If you are in the UK and want to purchase the Supernote A5 X or A6 X, there are currently three places that you can buy from; the official Supernote website, GorillaScribe (now Supernote.EU), or a second-hand unit from websites like eBay.
It is important to understand that unless you are buying second-hand, you should also budget for shipping and taxes.
In this post, I will look at the total costs of buying from Supernote and GorillaScribe. For a fair comparison, I will be looking at the prices of the Supernote A5 X Standard Set (which includes the standard pen and folio).
The calculations on this page were correct at the time of writing, however, you will need to adjust for fluctuations in the currency exchange rates, price changes, and special offers.
Supernote.com
Supernote is based in the US, but its products are shipped from Shanghai, China. They offer worldwide delivery within 5-10 days. Shipping and taxes are included in the total price.
The Supernote A5 X Standard Set costs $514. Shipping is an additional $48 and taxes are an additional $112.40. So that is a total cost of $674.40. When converted into GBP, that is a total cost of £560.85
TOTAL COST OF BUYING FROM SUPERNOTE.COM: £560.85
GorillaScribe
GorillaScribe (now Supernote.EU) is based in France and is Supernote’s authorised distributor for Europe. Shipping is included in the total cost, however, taxes are not. They do not give an estimated shipping time. Taxes will need to be paid separately, usually through the courier (DHL).
The Supernote A5 X Standard Set costs €562.50 and shipping is free. VAT will be calculated at 20%, which brings the total cost to €675. In GBP, this is £594.47.
TOTAL COST OF BUYING FROM GORILLASCRIBE: £594.47
Summary
So, at the time of writing, buying from the official Supernote website works out to be less expensive than buying from their EU distributor. However, because GorillaScribe is based in France, and they carry their own stock, there is a good chance that delivery times will be shorter than buying from Supernote, which ships from China.
As mentioned above, it is worth keeping an eye on currency exchange rates because fluctuations in the value of the Euro and US Dollar could swing prices up and down.
About the author
Dan Dutton is passionate about E-ink writing tablets, which bring together the pleasure of writing on paper with the power of digital technology. When he bought his first tablet, he realised that there wasn't a lot of unbiased information available for people that were considering buying an E-ink tablet, and so he built eWritable.
If you buy from supernote isn’t UK VAT also applied on import, on top of the US sales tax? Which would make it more expensive than gorilla scribe?
Looking back at the invoice from when I bought a Supernote A5X from Supernote in the US, it cost me $674USD, of which $112.40 was itemised as Tax (Products + Shipping) (I’m assuming this is the UK 20% VAT rate, although I’m happy to be corrected)
