporters at Atmosphere Grill and Lounge in Mandala, Blantyre, and dropped the unexpected.
This is it: They have slashed subscription prices of Premium bouquet to K55 600 from K61 000. Compact Plus is down to K35 700 from K42 000. Its smaller cousin, Compact, has plunged to K22 300 down from K23 800. Equally trimmed is the Family affair which now costs K12 700 from K16 700.
To DStv viewers who need every penny to survive the prevailing economic hardship, this means more change. Thumbs up for sparing a thought for the constrained customers!
To millionaires, billionaires and trillionnaires, the savings resulting from this good news from the high-end dealer of pay TV solutions could be a pittance. However, the tycoons are not in majority here.
MultiChoice’s is a no mean decision in an economy where prices of goods jetted off to the other side of the sky the day the kwacha stopped floating and learned to fly like Neil Armstrong’s spaceship.
Think about the runaway currency and whisper: “Please come down to earth, we miss you!”
Only if the currency remembers its way back to the good ole days it used to stand shoulder to shoulder with the US dollar will Malawians’ right to complain about what resembles Jamaican reggae star Ijahman Levi’s high-price crisis be deemed worthwhile.
Meanwhile, the fall of subscription fees have already sparked some murmurs: the price cuts are certainly good, but are they good enough? This is the question better tackled by the company which tags its prices in dollars.
For now, it is exciting that the DStv partners have committed to start doing business as usual.
With more TV service providers, the long-serving MultiChoice cannot expect an extraordinary edge over its competitors by doing business as it used to when it was a monopoly in the pay TV sector.
MultiChoice marketing manager Chimwemwe Nyirenda says “Business Unusual” is all about more channels, better content and affordable prices.
This is the yearning of Malawians dying for ultimate indoor entertainment. But one more thing: in their reasoning, doing business the new way also includes billing the viewers only for the channels they watch.
They call it “pay per view”, something like a superstore charging shoppers for no more than a bottle of milk because the buyer does not have to pay the price of the whole cow that produces the creamy stuff along with the beef, bones, hides and manure.
As power supply worsens and home economics do not add up, DStv users plainly want MultiChoice to stop billing them as usual. n
